UK to South Carolina

[T and M 1]

All of South Carolina is a no go area.

Driving from Columbia to downtown Charleston at night can be a bit terrifying. The road's usually abandoned, there's very few exits to stop at for gas, you start seeing a lot of deer and getting scared they're gonna jump out in front of you and you'll hit them and die and no one will find you for hours, or someone will come out of the woodwork with a pitchfork and a hungry look. Kind of Texas Chain Saw Massacrey.

The crime is pretty bad too, I think much worse than upstate SC....I don't know. It doesn't seem like a big deal to me, I mean it doesn't personally affect my life as crappy as that sounds. Most people in downtown won't walk around at night by themselves but I do it all the time. I've never really had much contact with N. Charleston but it is meant to be worse.

Unfortunately I think if you're from the UK you're probably in for a little culture shock no matter where you go in the US. Just because of the gun thing if nothing else. (well I don't know, maybe isn't London kind of bad, too, or Glasgow or Manchester or something?). But yeh our household at least is one of those where you have a gun for 'just in case' stuff though that doesn't really make sense, and then there's my dad's hunting guns, and then my mom keeps a gun in her car because she goes hiking a lot and bad things happen to hikers. First time Iain saw one around he seemed properly freaked out for awhile.

Waterfront Park. That rings a bell...but yes, the Griffon is very much tucked in and hidden. But it's a must see for a Brit in Charleston. When I used to go I knew very little about the UK....but it seemed pretty English to me at the time.

I used to live in North Charleston. But I also lived on the Old Kent Road near Elephant and Castle in London. Both are pretty much considered "no-go" areas, and have the same vibe...drug dealers and a lot of poverty. You'd have to be an idiot to carry your laptop around after midnight in either area. But I lived there for a few months and lots of my friends at the University of Charleston (The College of Knowledge, love it) used to live there, due to the cheaper monthly rents. Basically they used to say that anywhere north of Calhoun Street was dangerous. I lived near Cannon Street. It was exciting, to say the least!

Oh, by the way, if you are a night owl, the Hardees on Cannon Street used to start serving biscuits at 4am. Heaven on earth.

To be perfectly fair, though, a mugging in north Charleston is likely to include a gun (or at least someone claiming to have one), whereas south London muggings seem to involve (at the moment) knives or fatal beatings.

Seriously though, every city has "no-go" areas where crime is prevalent. One is usually fine if he/she keeps his/her wits about them. Taboos usually do more to perpetuate the poverty and inequality than actually keep "good people" safe.