About London
“ When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life;
for there is in London all that life can afford.”- Samuel Johnson
Alan was born in Wales but was raised in Peckham, South London. Metok came to study in the UK in 2004 and even missed London when she worked in New York. They now live at Elephant & Castle in South East London. London is the centre of the universe, well at least for us! As one of the world’s busiest financial and cultural centres, it draws from a range of peoples and cultures. London contains four World Heritage sites: The Tower of London, The Kew Gardens, Greenwich, and the site of Palaces of Westminster, Westminster’s Abbey, and St. Margaret’s Church.
London's vast urban area is divided into 32 London boroughs with names such as Bloomsbury. These are either informal designations, or reflect the names of superseded villages, parishes and city wards. The City of London is one of the world's three largest financial centres (alongside New York and Tokyo) with a dominant role in several international financial markets. It also has the world's largest insurance market, the leading exchange for dealing in non-precious metals, the largest spot gold and gold lending markets, the largest ship broking market, and more foreign banks and investment houses than any other centre. London's new financial and commercial hub is the Docklands area to the east of the City, dominated by the Canary Wharf complex.
The West End is London's main entertainment and shopping district, with locations such as Oxford street, Leicester Square, Covent Garden and Piccadilly Circus. The West London area is known for fashionable and expensive residential areas such as Notting Hill, Knightsbridge, and Chelsea. The eastern region of London contains the East End and East London. The East London area saw much of London's early industrial development; now the sites are being redeveloped for the 2012 Olympics.
London offers many museums and galleries, many of them free such as the Natural History Museum (biology and geology), the Science Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum (fashion and design), British Museum (historical artifacts) British Library (books), National Gallery (art) and the two Tate museums (art)
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