5 reasons you still underestimate Norwich

1. You still believe in the ‘Normal for Norfolk’ story

Every person from Norwich who has ventured out of the county will have been faced with the oh-so-hilarious jokes about webbed fingers, 6-fingered or 6-toed individuals and any kind of generic inbreeding/ incest joke that any person devoid of humour can come up with. I have tried to find any kind of evidence of where this may have come from, but Google (and even Google Scholar) offered me nothing. All seems to go back to doctors describing patients as N.F.N. (Normal for Norfolk), if they appeared intellectually-challenged. If anybody has any kind of better historical source on that, please leave a comment! I want to know!

And - please - stop these jokes. We have all stopped laughing politely two decades ago.

2. You think that independent food places are a thing of the past

Is going to an independent coffee shop for you synonym to cramming yourself amongst all the hipsters typing away some dreadful new book/play/song on their MacbookAir?

Well, here it just means going to a coffee shop. If you want a chain retailer, you can get them of course – but there is also plenty of different choice! Just a couple of examples:

The Bicycle Shop, The Birdcage, No 33 Cafe

3. You think that Norwich is a village

I know Norwich still likes to remind us of its reputation of once having been England’s second biggest city (ok, that was before the Industrial Revolution), but it’s big enough to have all you need. In fact, being the only reasonably sized city in East Anglia, you get lots of artists gigging in Norwich, which wouldn’t come to equally-sized Walsall. For everything artsy, literature, visual arts, music, come to Norwich!

4. You’ve been to Great Yarmouth once and made up your mind about Norfolk

Ok, arcades may have been cool when you were a kid but there is much more to Norfolk than that. While Great Yarmouth has its tackiness, it also has some cool stuff going for it – e.g. International Festival of Street Arts and Circus. Plus, the rest of the Norfolk coast is very different and diverse – you can visit the seals at Blakeney Point, walk along the majestic cliffs of Hunstanton or the long beaches of Holkham.

All I can say is, come back for a second impression!

5. We don’t actually want you to come here

This is a pure conspiracy theory: I think that people living here like the place so much, they don’t actually want to share it with anyone. Imagine hordes of tourists walking down the Lanes – what a horrifying thought (surely Londonders you know what it’s like!). We are happy in our little place, not having to queue for tickets, not having to book every restaurant table in advance and actually getting a seat in a bar!

So, maybe don’t bother coming- it’s too nice!