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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
National

I have nothing but praise for Peckham

Rye Lane, Peckham, Borough of Southwark, Greater London.
Rye Lane in Peckham. ‘I never felt unsafe walking the streets,’ says Jane Lawson. Photograph: Greg Balfour Evans/Alamy

I must have been working in a very different Peckham to that described in your article when I taught there in the 1970s (The romcom effect: will a new movie gentrify Peckham as Richard Curtis gentrified Notting Hill?, 7 March). The south London neighbourhood had its challenges certainly: classes sizes of 48, a school with no playground, flats with no bathrooms – necessitating a weekly visit to the bathhouse – and very little money. But there was good order and discipline in school. And I never felt unsafe walking the streets – unlike now, in too many locations.
Jane Lawson
London

• My favourite of my husband’s mishearings (Letters, 5 March): as he was leaving the house one day I called out to him – “Could you please post the letters?” His reply: “Could I pierce the lettuce?” I still cannot understand why I would ask him to pierce a lettuce, but then reality does not come into it.
Margaret Garland
Saffron Walden, Essex

• One of the things that makes me mad as hell is the depiction of women by means of stereotyped images of body parts. So thanks for illustrating your piece in the Saturday magazine (Why women are mad as hell and not afraid to show it, 4 March) with an open mouth, which, of course, must belong to a woman as it has perfect teeth and is wearing lipstick.
Isabella Stone
Sheffield

• Re messages on vehicles (Letters, 6 March), here in Cornwall, you’ll see “No pasties left in this van overnight” on bakery delivery vans. We value our proper Cornish pasties very highly.
Sally H Smith
Redruth, Cornwall

• Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.

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