It was the removal of the word “the”……

…..that turned me off the Notting Hill Carnival. Once the area’s affluent new residents began referring to it as “carnival” and comparing it to fiestas they’d attended in tiny Tuscan villages, it was all over for me. Back in the day, when the floats trundled past the end of my road, the carnival was a den of thieves and you followed those floats at your peril. It was never that fabled “Celebration of (insert cliche here)”. Not on the Monday anyway. Posh residents, corporate sponsors and more sympathetic policing have made it safer and better organised but one thing hasn’t changed. If you’re one of the thousands rammed in around the Good Times sound system when this comes on, you’ll be lifted of your feet in one huge, communal sway. Simultaneously scary and exhilarating, it’s still the kernel of the Carnival experience.