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Some years ago, visiting London with my daughters aged about 8 and 12, we were in Brixton one day. I asked them if they noticed anything particular about the neighbourhood, compared to other parts of the city. They couldn't come up with anything.

Two thirds of everyone (shoppers, shop staff, police, etc) were black, and they hadn't noticed.

It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II

by eurogreen on Tue Jun 16th, 2015 at 04:17:57 AM EST
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I had that experience when I was about 14 or so. Headed to London on a school trip from Dublin. We left our hotel in one of the cheaper parts of the city early in the morning, and I discovered my classmates were gaping at the passers by, astonished. I couldn't figure out why.

It was early morning down a side street, so the crowd was mainly non-white immigrants on their way to work. I hadn't noticed anything unusual: I'd moved to Dublin from London five years before. Some of the less travelled others probably hadn't ever seen a black close up: Dublin was very white thirty (Eeek!) years ago.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue Jun 16th, 2015 at 05:19:12 AM EST
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Recently my father recounted a memory from our first and only visit to London when I was 6. We arrived on a day when all shops were closed but we had no food, so the whole family went on a walk looking for something open. We found a building with an open entrance resembling a supermarket's, but it turned out to be a church. Just as we would have left, a hundred people streamed in for mass, all black. They were just as startled to see the bunch of shabby-clothed whites as my father at seeing them.

I have no memory of this, although I remember much more details from London than my father.

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.

by DoDo on Tue Jun 16th, 2015 at 03:42:53 PM EST
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