Camden

“All the anarchists live here,” my friend says, as we make our way through crowds of tattooed, pierced Londoners in front of shops and pubs.

“This is where me and Kelly are planning on living,” she says and laughs, leading us to an area which used to contain horse stables, but now has cheap thrift stores and food vendors. A familiar smell hits my nostrils and I immediately begin salivating.

“We’re near Indian food. Good Indian food,” I say.

“Right over here,” she continues heading down a slope to a vendor’s shop and getting a plate of rice, vegetable curry and chicken curry. I take a bite and my taste buds do a double take. This can’t be real. London has been the closest to having provided me with delicious Indian food outside of my mom’s kitchen. Honestly, delicious doesn’t do it justice. 

I think the first minute in this video might do the trick:

We walk over and sit by a canal, enjoying the view. In every school (middle school, high school, whichever) there's a group of maybe 6-10 edgy goth kids that keep to themselves. Dyed hair, studs, lots of eye-makeup, you know what I'm talking about. Some of them decided to come to a borough in London and thrive, attracting others like them to come and live here too. That is Camden.

It’s calm and busy simultaneously. It’s grungy and crowded and amazing. Just when I think I have a grasp on understanding London, when the feeling of newness becomes a feeling of familiarity, I encounter things so new that I feel like it’s my first day here.

That, I think, is what draws me to this city so much—there’s always change, always new.