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'Cockney London' - where would YOU take tourists? |
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#1 |
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Join Date: Jun 2007
Posts: 1,585
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'Cockney London' - where would YOU take tourists?
Just thinking about this 'Cockney London' tour idea, where would you take tourists if you had to sell them a bus tour? It's just struck me that East London has changed so much from the 'Pearly Kings' etc that it would probably be quite hard to provide a good tour, retro Cockney or otherwise.... So really the idea was on a bit of a hiding to nothing. As far as I could make out, all they could think of was a pearly kings and jellied eels! Then Stella just appeared to get lost around Commercial Road.
I think I would have driven to Bow (the Bow bells), perhaps talk about the work of the suffragettes in East London, take them to the pub where Jack 'the Hat' McVitie was shot by the Krays, take them to Whitechapel and gore it up with the locations of the Ripper murders, organise for a platter of Indian food to be served on the bus when they are around Brick Lane, yes, probably take them to Tubby Isaacs! and Limehouse to talk about the opium dens and the literary scene, and perhaps talk about Canary Wharf and the Docklands regeneration, although it's fairly uninteresting really. I'm just not too sure that the 'real London' they wanted to 'sell' existed. |
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#2 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: LFLF Research Div
Posts: 49,392
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Quote:
Just thinking about this 'Cockney London' tour idea, where would you take tourists if you had to sell them a bus tour? It's just struck me that East London has changed so much from the 'Pearly Kings' etc that it would probably be quite hard to provide a good tour, retro Cockney or otherwise.... So really the idea was on a bit of a hiding to nothing. As far as I could make out, all they could think of was a pearly kings and jellied eels! Then Stella just appeared to get lost around Commercial Road.
I think I would have driven to Bow (the Bow bells), perhaps talk about the work of the suffragettes in East London, take them to the pub where Jack 'the Hat' McVitie was shot by the Krays, take them to Whitechapel and gore it up with the locations of the Ripper murders, organise for a platter of Indian food to be served on the bus when they are around Brick Lane, yes, probably take them to Tubby Isaacs! and Limehouse to talk about the opium dens and the literary scene, and perhaps talk about Canary Wharf and the Docklands regeneration, although it's fairly uninteresting really. I'm just not too sure that the 'real London' they wanted to 'sell' existed.
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#3 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 34,226
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Quote:
Just thinking about this 'Cockney London' tour idea, where would you take tourists if you had to sell them a bus tour? It's just struck me that East London has changed so much from the 'Pearly Kings' etc that it would probably be quite hard to provide a good tour, retro Cockney or otherwise.... So really the idea was on a bit of a hiding to nothing. As far as I could make out, all they could think of was a pearly kings and jellied eels! Then Stella just appeared to get lost around Commercial Road.
I think I would have driven to Bow (the Bow bells), perhaps talk about the work of the suffragettes in East London, take them to the pub where Jack 'the Hat' McVitie was shot by the Krays, take them to Whitechapel and gore it up with the locations of the Ripper murders, organise for a platter of Indian food to be served on the bus when they are around Brick Lane, yes, probably take them to Tubby Isaacs! and Limehouse to talk about the opium dens and the literary scene, and perhaps talk about Canary Wharf and the Docklands regeneration, although it's fairly uninteresting really. I'm just not too sure that the 'real London' they wanted to 'sell' existed. |
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#4 |
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Inactive Member
Join Date: Aug 2010
Posts: 2,193
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Don't most original cockneys live in Dagenham now?
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#5 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Jun 2007
Posts: 1,585
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Thats about it I should think. The Luftwaffe, slum clearance and redevelopment of docklands accounted for most of the rest?
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#6 |
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Join Date: Jun 2007
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Quote:
Don't most original cockneys live in Dagenham now?
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#7 |
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Join Date: Jun 2007
Posts: 1,585
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Hi lucky, staying with your Real London theme, would be easy enough to do once it was researched properly re what life was like, say 200 years ago. Then get your tourists to dress up in style of those times, which would add the right atmosphere.
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#8 |
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Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: LFLF Research Div
Posts: 49,392
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I'd be a bit reluctant to make tourists dress up, but I suppose it would be one way to get them into the spirit (unlike Stella's 'Knees up Mother Brown'!)
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#9 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Nov 2010
Posts: 197
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Well LS said Bond street.
He was right on the mark. They should have taken them to where they know best. |
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#10 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: London
Posts: 7,314
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Hi lucky, if you posted your placard saying your tour was London Past, which included a costume shop where clothes of those times could be got, then I'm sure the tourists would be keen to take part. Then you pile the tourists onto a charabanc or two, and off you go. Thing is this sort of Tour would be something new to them, which they would tell all their friends and family when they got home to wherever, and your name is made.
![]() I think I would have done London Crime instead of Cockney London. As well as "The Kray's Manor" you also have The Clink near London Bridge, which is an museum and recreation of the underground debtors prison. The London Dungeon, The Old Bailey, The Tower of London, Westminster Bridge (I think people were hung from that). This was actually one of the easiest tasks. As any tour guide knows, you have the freedom to bullshit in your job. As long as it sounds plausable and you look like you know what you are talking about you can get away with saying pretty much anything. |
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#11 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: Somewhere in the UK
Posts: 6,493
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The set of EastEnders? Corrie does tours. Does EE?
I'd do a Dickensian tour. Inns of Court. St Paul's. Mudbanks of the Thames. But that's probably just me. Though it gives great scope for dressing up! |
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#12 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: East London
Posts: 25,846
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Bow Bells are in St Mary Le Bow - in the city.
But apart from that you're right, most of what you referred to was actually all on, or just near, the Mile End Road. So perhaps a trip down the Mile End Road to Stratford to see the Olympic site may have been a good idea. |
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#13 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Homerton, London, E9
Posts: 1,742
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I wouldn't have bothered with the Cockneys, I would have done Kensington, Chelsea, Knightsbridge and surrounding areas.
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