What a pane...

I think that each one of us has our own, unique relationship with a city depending on how we interact with them.

For instance, to me Glasgow is gritty, bohemian, arty, industrial, working class, friendly and 'hip' (sometimes overly so - I'm talking about people double checking to see if you have spotted the copy of Kerouac's On the Road in their back pocket). Whereas Edinburgh is almost forgivably aloof, historical, intellectual, theatrical and comedic. However, despite having visited Inverness more times than the other two put together I find it hard to place my personal version of an identity on it.

If you look around closely you can pick out a couple of quaint, brown-brick buildings with wonky, tiled rooftops. However, these rarities always seem to be jammed betwixt the concrete monstrosities that 60s Inverness called urban development. Some parts feel more like somewhere in the old Eastern bloc than an old, wee Highland fishing town.

One thing that I find Inverness has always had going for it, though, is the genuine friendliness of its people. To give you an example, I was in the post office this morning and had been waiting in the queue for about 10 minutes before I was called to 'cashier number 2 please'. There I found a smiley guy about my age and who, oddly, looked a lot like me. So much so, in fact, that for a second I thought I was seeing my reflection on the windowpane . But then I remembered that I wasn't called Thomas and nor did I work in a post office.

I realised that the reason for the 10 minute wait was not because all the people in front had complicated things to do, but that the people behind the perspex were sparking up conversations. Seeing the address on the envelope Thomas asked me about France and my connection with it. He then proceeded to ask away, with genuine interest (or at least I hope) about my year abroad.

This Highland friendliness was yet again on show later on. Whilst on the bus home when the bus driver stopped for a full five minutes so that a fellow passenger could help two tourists find their way to the animal park. No-one moaned once.

On a less friendly but arguably funnier note some bloke walked passed me and said to his mate "look at the state of that guy's fuckin' jeans!", referring to the jeans that make my legs look like they have simply been painted black. He was wearing kappa trainers and faux-ripped jeans so....whatever.