Southgate

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i have become fascinated by Southgate

― gareth (gareth), Saturday, 21 September 2002 10:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Don't be. Full of Thatcherbabies, women who look like they slap the change in their arse pocket in Asda adverts and 1997-era Pizza Express-type expansion.

― suzy (suzy), Saturday, 21 September 2002 10:52 (twenty-two years ago)

it reminds me of finchley. and theres something about the northern overground piccadilly stations that i like. i want a shed in cockfosters. it could be that i'm in one of those moods where i listen to piano magic and dream of rusting ships...

― gareth (gareth), Saturday, 21 September 2002 10:56 (twenty-two years ago)

gareth southgate! do you see!

― jel -- (jel), Saturday, 21 September 2002 11:00 (twenty-two years ago)

more snobbery from Suzy. Southgate is of course so Thatcherite that it kicked out Michael Portillo (then going through his hard-right phase) in 1997.

I know what Gareth means. I like Colindale, and the underground station there is a wonderful thing.

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Saturday, 21 September 2002 13:34 (twenty-two years ago)

The northern outpost for me is Wood Green Underground Station. I've never gone beyond there (in terms of local travel). I don't know Finchley either, although I was once talked into selling Communist newspapers outside a factory there. What is it exactly you like about it Gareth - is it that you still get a whiff of the old, sort of genteel suburbia there (despite the McDonalds, Argos etc.)?

― David (David), Saturday, 21 September 2002 13:52 (twenty-two years ago)

the 1984 by-election there which first returned Portillo to parliament had a candidate running on the platform "Abolish Greater London, Restore Middlesex"!

Labour actually lost their deposit on that occasion, but 13 years on it was the scene of that great moment where David Dimbleby literally couldn't believe what he was saying was true ...

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Saturday, 21 September 2002 14:13 (twenty-two years ago)

erm, sorry I can't talk about anything other than politics (the curse of joining a thread about a place you've never been to!)

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Saturday, 21 September 2002 14:15 (twenty-two years ago)

But that 'bring back Middlesex' thing fits in with the picture of it I'm getting. The Oxford Street 'eat less protein' man (whose name I've forgotten again even though he was discussed on a thread here not long ago) probably lived in a semi in a place like that.

― David (David), Saturday, 21 September 2002 14:25 (twenty-two years ago)

haha David I'm listening to the chart from this week in 1960 as I write, and I can sense EXACTLY what you mean. Suburbia as it was when it was not seen as contradictory or unusual for Tories to be anti-American, quite the opposite in fact.

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Saturday, 21 September 2002 14:35 (twenty-two years ago)

i can't say for sure, i haven't been in ages, but it has cropped in conversation a couple times in the last few days (a couple of friends are looking to move there). there is something about large chunks of north london that appeal in a variety of ways (for example, robin, i don't like northwest london - i could never like colindale)

but, between the high barnet branch of the northern line and the piccadilly line i just like. finchley has emotional connections for me (first place i lived in london - ironically, when i lived there i wanted to be much more central, now i am, but i should have appreciated what i had then a bit more).

palmers green also fascinates me

― gareth (gareth), Saturday, 21 September 2002 16:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Ha ha I live in Southgate, though I have a feeling it is a radically different town than the Southgate you all are speaking of.

― Nicole (Nicole), Saturday, 21 September 2002 16:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Southgate or New Southgate? I have several friends that live in New Southgate, and two of them call it WITS END because they hate it so much.

― kate, Saturday, 21 September 2002 16:48 (twenty-two years ago)

A US Southgate. I suspect there are probably a lot of Southgates in the States because so many places have been named after English towns.

― Nicole (Nicole), Saturday, 21 September 2002 16:55 (twenty-two years ago)

southgate, i don't know new southgate very well, although i did get off at arnos grove once because i wanted to look at something, although i now forget what. also near southgate is oside, i went to osidge library once. cant really remember osidge very well, i was exploring the finchley and barnet environs

― gareth (gareth), Saturday, 21 September 2002 16:57 (twenty-two years ago)

edmonton has a southgate replete with mall. themall has sky lights, with poetry etched on the edges. the neighbourhood is newish, and has students mostly.

― anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 21 September 2002 17:21 (twenty-two years ago)

haha the London Southgate is near to the London Edmonton! All sorts of room for comical confusion! Or possibly not.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 21 September 2002 17:31 (twenty-two years ago)

Los Angeles has a South Gate that's mainly an armpit of a suburb.. but most well known for being home to a PETE ELLIS DODGE car dealership....

"PETE ELLIS DODGE... LONG BEACH FREEWAY... FIRESTONE EXIT... SOUTH GATE!"

― donut bitch (donut), Saturday, 21 September 2002 18:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Having actually been to Southgate, it seems kind of anomalous that Steven Twigg represents it. But then Enfield Southgate, his constituency, is larger than Southgate proper. The 'our age' people who live in Southgate proper are *total* Thatcherbabies - and they voted for New Labour as opposed to Labour (excellent Fabian nonwithstanding).

Robin, it's really boring and reactionary to assume snobbery on my part over somewhere you've never even visited, when I have. I mean, I don't run the theme from The Wicker Man through my head every time you post, right?

― suzy (suzy), Saturday, 21 September 2002 18:58 (twenty-two years ago)

I've lived there Suzy! Can *I* accuse you of snobbery? ;)

― Tom (Groke), Saturday, 21 September 2002 19:15 (twenty-two years ago)

My aunt - retired teacher, v. anti-Thatch - lived there for years too so I've known the area for ages. It's not an exciting area and it's very suburbanised but it's also a lot friendlier than Suzy's descriptions would suggest: a big Cypriot community in that part of town, who always treated us very nicely. It's quiet and it feel safe but not 'safe' in the gated-community/monoculture way that bits of Surrey do, just in a sleepy English way.

― Tom (Groke), Saturday, 21 September 2002 19:20 (twenty-two years ago)

New Labour is still "Labour", Suzy, in the same way that Thatcherism was still "Conservative" even though it wasn't consensual post-war model and it arguably wasn't really conservative at all etc etc. If there's one thing I *really* hate it's hard-left snobbery about places which only swung to the centre-left in 1997 or 2001 - personally I don't care how long area has been Labour or Lib Dem, as long as it's a centre-left MP *now* it's alright by me.

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Saturday, 21 September 2002 19:39 (twenty-two years ago)

"how long area" = "how long an area"

(actually I like living in a Labour marginal that used to be Tory and I'm kind of glad I don't live in a safe Labour seat - you feel like you're closer to the heart of Important National Issues)

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Saturday, 21 September 2002 19:43 (twenty-two years ago)

i am not fascinated by east finchley, this is because i used to live there quite near there so it is less unknown, but east finchley shares some of the characteristics of palmers green and southgate. i like these places. i am turning into the jel of the north

― gareth (gareth), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Why does a Cypriot population make somewhere more friendly? That sounds racialist to me.

― the pinefox, Monday, 30 September 2002 15:11 (twenty-two years ago)

implication of tight knit community, more extended family oriented?

― gareth (gareth), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:15 (twenty-two years ago)

I think my colon was misplaced Pinefox. Southgate was friendlier than the description "Thatcherbabies" would suggest. It had a big Cypriot community who seemed especially friendly. Those two things were linked (i.e. I'm not sure what kind of sense of community it would have had without the Cypriots there), but I wasn't suggesting that this was a general rule and that Cypriots worldwide are naturally friendly.

― Tom (Groke), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:15 (twenty-two years ago)

implication=expats banding together?

― gareth (gareth), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Well I think your first implication was more OTM. i.e. we befriended (or Isabel (who IS naturally friendly) did) the Cypriot lady who ran the newsagent opposite our flats and she would say oh have you been to such-and-such a sandwich shop, my cousin works there, or have you been to this shop, a friend runs it...so we got more of a sense of the community than we would otherwise have.

― Tom (Groke), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:21 (twenty-two years ago)

When I lived in Palmer's Green I was fascinated by all the Greek/Turkish 'social clubs', where blokes (always blokes) would just sit around smoking and playing cards all day long - now that's my idea of social!

Two Cypriot friends of mine were known as the 'bubs' at their school - ie bubble and squeak, greek!

Tom's description of Southgate certainly chimes w/ my experience of Palmer's Green - I'd live there again in a second if it wasn't for the utterly rub transport down that way...

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:26 (twenty-two years ago)

they watch TV also, surely?

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:42 (twenty-two years ago)

I think you've been looking into ppl's living rooms, Mark...

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Monday, 30 September 2002 15:49 (twenty-two years ago)

I think my colon was misplaced

Where's Dan when you need him?

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 30 September 2002 18:44 (twenty-two years ago)

i didn't think southgate was particularly cypriot though, that seems more suburban. if we're going to talk green lanes instead then we need to talk about the turkish football clubs (trabzonspors just up from newington green, actually its not trabzonspor is it, its another one, theres one in stoke newington as well, but now we're getting into different demographics)

queen g not to thread!

― gareth (gareth), Tuesday, 1 October 2002 07:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Greek kids at my school were called "bubbles" too! When they weren't being called "innits".

those social clubs typically have pictures of Greek and Turkish singers in the windows. They almost invariably have net curtains too.

There are a lot of parks on Southgate and Palmers Green. Broomfield Park is particularly pleasant. It has three different duck ponds, a pond specifically intended for model yachts, an aviary, a mini-Kew greenhouse and a crazy golf course. It also had an Elizabethan house which suffered a huge fire in the early eighties....they're still wrangling about what to do with it (restore or demolish) with the consequence that it is just a charred shell encased in plastic sheeting & scaffolding. A plan to save it by tuning it into a pub-restaurant was scotched due to local residents' objections.

Arnos Park is spanned by a huge viaduct which carries the Tube line from Arnos Grove to Southgate station. Grovelands Park (which had its fifteen minutes of fame when Pinochet was a patient at the private hospital in the grounds) has a large pond which was the only place I have ever caught a fish (just one - in a Cub Scout fishing contest when I was ten).

― MarkH (MarkH), Tuesday, 1 October 2002 08:13 (twenty-two years ago)

twenty-two years pass...

Sir Gareth.

― Blake the Messenger (Tom D.), Wednesday, 25 June 2025 06:53 (three days ago)

wow, he'll eventually become the first ever knight of the realm to get turned down for a League 1 managerial vacancy he has interviewed for.

― vodkaitamin effrtvescent (calzino), Wednesday, 25 June 2025 07:02 (three days ago)

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/reward-failure

― Blake the Messenger (Tom D.), Wednesday, 25 June 2025 07:13 (three days ago)

I moved to Southgate in the year this thread started. We kept going outwards in N London until we found a place we could afford a house, and we've been here ever since. It has plenty of things that are useful when you have small children - schools, parks, libraries, doctors, swimming pool, public transport, 24hr supermarket - but not much else, and now our children are adults and have moved away we realise there is little to keep us here.

It is handy for the M25, which makes driving out of London easier.

― fetter, Wednesday, 25 June 2025 07:30 (three days ago)

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