I'M no homebird but I'm happy at home, home being my own small walls and my own small community.
I love my area of the city: its proximity to parks, its proximity to the city centre, its hipsters, its artists, its 57 (or so) varieties of people, its wastegrounds and history.
I love Govanhill's curry houses and quirky cafes. I don't mind the groups of people standing out on the street in the evenings. I jog past the fly tipping with a tut and a call to environmental services.
I love Tramway, the art and cultural venue on the corner with its hidden gardens and home for Scottish Ballet. I love the Gurdwara, gold tipped and regularly setting off fireworks that bring me outdoors in my pyjamas for a dark sky swatch, though that's a little over the border, speaking strictly.
I adore the old Edwardian bathhouse, kept open by fierce love from determined campaigners who fought Glasgow City Council plans to close it and won. It may not be returned yet to its glory days as a swimming pool but it bustles constantly with theatre, art, parties, political debate, craft, music - all in the ceramic surrounds of the main swimming pool.
Once I saw the ghost of King Hamlet pace the upstairs seating gallery, another I danced underneath a disco ball, yet another I had my tea.
We have more than 50 languages and roughly as many nationalities. It makes for what must be the most diverse area of Scotland, a claim with its good and with its bad.
Its good means colour and vibrancy, exotic foods and musical chatter. Its good means creativity and diversity.
Its bad means tension. It means overcrowding and unscrupulous landlords, substandard housing conditions and crime enough to warrant its own dedicated police operation. There's a committed, multi-agency task force trying to eradicate the problems that stop our wee suburb from being as wonderful as it should be.
Some neighbours are concerned enough to have organised a march through the community this weekend. How odd to be so happy somewhere others are marching in outrage.
It is an area with community spirit, I can say that for Govanhill. And maybe the motivation to keep Govanhill Baths open, against all odds, is the same as that which makes people furious with despair at the state of the back courts - community spirit.
Govanhill Baths celebrates its 100th anniversary this week as the protesters lace their marching shoes in preparation. I respect the desire to make things better.
So, good luck to both groups, albeit one grudging and one wholehearted.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article