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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

London Childhood

237 replies

daisiessunflowersandtulips · 04/08/2012 14:57

In Laws are adamant we should move out of London when the baby's born. Apparently it isn't a "good environment to bring up children in". which they wouldn't know because they never bloody visit. I am Hmm to this because I grew up in London alright, but they seem to think I was terribly deprived.

Here are the things I missed out on (and which my in-laws always bring up)
-playing in the street. Neither I, siblings, friends, cousins, ANYONE I know who grew up in our parts of London (leafy zones 2-4) ever did this.
-knowing who our neighbours were. Well we knew who the ones on either side were and they didn't have kids. We didn't know any of the other kids to say hello to and frankly that was fine by me.

Here are the things we got
-being allowed to get ourselves to and from school at a younger age than DP and his siblings and other friends outside London because schools comparatively closer, roads busy in a suburban sort of way with traffic lights not an A-road busy way.
-going to wonderful parks to play, Heath, Golders Hill, Clissold Park, etc. Parents came with when we were younger and then we could go by ourselves.
-being able to go to and from friends houses independently by 9 or 10 if if were short walking distance or 11-12 if it were longer walk or bus by ourselves and not have to hang around getting lifts
-loads of museums, cinemas, art galleries with kids stuff on

Now London might not be to everyones taste and I TOTALLY get that. But you're telling me it's worse than some pissy town in the middle of nowhere with no transport links to bring up a child? Seriously?

OP posts:
AmberLeaf · 05/08/2012 15:09

however, I do think it would be so painful as a mum to deal with the pressure of gangs on my children, particularly if I had Black sons on and around certain estates in certain areas of London - I know from our students how hard it is to avoid any involvement. Their influence on our young is a growing problem which needs to be addressed

As a mum of black sons living in a certain area in south east london I have to say its really not something that causes me much concern.

Being male, black and from london doesn't automatically mean you are or are likely to be in a gang.

Having parents that don't or can't care for you properly are generally why boys get into gangs and being black doesn't mean that's how you are brought up.

Visiting family in the country my son was asked by a local teen if hed ever stabbed anyone

ChopstheDuck · 05/08/2012 15:10

I lived I'm croydon for a year and loved it. Was bang in the middle of it all, two mins to what is now a tube, 3 mins to tram and buses outsides my door. Restaurants on my road from a huge range of countries, grocers where I could get a vast array of fruit and veg at rock bottom prices. I lvoed the multiculturalism and vibrancy. My white children see in the minority rather than my mixed race twins, and my daughter picked up Tamil at school and played at Indian weddings. We didn't have a garden, but we would drive to battersea park at the weekends and have bbqs. It was brilliant.

We moved though, because of the schools, mainly. I really miss it, and would live in the city like a shot if it wasn't for the kids. Despite all the lovely things, it was t safe for them really. At night there were frequent shootings, and during the day the traffic was dangerous. My 7 year old can walk to the library here. I do hate though, having to drive everywhere, and even the kids have to be driven to activities whereas my oldest would prob now be getting buses if we still lived in the city.

GetOrfMoiRing · 05/08/2012 15:13

I am the product of a west-country small town upbringing and I cannot say boo to a goose.

Literally. I was chased by one up a farm lane and they terrify the life out of me to this day. I am convinced the bastards have teeth.

Aboutlastnight · 05/08/2012 15:18

Have to admit though I grew up in sarf east London, I come from a long generation of Londoners but 8 years ago DP and I decided to move 400 miles away.

Not because of schools ( there are good and bad schools like anywhere else) or gangs etc

But because London is such bloody hard work. I love visiting with the kids though.

ClueLessFirstTime · 05/08/2012 15:19

getorf geese have sharp toothlike thingies in their beaks. I give them a wide bearth even though (because?) I grew up with them in the garden.

GetOrfMoiRing · 05/08/2012 15:23

Christ I have been convinced all these years that I imagined it, and gave geese archaeopteryx type qualities which they didn't deserve. Grin

MaryHansack · 05/08/2012 15:24

because London is such bloody hard work.
that is a good point

AmberLeaf · 05/08/2012 15:27

Life in london is as hard or easy as you want it to be IMO!

Geese deffo have teethy beaks. One 'got me' when I was little.

Horrible spiteful creatures!

motherinferior · 05/08/2012 15:27

I grew up in Norwich (shudder) in the 1970s when anyone from further away than Cromer was a suspicious forriner, and my Indian mother was racially harrassed out of the school where she taught. Now that was hard work.

JumpingThroughHoops · 05/08/2012 15:29

Last summers riots will not have made London look particularly good to outsiders.

London: Secret Squirrel Club

bigTillyMint · 05/08/2012 15:30

How is London bloody hard work? Genuine question.

GetOrfMoiRing · 05/08/2012 15:31

Why is London hard work? Genuine question.

I would have thought it would be easier to live in London (if you work there) than live out of the city and spending your life commuting in.

GetOrfMoiRing · 05/08/2012 15:31

x posts tilly Grin

bigTillyMint · 05/08/2012 15:34

Great minds Wink

SunAtLast · 05/08/2012 15:41

We loved London and had we had the £500k necessary for a family home with garden we would have stayed.

We now live in the leafy suburbs and I must say it was a good move for us. We still have London on our doorstep for museums theatre etc but we also love the smaller community aspect and the green belt space, country parks, accessible motorway etc

LadyClariceCannockMonty · 05/08/2012 15:43

Ruby, possibly Grin, although I don't know about the 'air of a lady'. In my neighborhood I am most likely to be spotted sloping out for a paper/sandwich in my work-from-home rags outfit of leggings and one of a selection of voluminous old tunic tops.

I HAVE lived out of London ? spent my childhood in villages and suburbs ? and have had a much better time of it since moving to a city (Glasgow first and then the Smoke).

Village/suburban life was for me a Morrissey-style gloomy perma-Sunday. No jobs, nothing to do, no one knew their neighbours because everyone went everywhere by car, words like 'darkie' and worse were commonly used, casual homophobia and xenophobia were rife, an innocent enquiry about a copy of the Guardian in the paper shop caused raised eyebrows and gossip ...

Come to think of it, when I go there now to visit family it is still like that ...

Give me a city any time, even with the ignorant comments you have to contend with along the lines of 'Ooooh, how do you cope with all those bombs?' Hmm, 'Ooooh, the pace of life would be too much for me' (like no one ever strolls round the park or sits on the sofa in a city), 'guns, stabbings, gangs, blah blah recycled Daily Mail horseshite' ad infinitum.

Aboutlastnight · 05/08/2012 15:45

When I lived in London I had a regular commute from Crystal Palace to Upper Street. If I never see the northern line again it will be too soon. I would frequently end up in a state of panic and rage as tubes were cancelled, tubes too crowded to board, tube strikes, bomb alerts etc

Even a shopping trip to buy new clothes would avoid done sort of transport nightmare. Then on a sunny bank holiday you ah decide to go to the seaside for the day just like the other 16 million Londoners - and spend two hours on Purley Way. Then another two hours stucka on M25 on way back. But thank God you are not trying to get to Gatwivk like all the other poor bastards nose to tail opposite...

That is why London is hard work.

In Glasgow people get tetchy if they are stuck for two minutes on the Kingstn Bridge Grin

saintlyjimjams · 05/08/2012 15:45

We moved out of London when the kids were small and would never go back. But a) I never particularly like living in London b) nor did dh c) we love open spaces - the sea and the moors (all of which is in short supply in London); I feel suffocated in London d) ds1 in particular needs wide open spaces with very few people e) didn't particularly like commuting. Now ok that means we need to avoid the beach on sunny days at the moment and head to the moors instead, but from September - June the place is his.

But it's horses for courses isn't it. There's no right or wrong overall.

MaryHansack · 05/08/2012 15:46

Why is London hard work? Genuine question
ooh the Northern line in rush hour, stuff like that....

MaryHansack · 05/08/2012 15:47

x post about northern line, Grin

Aboutlastnight · 05/08/2012 15:49

The Northern Line just about sums it up Grin

PigletJohn · 05/08/2012 15:55

London is not a place. It is a lot of places which are close together, and some of them are contiguous.

GetOrfMoiRing · 05/08/2012 15:59

lol at the northern line. I would have thought it would be the circle line which would finish people off. Grin

Aboutlastnight · 05/08/2012 16:04

I had a particular hatred of the central line too especially in high summer when the suffocating heat ( and stench of eye wateringly expensive aftershave) made you feel like you were going to keel over.

And the moment the tube stops in a tunnel and you can feel the tension rise as it gets nearer to 9am.
( I can whinge for Great Britain, am still a Londoner at heart)