PART TWO STEVEN BERKOFF

IN STAMFORD Hill, I had a sense of discovering a completely new world. We all seemed to have something unique in common, a sense of going nowhere. Most of us had left school at 15, had passed no exams, were utterly rootless and therefore we belonged to each other. The longer I traipsed up to “The Hill”, the more I felt myself become embraced in my new family.

I met Harold Harris, a most charming and funny young man who actually practised his alto sax at home and had dreams of one day being a pro. He became my first real pal on The Hill. Girls were now becoming a predominant feature in our lives and a source of some obsession. Of course no one in my family could be bothered or was ever remotely interested in giving me a few biological facts so you had to stumble along finding out as you go so to speak. Harold suggested that we both go to the Royal dance hall in Tottenham. I had never been to a dance hall in my life except for the Stamford Hill Boy’s Club where I desperately struggled with the rudiments of “jive”. So Harold and I jumped on the bus to the completely unknown and mysterious purlieus of a place called Tottenham.

We got off at the Royal as I remember on a Saturday afternoon where they had what they charmingly called “Tea Dances”. I entered the great cavernous structure of one of the most magnificent buildings I had ever seen. The men’s room was on the left and the lady’s on the right as you entered, and there you would repair to mend your “barnet” and arrange the recalcitrant strands before you strode on in.

But what a sight greeted your eyes. The palaces of Kubla Khan could not be more magnificent. I seem to remember a huge spinning ball of mirrors, a vast dance floor and, to the left, an immense bar. This was civilisation, this was adulthood, this was my rite of passage. I did ask a young lady to dance and I was in a state of pure teenage lustful excitement. To hold your lady in your arms for the duration of the dance, thank her for it and return to your own seat was the nearest thing to heaven. From then on, the Royal Tottenham was my university of the practicalities of dealing with the essentials of life.

Saturday night was the night that all Stamford Hill waited for. This was part of the ritual that defined our tribe. We’d dress as best we could, bathed, spun our hair into immaculate waves and then we entered Nirvana, hoping against hope that we might strike lucky and take home a pretty young lady who would not object too much to some fierce and enthusiastic necking behind the council flats.

The Royal had some odd unwritten rules and one was to stick to your own side. The Jews on the left and gentiles on the right. And woe betide you if you were tempted to stray. When fighting did break out it was swift and utterly ferocious.

Then, if unattached for the night