Woking a Shithole?

Woking a Shithole?

One man’s pride in his home town

Brought to you in Stereophonicless real air sound

Unless you happen to be listening to the Stereophonics

Are you sitting comfortably, you can always skip to the end or just check out the Wikipedia page, an universal motto that can and probably should be applied to most things in life.

Woking is my hometown, and is also home to many other excuse my modesty amazing things, such as the Shan Jahan Mosque, which is the first ever mosque to be built in England, this was meant to be my first unique selling point about Woking as it’s a nice historical tit-bit, unfortunately you may wrongly ,wrong in the sense that you’re a bad human being, have come to the conclusion that this would mean Woking has a higher than average Asian population, or as my friend Joey who incidentally is “training”, to be a marine would put it,

“I don’t want to go out in Woking it’s full of paki’s”

For shame Joey for shame, he was 13 when he said that, so maybe you can cut him a bit of slack, I’m not sure, and I’d definitely have been more inclined to lean towards Joeys messages if they were more hippie friendly if you know what I mean but then again I don’t think Joey would be ideal Marine material if he was walking around in Birkenstocks spreading messages of peace and love.

So if you yourself are not fond of Asians I recommend you stay clear of Woking. Or better yet never leave your front door.

One resident from the Woking ward of Maybury, who would especially tell you to keep clear, is my good mate Spinky(wot) he used to constantly refer to his home town as Delhi, which although wrong is quite clever, Delhi being the capital of India.

Although I think all you freaky Asian haters if any of you are still out there should look on the bright side. I know from experience that in Woking one is never too far away from friendly people and many a friendly shop which sells Rizla and beer. Who doesn’t like friendly people, or beer, or Rizla, I’m guessing grumpy people.

Of course if your modern enough to love and embrace all walks of life, all colours and creeds, then welcome to Woking, come head on down, if I’m about, and we happen to meet, I’ll buy you a pint, you can even check out the Mosque, which is actually quite lucky to still be standing.

Not only did it survive both world wars, but as of September the 11th it survived two attempts at being burnt down.

September the 11th by the way was the first day I experienced one of those where were you on the day moments,

I’ll always remember I had just started my first real job, I say real job because being a paper boy just doesn’t cut the mustard,

especially the way I did the round, sorry No.33 Lavender road,

anyhow 9\11 as well as being a great global tragedy was a day in which the fate of one particular budgie was sealed and by some merry co-incidence (Yahtzee hippo) was the day I begun working for Pets at Home.

Another famous where were you moment is when president Kennedy was assassinated, I can’t join in this one because I wasn’t even born, unless reincarnation is the ticket in which case, who knows, maybe I was the third gunmen on the grassy knoll,

As I was saying, after September 11th the Shan Jahan Mosque was the victim of two attempts at being burnt down, and that it still stands today is testament to the fact that I failed in my mission both times,

alas,

but at the nearby Pets at Home superstore (Lion Retail Park- Woking) you can find some burnt out store posters and the melted bin of boredom.

The Shah Jahan Mosque (also known as Woking Mosque) is not the first mosque to be built in Britain it is the first purpose-built mosque to be built in Britain.

Built in 1889 it comes a close second in the race to build the first Mosque in Britain narrowly losing out on the gold medal to Quilliams Liverpool mosque

The mosque was actually built by an orientalist; I love that word, an orientalist named Dr Gottlieb Wilhelm Leitner. He was born of Jewish parents in Pest, Hungary.

Some friends and I took the word and turned it into our very own “orienmentalist”, which you yourself can now use in phrases such as “watch out the washing machine is about to hit oriemental”

Pets at home Woking used to sell a lot more products then it does now, for example plastic tubs of locusts at 20p a go,

in the wrong hands these locust's could be turned into a deadly Halloween trick, an affordable one too, for as little as a pound, notorious non treat givers such as No. 33 Lavender Road, could have their houses subjected to the eighth on the list of biblical plagues,

I used to love doing my paper round after that Halloween, with the friendly chirp of locust chatter springing forth to greet me from every bush, hedge and shrubbery.



Woking is also home to Horsell common made particularly famous by the Martian invasion that begun there,

I’m going to take the time now to reassure you that by the best of my knowledge I am not an alien, on the other hand there was this funny time I was messing about with my nephew Henry(4) when I called him a smelly egg and he retaliated by saying,

“You’re an alien”,

This immediately made me think, good comeback kid, so who knows maybe he’s onto something.

Anyhow it wasn’t really the imaginary aliens’ landing that makes Horsell common, one of the most un-common commons around it was good old H.G.

H.G Wells once lived in Woking and you can even visit his house, but he doesn’t live there anymore.

Don’t worry you can console yourself of this fact by venturing to Weatherspoons to enjoy a Pint, but while there don’t look down, unless you fancy a big trip.

The carpet at Woking’s Weatherspoons, is just as accomplished as any drugs legal or otherwise at producing some startling chemical reactions in the brain,

the beers not so bad either, well it’s cheap and that’s the main thing.

On the wall is a button that when pushed will allow you to travel in time, hard to believe I know but I assure you very true and definitely handy when last orders come round.

Horsell Common alone without any of the War of the Worlds madness really is most beautiful.

There on a clear night, in the milky way, you can see the stars make a lions face appear in the sky, if you’re lucky the stars may even dance for you, they did for me once, and when I listened carefully it was as almost as if they were calling me home,

anyway enough of this E.T flat-trap I fancy some Greek mythology.

In nearby Pyrford you can often see Zeus, usually above the local butchers, he is not a kebab shop owner, and is most likely to be in the form of a cloud, you’ll notice him just floating, having a look down, pretty much checking out how everything’s going on.

Once in Pyrford I saw giant monkey riding on his magic fly cloud, he was a long way from China, as they say in England, which has Chinese roots, you can even find some on Woking’s Oriental Road, which used to be home to the Oriental institute.

Oriental Road finds itself lying upon a hill,

its sides are lined with trees,

it has a bench, an old people’s home, and also the house where I was born,

well the house I was taken too after my first visit to a hospital, which I really can’t remember at all, thankfully as apparently it was pretty messy, there was talk of me being covered in blood from head to toe, boy that must have been some party,

anyway my house at Oriental road sits at the bottom, whilst right at the very top of the hill is Woking railway station.

Woking railway is Historically linked with the trafficking of corpses to cemetery’s to provide for the overspill or should that read overkill of the dead bodies that had begun to pile up in nearby London,

a plague will have that kind of knock on effect upon a town.

Today the plague has moved on from cows and rats to being spread by pigs, since St Georges time we’ve been out of fire breathing monsters in the U.K, so I’m quite looking forward to the next year of the dragon,

Meanwhile with optional swine flu mask attached you may want to enjoy a luxury cruise, by taking yourself on a trip by train from Woking station to Brookwood,

which is known round these parts as “the ghost town”

For when a train stops at Brookwood, cue eerie horror music, the train doors open, yet no one gets on, and no one gets off,

Apart from you of course, if you happen to be one of the nutter’s or I suppose mourners that’s decided to pay a visit to the cemetery.

Brookwood is where the dead people were taken on the train from London to be dumped and if I’ve got my facts right this played a major part in the springing up of Woking town, it certainly accounts for the cemetery.

In the grounds at Brookwood cemetery you will find amongst the ghosts and old tombstones, a very remarkable tree, so remarkable in fact it adorns the front cover of the book, “meetings with remarkable trees” by Thomas Pakenham, if your names Thomas, than he shares your name but he’s probably more of a ham packer than you.

In Woking Park you will see swans,
And at Hopwood’s moth lit strobe,
Well rock up and take it in my friend
You’ve found an awesome place to smoke

Its undercover see so makes a perfect shelter from the elements, id even testify in a court of law that it’s a perfect place to stop and roll a cigarette, id go one step further and swear on the bible but that sort of behaviours a bit rude for my liking

Talking of smoking according to some of the greener locals it is written in old stoner folklore that pixies like to toke joints after midnight on Pyrford common and that is not fog you see misting up above the grass but hashish smoke, also apparently for reasons unknown Pyrford lodge is dancing easy.

Here are some helpful phrases that will be of benefit to you if you happen to visit Woking

1. “Innit”
2. “Sorry mate I don’t have any spare change” that one is universal
3. “Sorry mate I haven’t got a ticket and I haven’t got any money to buy a ticket either”
That one will save you money if you happen to travel to Woking via the train

Now I’ve just got time to leave you with a little wise old monk fortune cookie type rhyme

And to any person who says Woking is a shit-hole,
I’d reply with a No,
It all depends,
On whom you see and where in fact you go.