When I lived there the IRA was still quite active, which meant no trash bins anywhere, surveillance cameras eveywhere and terrible tube service as every time someone forgot a package on the train, the whole system would be shut down while they called the bomb squad in. I remember walking to work early Saturday morning when I thought I was the only person in the area, then a giant explosion as an IRA bomb ripped through the National Westminster Bank building. Nobody was killed, but I remember endless streams of paper wafting down from the sky.

The photos are of the Bank of England and the stock exchange.