10 things....

[ukdane]

Someone (actually it's two girls) at work is planning on visiting the UK in late September, and have asked me for some ideas of things to do and see in and around London.

Idealy they would like to do NON-touristy things, so your challenge if you dare to accept it is to come up with "10 non-touristy things for a tourist to do in September, in and around London".

Thanks.


(I could only come up with 3 ideas and they were all tourist things: visit Gerrard's Street, "do" the London-eye, and see "The Lion King" musical. Oh, and the obviuos visit a pub! Can you come up with anything better?)  

[Mr C]

Get pissed in Hyde Park.
Visit the Zoo.
Kick one of those gaurd blokes in the goolies and run off laughing.

[House of Usher]

Kick one of those guard blokes in the goolies and run off laughing.

Too touristy.

[chimpanzor]

Sit in and watch the telly.

[Conexus]

Talk Danish very loudly and slow to evey annoying Londoner you bump into (work cut out for you there)

[House of Usher]

1) Go to an un-promising looking pub and stay there all day while sunny weather and the touristy sights and sounds of London pass you by outside.

2) Use a public lavatory not located in a railway station.

3) Go to the cinema and see a film you could see absolutely anywhere else in the UK, or Europe for that matter (while sunny weather and the touristy sights and sounds of London pass you by outside).

4) Wander round inside St. Martin's in-the-field instead of visiting St. Paul's or Westminster Abbey. I don't know what you'll see inside. I've only ever been in St. Paul's.

5) Sit in the park and read a book. All of it, from cover to cover.

6) Paddle in the Thames.

7) Walk everywhere. Do not be tempted by the underground system. It only exists to do a cut-and-paste job that joins up all the tourist attractions leaving out all the authentic geography and historical street plan of London in between.

8) Arrange a meeting with your MP so you can lobby him/her concerning an issue important to you as one of their constituents.

9) Have your photograph taken outside the London headquarters of each of the three main political parties.

10) Spend an afternoon in Games Workshop playing Warhammer or the Lord of the Rings equivalent. I presume it's possible to do this in London just as in the provinces, and that absolutely everything in shop doesn't have to be kept under lock and key to stop cockerney chimney sweeps and street urchins mooching off with it. ("'ere Fagin: these sausages are mouldy!").

[ukdane]

Ok,
Anyone got anything sensible to add?

[Quirkafleeg]

"Shut 'up and drink yeah gin!"

Buy the Rough Guide to London...

[Art]

Garlic and Shots on Frith Street always seems to be a winner. The Tate Modern, of course. And the Jack The Ripper tour,  a walk round some interetsing bits of the east end which now has the added benefit of a really good view of the Space Gerkin.

[House of Usher]

I say just give in and do the touristy things. But Gary's suggestion of buying the Rough Guide is sound advice (I bet it mentions about visiting St. Martins in-the-field and getting out of the underground to see which attractions you can join up by walking between them, though).

[+rufus+]

Tell em to go to 'Lounge Lover', (not far from Liverpool St Tube)a great cocktail bar, book a table though,it's popular.
  Go to a gig, 12 Bar Club,Metro Bar,Buffalo Bar,Borderline etc. Plenty to choose from,and there's so many good bands at the moment.
Go to the Record/CD/Book /Clothes exhange chain in Notting Hill(right next to tube). Great selection of designer and unusual stuff and it's open 7 days a week til eight.
 Have a great bangladeshi meal for under a tenner on Brick Lane(I recommend Le Taj, unlicensed,but you can BYO,and no corkage!),after go to 93 feet East or similiar.
:-) R

[Max Kon]

tell them not to go to the lion king. it is absoluty shit. They will come out with headaches as the sound systems are turned up so loud. Sadly arsenic and old lace is not still on at th strand as it was ace. It had kramer in it.

[DavidXBrunt]

The Natural History Museum is an utterly fantastic place. Just great.

[LARF]

It's impossible Dane, London is just one huuuuge touristy thang, what you ought to say is things that are not considered touristy but are a bit off the beaten track, so to speak. It may be a good idea to ask them what type of things they like doing i.e. clubbing, strip clubs, art galleries, films etc. etc.

[+rufus+]

And if they're 21 I'm sure we can arrange personal escorts...:-) R