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
