Dalston-Dubai

I'd read about the new Dalston Superstore from Dubai so on Saturday night I was itching to go. It went like this... 10 mins walk in pouring rain... 10 mins queue in pouring rain...£5 entry fee...10 mins queue for a drink...generic electro hoxton music...kids too cool for school...leave. Such a shame. I spoke before about the gentrification of Dalston and it seems the city boys are pushing the shoreditch crowd up the Kingsland road, but where do the Dalstonites go... not to Stoke Newington surely!

The answer is Barden's Boudoir. Loud and unappologetically dirty, live drums and guitars and a girl screeming down the microphone without any reference to the beat. She bounces around with the other girl guitarist and then they both take their tops off and bounce around until the set finishes- weird, arty, fun and live, how a night out in Dalston should be.
The perfect way to end my Dalston visit.

George and Niall moved into their new flat today. A new build apartment block right on the Junction. Its all glass and brick, not quite the mega-structures I see in Dubai, more Northern European, possibly Scandinavian design. White walls, floor to ceiling glass windows, balcony overlooking the leafy city. Its so much smaller than in Dubai, understated, sophisticated but fun and relaxed. They are almost on the top floor- the 9th and that makes me think of our apartment on the 24th floor and how your ears pop when you go up in the lift. Another thing that hits me is the smell of new carpet- a smell I didn't realise I hadn't smelt in a long time but there you go. I feel nostalgia for my apartment in Dubai, the sunshine and the sandy coloured buildings, the view of the sea and the noise from the building work. I feel appreciation for both, if only Dubai had more parks and trees... if only I could afford my own brand new flat! We crack open a can of beer and toast the new place. Well done G&N, such a happy new home.

Out and about around Ridley Road market and the Junction Sainsbury's, surrounded by music and shouting of massive Caribbean women kissing their teeth as they stroll oh so slowly along Kingsland Road. The queue at the pound shop, the begger at the cash-point, the wig shops and nail bars, the roadworks and dirty hoardings, the gnarly pigeons... what a symphony! I breath in the bus fumes and the dirt as the sun shines and I'm home!

OK so we've known this for over a year now but the secret is out - Dalston has been lauded by the Guardian, that barometer of the cultural zeitgeist, as the coolest place in Britain.  Highlighting nightspots such as Disco Bloodbath and the newly-opened Dalston Superstore (Barden's Boudoir is so 2006, people), the newspaper hails it as being "like the lower east side of Manhattan in the late Nineties", and the perfect antidote to Shoreditch's overpriced cocktail bars and member's clubs. Read the full article here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/apr/27/dalston-cool-london-suburb