FAGGOT CUTTING
EXCERPT FROM TRUE BRITS ©JR DAESCHNER

Like capitalinos everywhere, many Londoners imagine themselves a cut above the provincial hoi polloi, far too busy and sophisticated to waste time or money on Olde Worlde traditions.
Loudly proclaiming their love of multiculturalism, they're often quick to sneer at their own country's diversity, particularly when it takes the form of odd pastimes practised by Little Englanders, Weird Welshmen and Crazed Scots.

However, London itself is teeming with traditions as strange and fascinating as anything you'll find in the provinces.
Most of these events take place in the very heart of the capital, in that bastion of 21st century banking, a global rival to Wall Street-the City of London.

There, between William the Conqueror's Tower and the all-conquering skyscrapers, right under the noses of the Masters of the Universe, thrives an alternate universe of gold and ermine, choirboys and boundary beatings, as well as boat races and blessings. In common with their country cousins, many City-dwellers have a hard time explaining why they uphold these seemingly nonsensical customs: maybe it's simply because they're Londoners.

Then again, who needs flu jabs when the Blessing of the Throats is just around the corner? In early February, office workers flock to Britain's oldest Catholic church-St. Etheldreda's in Holborn-to have a priest hold two candles over their necks in the sign of the Cross to honour St. Blaise (the patron of throats).

Every Good Friday, a sailor adds a hot cross bun to the mouldy collection hanging in the Widow's Son pub in Bow, each one a reminder of a son lost at sea many Easters ago.

In the spring, several churches mark Ascension Day (40 days after Easter) with the "Beating of the Bounds"-whacking the boundaries of their parishes with sticks.

At All Hallows By The Tower, the officials hold a schoolboy upside down over the Thames to the accompaniment of the "Beating Hymn" sung by the congregation on shore; every three years, they also stage a mock standoff with the Beefeaters from next door, commemorating a blood feud from more than 300 years ago.