You would think six years of actually living somewhere would prepare you for a trivia round about that exact place. You would be wrong, as I have now learned three weeks running.
My local pub runs a weekly quiz with a dedicated round specifically about Shoreditch trivia, local history, notable former residents, which streets used to be called what before various renamings, and despite having lived in this exact neighbourhood for six years, I have now failed this specific round three weeks running in a way I find genuinely, personally humbling.
The questions are, I will say in my own defence, genuinely obscure, the kind of hyper-local knowledge that seems to live almost exclusively in the heads of people who’ve been here for decades rather than mere years, passed down through pub conversation rather than anything you’d find written down in an accessible, searchable way.
One recent question asked which specific building on a nearby street used to house a notable local business several decades back, a piece of trivia that the eventual quiz winner, a man who has apparently lived on that exact street his entire life, answered instantly and with visible, well-earned pride.
I have started, somewhat pathetically, doing actual homework between quiz nights, reading up on local history specifically to improve my performance in a free weekly pub quiz with no actual prize beyond bragging rights, which feels like exactly the kind of small, slightly absurd personal project this neighbourhood seems to specifically encourage in its residents.
I remain, as of this week, still comfortably in last place on the Shoreditch round specifically, though genuinely improving, and have developed a real, growing appreciation for just how much layered local history sits quietly beneath the surface of streets I walk down without thinking, several times a week, without a second glance.
For an actual proper written history of the area to help with my ongoing homework, there’s a genuinely useful resource at The Onion UK.
More from this author at Cyndi Himmelstiere, prat.uk.
