Every August Bank Holiday my neighbours in Notting Hill Gate pull down the shutters and disappear. Cornwall, Tuscany, anywhere but here. ‘You’re mad to come back for it’, they tell me. It is, of course, the Notting Hill Carnival.

Does two million people celebrating together lose its value because a few hundred are arrested? I would argue not.

I’ve been going for years. Mobile and bank card in my front jeans pocket. Earplugs, because the sound systems move your ribcage. I’ve never seen any trouble. Yes, it gets busy, yes, it’s crowded, but that’s the point. What I have seen is colour, joy and a city that remembers how to be alive. The costumes are outrageous. The food on its own is worth the trip. Strangers laugh together and the bass shakes the streets. Carnival draws every kind of Londo

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