Krazy Krystal's Laboratory

On the other side of the world..

I live within the walls of the city.. check out this map, the arrow points to my place!

My street name is Walmgate, and there are many other similarly named streets within the town.. among them: Stonegate, Coppergate, Gillygate and my personal favourite, Whip-ma-whop-ma-gate. Contrary to popular belief "gate" doesn't mean a gate where you enter or exit, as it is from the Viking word "gata" meaning street. The actual entrances and exits to the city through the walls are not called gates at all, but "Bars". I walk through Walmgate Bar on my way to work each morning.. but I have never seen anyone serving drinks..

So gates are streets and bars are gates.. confused yet? It gets worse...

The shop names here are equally confounding.. "Office" sells shoes, whereas "Boots" is a chemist. "Selfridges" has nothing to do with whitegoods, it's a department store as is "Woolworths" which is not a supermarket. I live near a "MacDonalds" which sells furniture. Go figure.

To further highlight shopping confusion, the Brits still use 1 and 2 pence coins. So buying something for 88p can require up to six different sized and shaped metal pieces *sigh*

Not that I'm complaining mind you, it's a very lovely and beautiful place, steeped in history and all that other pamphlet propaganda... but it really is the other side of the world.

posted by Dr Krystal @ 12:43 pm