There is much derision by those who don’t live in the capital at the fact that not many people in London know their neighbours, as if it is a bad thing and that without the camaraderie of the old East End, you can’t have a fulfilling experience in your ‘community’. I have only briefly seen any of my neighbours in the six-apartment block we all share, perched precariously at the corner of two main roads, with a Nando’s, a McDonald’s and a Pizza Hut within spitting distance. My neighbours’ main contribution to my life is via pollution, be it noise or air or otherwise.
The flat directly below me seems to have changed occupancy in the last two or three months. The deafening silence of my days and nights have now been replaced by thuds, bumps and beats, sometimes not starting until midnight and going on through the early hours. No genre of music is left untouched: dubstep, dance, rap, R&B, classical, TV themes and even the lambada have all, at one time or another, filtered ‘gently’ through my floor, making my furniture shake and sending a not entirely unpleasurable vibration through my couch and up my spine. Read More…