Brixton has undergone dramatic changes in the past decade. The author returns to visit their childhood neighborhood and is surprised by the transformation. Many new young professionals now call Brixton home, attracted by affordable property and good transportation. This influx has boosted local businesses. The author's friend's cleaning business is overwhelmed with demand from new office clients. While memories of past racial tensions remain, Brixton residents refused to give up on their community, driving its revitalization through their determination to improve it for future generations.

1. Changing The Face of Brixton
Do you remember the place you grew up, the busy streets you used to ride
bicycle through, the small ice-cream shop on the corner? And how very much
bigger all these spots felt when you were a kid? Memory can sometimes play
funny tricks on our mind.
Growing up in Brixton was not an extraordinary experience, but you
realize how much you feel attached to something when you lose it. For one
reason or another I have been away for over a decade now, and just some weeks
ago I accidentally met with a friend who still lives in the neighborhood. He
invited me for a dinner and I irrevocably felt compelled to agree. It was the most
peculiar of experiences, coming out of the Brixton tube station, stepping in what
felt like a time machine. Well the places and the streets we there, but my
neighborhood was not. The atmosphere felt very different- many more young
people, hurrying up with the determined expression of successful office
managers and downtown city workers. We ended up in Barney’s café on
Coldharbour lane, each catching up on our lives. While I was away doing my
studies in Cambridge, he has started his own venture in the cleaning business,
specializing in office cleaning. Through his eyes I could trace back the change in
Brixton looks.
First there were the new office buildings, attracted by the low prices of
property and the good transport links in the area. The famous shops of Brixton
prospered greatly from the fresh influx of young people, the trading areas
steadily extending everywhere. Robert, my friend, could boast on hardly
managing his business, overwhelmed by the new clients, whose offices had to be
cleaned on a daily basis.
I had seen the evidence, and now I was hearing the same story, but I
somehow could not relate it to my childhood memories. I could vividly
remember the calamitous results of the Electric Avenue bombing, the burst of
outrage and racial tension that arose afterwards. Whenever I mentioned that I
was born in Brixton during my university years, people almost automatically
assumed I have in a way been involved with drugs in my teenage years, though
it had nothing to do with reality. And now I am hearing about new business,
young people looking for property in the area, not trying to leave it. How can a
neighborhood change so dramatically in the span of just ten years?

2. Now there are many possible answers, both economic and social. For me
it is the result that sticks out. It is the will and stubbornness of people not to give
up on the place they live in. It is their desire to make their neighborhood a better
environment for their children, for their friends and for the people who visit it
every single day. For what kind of person are you if you do not try to make the
world you live in a better place?