Brick Lane, London

Fantastic find - much better than hitting Bond or Oxford Street!

Brick Lane, which is off Whitechapel in East London, has been an immigrant settlement area since hundreds of years ago. Now it still has a large Bengali presence (eg, the HSBC branch has ads that say "Islamic banking" and market Islamic loan products).

Along Brick Lane, in addition to the Middle East restaurants and the occasional India curry houses, there are now side-streets of cafes, galleries, and boutique shops. And graffiti in many places too! Apparently there were Bansky works too, but the gallerist told me that people have "boarded it up" since they know its valuable - so even though it's "street art", one cannot see it anymore!

Because of its culture, many movies, books, MVs, are set in here, including Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses (which I never finished!)