Chavtowns

Crook

I can’t believe Bishop got in and not a word about Crook.

Crook Vegas as it is affectionately referred to is a bleak shit hole somewhere in County Durham. Pram faced locals descend on the town centre to visit Greggs, Peters or shoplift wares from the ‘Original’ Factory Shop. Many of them reside in the delightful and scenic ‘Gaza Strip’. At weekends the streets are patrolled by rabid, white lightening consuming gangs, many of whom have taken to wearing flat caps and rigger boots and calling themselves the CTC or Crook Town Casuals, perhaps the Crook Town Cunts would be more appropriate, or just cunts for short. These youths urinate in a phone box and boot footballs up and down the street, a highlight is going ’up the back of the doctors’ for a few cans or visiting Ronnies video shop for some kets. Countryside sports such as lamping are popular, along with shooting tramps and burying their remains at local sites of natural beauty such as Kitty’s Wood. The town boasts a scenic picnic area, which doubles as a dogging venue, trees by day, a fat lass’ arse pressed against the windscreen of a rusty Ford Escort by night. 

There are few shops, however it has numerous take away outlets and a surprising number of pubs. The Crown or Fraggle Rock is particularly lively on giro day. Standing proudly is the council building or pagoda, the vision was a modern and Japanese influenced stylish administrative centre for the now defunct Wear Valley Council, sadly it looks like a pile of shit, designed in lego by a retarded pre-school child.  The main street, laughably called Hope Street (no fucking hope more like) may well boast the highest concentration of betting shops in a 20 yard radius. Again, giro day is a busy period. Tanning shops help the women over 40 to maintain a healthy orange glow, with skin the texture of dry, cracked leather. They are easy to identify clacking down the street in 80s stilettos like a group of angry velociraptors.

Economic activity in the town is somewhat limited, although the local ‘fag houses’ stocking a wide range of snide, foreign smokes appear to have combatted the recession effectively. The once weekly market also thrives, particularly the 2 stripe tracky bottom stall and the jeweller does a roaring trade as locals trade in their Elizabeth Duke in time for the man from the provy or shopacheck to collect the next instalment of the substantial debt racked up purchasing a 50″ plasma screen to view Jeremy Kyle or buying there foul-mouthed toddler a Playstation 3.

Genuine citizens need no explanation as to the true identity of the Cheif, Tennis Man or Radio Roo. They refer to places as what used to be… for example the aforementioned Factory Shop- what used to be Presto, Crazy Jakes- what used to be Bob’s Bargain Centre or BBC (a sadly mourned local resource that proudly displayed its range of sex toys and hardcore porn amongst the household cleaning products) and so on and so forth.

Another key local event is Thursday noght Family Planning Clinic, attendance is not advised for the over 15s, as they may be intimidated by the ferral hoards of 14 year olds in tracksuits vociferously demanding clap tests. Since the sad demise of the Rainflower Arcade or ‘Chongers’ there is little in the way of entertainment, perhaps explaining the high teen birth rate and demand on council dwellings.

[starratingmulti id= tpl=12 average_size='20']Bransholme is not strictly a town in its own right, it is a suburb of Hull.  It is also the largest council housing estate in Europe, need I say more!  The best way to go there (who would want to go there in the first place?) is on the number 30 bus – no self respecting person would take their own vehicle – they remove the parts while you are still driving it! Depart the bus at Branny Senna (Bransholme Centre – a shopping mall – more about this later!) and the first thing you hear is some ten ton, blubbery, single, ugly as sin, teenage mum shouting at the top of its voice (or is this normal for a Branny Chav?) at a snotty nosed kid as it runs away, “Ged ‘ere now, you fooking little bastard”, well that is really going to give the little bastard a complex – it is bad enough actually being a bastard without broadcasting it to all and sundry! Then as you take your life in your hands and enter Senna, you are confronted by a smoke screan of fag smoke – they can’t read so they don’t know about the no smoking laws in all public buildings – and then lurching out of the mist are the local neanderthal male’s, clad in shell suits, baseball hats and nicked bling, gormless looks on their faces and grunting to each other – the strange thing is they seem to understand each other!  Having had enough of this – and not being able to breath I re-trace my steps to the bus, by this time the ten ton blubber has attracted males trying it on. “Fancy a fook, darl?”, they grunt, “Fook off,” is the response. The bus arrives, the doors open and I jump on, the driver hits the gas and gets me out of there as quickly as possible. If  this is what Bransholme is like, I daren’t venture to North Bransholme, it’s bound to be worse.

What can I say? It’s a shithole, but it’s home! As a boy of very young I remember no fake tartans, 12 year old mums and more then half of what shite goes on now.

Too small for a town and too big for a village, recently wasted money on the two most pointless things the town needed. The Pedestrianisation of the Town Centre, which sees bus stops change more then my underwear.. And the all new “Through-A-Bout” bollock which is supposed to ease congestion, but what it really did was tore up a perfectly good bike path and old railway route and made the route home from town take half an hour instead of 10 minutes. But then again.. That bike path was a chav-infested haven.. I now have a slight respect for the council!

I will start with the outskirts of the town and work inwards. Starting with Haughton/Whinfield/Springfield/Harrogate Hill and tall those areas nearby.. Shithole. Done. Nahh.. Has Asda in this bit and what is said to be the best target for bombs.. The Shuttle & Loom. Formerly a chav infested pub with watered down beer (which can only be described as piss.. which wouldn’t surprise me if it was!) and a yellow wall. Now recently gone through a restoration which has got rid of the yellow wall but will most definately have the other two still there! This area has some quaint streets, but they are all nestled within the finest brick-looking cardboard boxes I’ve seen! Council Estates.. Filled with dole wallers, underage parents, inter-breds and.. Well any other words for chavs you can think of.

I would go on about other areas but I’d just be repeating myself. So here’s a list of places to avoid (unless you want to get stabbed).. Darlington. Hahaa.. Nahh.. Skerne Park, Firth Moor, Eastbourne, Haughton (near St. Andrews, Church) Red Hall, please add if I’ve missed off.

To the town! During the day it’s an alright place. This is when normal people dilute the arsewipes so all seems like a good place to be, apart from the constant not moving of others and the battering from pushchairs you get. Token arguments between chavs of “who fucking gets to fucking hold the fucking fiver they’ve found on the fucking floor” are there as a form of offensive street performers (DON’T PAY THEM!) and, above all else, the shops aren’t the best there could be. With rent up loads are closing down quicker then they went up (what was that nice shop with a bit of tat you thought of buying but left to get money out has now shut down now you’re back). Then the 4-hour 5:30 block comes where town gets quiet, college students stop laughing at cracks in the floor while quoting ‘RANDOM’ at everything they see and go home, chavs get sick because they can’t find “anymore fucking fivers on the fucking floor” and go home, the Job Centre shuts so the dole wallers go home to their council estates, the Post Office shuts so the oldies can no longer get their pension ’til tomorrow and the shops shut.

After said block, the night begins. Avoid Tanner’s, Retro (formerly Flares, chavs think they know all the songs because they’ve heard them remixed into a god awful song and the elders start trying to be hip.. In fact if these weren’t in this club there would be three people and the staff), Yate’s, Barracuda.. In fact avoid ALL of Skinnergate at night (and day).

So we start in the latest Wetherspoons, The William Stead (Steadie’s). Nice. Spoonies priced drinks and not at all rough as fuck. Next door is 10 Crown Street who do a belting Cosmopolitan, never been during the day but night time is cool. A long way up (opposite Joe Rigs) is Number 22, a real ale pub filled with oldies who love folk music and singing with fingers in their ears, slightly expensive for a drink, but is great for a pint.

Going back into town is Scene, what used to be Bacchaus, filled with goths/moshers/emos/scene kids/confused people who arent quite chav and arent quite moshers (or “boggers” if we turn back the clock a few years). An alright place with reasonable priced drinks and long hair.

Next door is Inside Out (formerly Club 2K, a chav as fuck club), now a place a chav can rarely be seen. Run of the mill nightclub playing 3 rooms of music, each of which a good choice.

But, I know what you’re thinking.. WHAT ABOUT THE ONLY CLUB IN DARLO?!.. Escapades, Spades.. Whatever you want to call it. It’s shit. Waste of mortar and bricks and where chavs go when they’ve had a barny with the 2 year old missus and go to pick up another underager. Plays shit, serves shit and the mental age+IQ is about as equal to what the capacity is.

Maybe Darlo Boro Council should save up money, one to fix the road which have more holes then Swiss Cheese, but second to rip down Spades and the council estates/chav areas, and then invest in shooting each and every chav in Darlington and bring the population down from 100,000 down to about 3,000.

Oh, and avoid Morton Park from about 4:30 as it gets busy and the boy racers and their latest features (include state-of-the-art back seat warmer, who is no more then a run-of-the-mill 6 year old chav lass) do the worst driving round Maccy D’s car park. Go here if you want easy money (park up, eat a BigMac meal, then wait for one of them to hit your car, get the plate number as they will drive off/do a pegger, and claim on the insurance). Then again, insurance and chavs don’t go together so it may not work your way.