Off Old Kent Road a Soviet Tank is helping wage a one-man war on Southwark Council.  Angry at not being granted planning permission for a new development, local resident Russell Gray followed the only sensible course of action available to him: he bought a decommissioned T34 for his seven year old son and parked it on the disputed land.  Before doing so he applied for new planning permission, not for a building but for a 'tank'.  Assuming that he must mean a container of some description, the council approved the request.  Their linguistic loss is our gain.  Urban legend has it that the turret points at the council offices.  Which it actually does right now. However as the tank is the play thing of graffiti artists and anyone who fancies clambering over a piece of cold war history, it is matter of some luck whether it will when you visit.

Russell bought the T34 in 1995 after it was transported from Czechoslovakia to London, for filming a modern day version of Richard III.   He named the tank 'Stompie', in memory of Stompie Moeketsi - an ANC activist killed by Winnie Mandela's bodyguards in 1988 after they suspected him of being an apartheid government informer.  A not uncontroversial decision given that it is parked at the end of Mandela Way.

In 2002, Russell first allowed the tank to be painted, when the American artist Aleksandra Mir wanted to turn it a bright shade of pink.  Mir's project harked back to an event eleven years earlier, when Czech sculptor David Cerny painted a similar tank pink in Prague.  The fact that the tank in question was a Soviet war memorial caused a bit of a stir.  Officially the memorial was meant to commemorate the Soviet liberation of Prague from the Nazis.  However for locals it came to symbolise the Soviet tanks that put down the student uprising of 1968 (in which Stompie had taken part).  Whatever its connotations, the government couldn't have it being defaced, so the army repainted it green three days later.  Ten days after that, a group of political campaigners painted it back to pink.  Which meant the government had to give it a green coat again.  Which meant that... Well you get the idea.  Before paint stocks ran perilously low, the government decided it was best for all involved if the tank was removed and replaced with a fountain.  All of which explains why Alexandra Mir went to the trouble of painting Stompie pink and geting a girl in a pink bikini to pose on its turret (ed: does it?). With the precedent set it is now open season on poor Stompie for anyone with a spray can and a dream.  Although obscured now, the latest makeover gave Stompie the colours of a Chicago Taxi Cab.

And what became of the young seven year old boy who received a tank for a present?  In 2006, he was asked to leave an elite private school because of his persistent poor behaviour. His father lost a quarter of a million pound lawsuit trying to fight the explusion.  Is that the rumble of more tanks I hear?

Bonnington Square is my favourite of London's many hidden gems.  At the Square's heart is a Pleasure Garden that has been beautifully landscaped by the local community.  Hidden among the palms at one end is a giant guardian in the form of an 1860s industrial waterwheel that watches over the trees, flowers and visitors.  The garden alone would be enough to justify a trip across London, but Bonnington Square has much more to offer.  The huge community spirit that went into the garden has overflowed into the surrounding streets, taking the gardens with it.  Every available inch has been used to plant yet more trees, shrubs and flowers.  The pavements feel as if they are bursting into life.  Look a little closer and you'll find that there are open passages winding through houses to yet more community gardens. 

Having explored the gardens I recommend visiting  the small resident-run cafe opposite the garden gates.  Come on the right night and you'll be treated to local musicians and singing staff.  London life and community spirit really doesn't get much better than this.

Robert