Welcome to Govanhill, Glasgow’s weirdest neighbourhood, home to assorted brammers and bodyswervers including Rab fae Torrisdale Street and mad Tracy who torched her flat that time.
A place that’s always changing, from ‘the worst streets in Scotland’ to the hipster apocalypse of coffee and artisan bakeries, as well as muppets, rockets and midge rakers keeping it real.
Marvel at the flapping tongues and slanging rhyme. Find out where to buy brontosaurus cutlets. Learn why New York stole all its ideas from around here. You’ll be reeling at the sheer up-and-comingness of it all.
Cheers Govanhill is a humorous, semi-fictional, lyrical love letter to an endlessly fascinating place and is well worth a wee swatch.
Author Peter Mohan was born and brought up in Glasgow. He lives and works in Govanhill and has never knowingly been to Strathbungo.
Cheers, Govanhill, which includes a foreword by acclaimed photographer Simon Murphy, costs ten Scotch pounds plus a few quid postage. It’s available here:
I don’t mean my pink pantaloons and platform boots, bleach blond beach bum hairstyle, or my engaging content on social.
I mean I can taste Govanhill everywhere I go.
Grandpa’s Vietnamese dumplings, Errol and his hot pizzas, Dracula’s favourite deli. Mushroom paratha, fish pakora, chicken on the bone from Yadgar, priceless, secret Yadgar, the lowest-profile legendary restaurant in Glasgow.
Essential taste from a takeaway joint with a table at the door, maybe a hatch and a plastic screen. Multi-coloured flavours on the roof of your mouth, the back of your tongue, the heat on your forehead from the chillies.
Eggless Turkish pastries, Indian sweets and chai.
The brown taste of coffee. Flat black long. Milk café too.
The city’s best fruit shops. Limes, dates, pomegranates, tangerines or aubergines. And graps, appels and plooms, as we say in Govanhill.
The shop with no signage and a queue of white people outside is a bakery.
The big shop with the Govanhill queue inside is Lidl, the busiest Lidl in Scotland.
And pubs. Closed pubs, dry pubs lying in wait, ready to swing open and spring back to life. A warm gust from an open door, laughter and music from inside. Memories of a past, a past we still hope for because all we have is the future.
Until then it’s the world cups of lockdown beer, some Polish, some Czech, Mexican or Japanese. Craft ale, real ale, pretend ale. Wild cards like Jamaican tonic wine, or the Buckfast your granny drinks to cure her brutal Baileys hangover.
But the greatest thing, the ultimate taste, in Govanhill or not, is hot buttered toast and a mug of tea.
Right there, wherever you are, any time of day. Of course it is.
White bread knocked stupid, ideally. Milky tea, crisp toast, melting butter, marmalade, lemon and lime from a barrel-shaped jar, a jar of memories, lifted down from the shelf at home.
Friday nights, family nights, uncles and aunts and parents and kids, singing and laughing and talking about football, politics, football again over cans of pale ale and bottles of whisky then a game of cards and some tea and toast.
Nights that make you feel you belong. The safety, strength and love you need to endure. Because it’s cold out there, even in the sunshine, and especially when you lose your sense of direction coming home to an empty flat.
So I was with my brother but we weren’t in the pub and we weren’t at the game, we were walking down Victoria Road instead.
Or maybe it was Cathcart Road or Dixon Avenue, Calder Street or Kingarth Lane, or some other thoroughfare popular with traffic and pedestrians and sourdoughballs.
Does Govanhill always sound like this?
Like what?
Like a building site.
He’s right, of course. He always is. Just don’t tell him I said that.
Road works might be over, cycle lanes complete, but blocks of flats are being built, sewers and drains need replaced. Diggers and rollers on pavement tarmac, cutting and drilling through landscape concrete, hi viz slow motion lo viz blur.
Not quite suburbia round here, is it?
He’s right, again. Too much shared space, too many exotic lifeforms, not enough deadly white silence. No kids in crash helmets on their bikes in a cul-de-sac.
You hear more languages round here, too. Arabic, Kurdish, Farsi and a hundred more to go with the high-density housing, exclusion and ill health. Creaking floorboards, a dripping radiator, the sound of a mattress dropped in an alleyway.
We both look up but there’s less sky in Govanhill, we see roofs instead of sky, hear seagulls on those roofs, not like a gentle sunset by the evening shore but like screeching banshees angry at a tree.
Barking dogs, scurrying mice, I’m sure I heard an owl in the attic last week.
Still, it’s good to be out of the house, walking around, sight and sound. It helps us stay alive.
Up near the park now, buskers busking, almost jazz in the almost sunshine, or Roma musicians with fiddle and squeezebox. A siren in the distance, probably an ambulance or a fire engine or a cop car. Thunder overhead, rain starts to fall in long grey sheets that make so much noise because there’s only us there to hear.
I ask my brother what it’s like in the Gorbals and he said the ice cream van plays the Benny Hill tune, sometimes the theme from The Godfather, and the neighbours through the wall were playing a game of rugby last night. Still, makes a change from listening to you talking pish.
I said shut it Gorbals right and he said by the way Govanhill, keep it down.
Too much place, the same place, the one that never changes.
Relentless rows of street after street, tenements with faces, big glass faces, walls closing in, blocking the view, limiting our horizons, everywhere we turn.
Inside is too crowded, even if you live alone, office, restaurant, entertainment hub all its own.
There must be different places, other things going on, over there not here.
But I don’t know and neither does Govanhill.
So we’re stuck together going round and round in the streets, in the flat, on the page.
The same shops at regular times for essential purposes, daily walking along identical pavements.
Reheated eating, repeated every day, always on that chair, wearing this set of clothes, the usual rubbish lighting on Zoom. We even go to sleep in the same position each night.
I’ve worn you out, Govanhill.
Crossed all your roads, climbed all your trees, been down those forest trails, mountain paths and hidden glens.
Stared out at your flat sky from the living room, bedroom, kitchen window.
Clapped with my neighbours, heard the ambulances in the street and the crying relatives, and sat and watched the moon rise over the roof of the tenement opposite.
In the best of all possible Govanhills.
So it might be too much but there’s nothing else for it, it is all there is.
I can’t see less of Govanhill, nor less of myself.
Can’t sing in another voice, wear a new outfit, breathe different air, not here, not yet.
So it’s me and you, round and round, nothing less, nothing more, no more than Govanhill.
I have to be where I live, otherwise it would be a different blog.
Yes, I went to Shawlands. But only the once and only for a coffee. It meant nothing to me.
Yes, I used to live there but now I love you, so I do.
Sick of the sight of you too, though. Your daft face there every morning as I wake up, looking just that bit worse than yesterday.
Bored of you, mate. Seen it all before. And these days there’s nothing else to look at so aye even better, cheers. Nightmare. You’re a nightmare.
No. I didn’t mean that, I’m sorry I said that, please forgive me. You know I pure love you.
But really, neither of us are at our best.
I’m in a state of extensive disrepair. Face collapsed, knees too, other bits needing replaced, recharged, tarted up.
Exhausted and rundown, and everyone I see is the same. An attempted hairstyle and colourful clothes can’t hide the inevitable sense of decline, eh? We’re all falling apart.
But I can still pass for a young man, of course. Therty at most, probably younger. No? What are you laughing at? Cut me some slack, Jack. These are challenging times. Unprecedented, even.
Your four walls don’t look great either, Govanhill.
Boiler leak and room freeze, broken floor to suspect window, cooker dead and chairs unknown. And don’t talk to me about the backcourt.
You could do with a lick of paint, a few nips and tucks, spruce yourself up.
And don’t worry, I’m not going to move to a three-bed new-build with a posh balcony in Langside, or hook up with some wee trampy bedsit in the west end.
You know I can’t live anywhere else.
Don’t know if we need some time apart, a bit of space, get our heads together, find out what we really want.
Back when I worked in an office we would go for a drink on a Friday and on the way home I’d stop at a Chinese on Allison Street for balls of batter in a bright red sauce congealing before my eyes.
Now it’s a Ghanaian takeaway with a friendly young guy serving fish chowder and yams, and the office is still closed.
Always so many places to eat round here. Afghan, Kurdish, Vietnamese. Halal, vegan, deep-fried. New places which opened then closed, old ones I haven’t even tried yet. Takeaway, kerry out, readymade.
The chippy’s still allowed too.
Hot potato oblong seared in molten fat, yes please.
Closing time on a Saturday, standing in the mouth of a close eating a bag of chips, hoo-hoo-ing and haa-haa-ing, blistered tongue, teeth burning, steam rising. Hold your chip up to the night sky and it looks like an alien monolith, except smaller, and much tastier.
Vinegar, of course, never sauce. No adjectives, either. Not curly or French or crispy or waffle or sweet or fries or anything. Just chips. Scorched fried floury tattie bits to fill the belly and soak up the beer, cheers.
Watch you don’t meet Rab fae Torrisdale Street but. Mad Tracy said the sight of him eating chicken and chips was the most disgusting thing she’d ever seen.
Maybe me and mad Tracy should start a food blog. Take an in-depth look at Govanhill’s culinary scene. I could be the restaurant critic, an undercover eater writing online reviews.
Definitely food. Smiley face.
Served on a plate. Thumbs up.
Pure pish. Sad face.
Still honing my skills but you get the idea.
Until then it’s a yard of ale and broccoli ice cream like everyone else who’s working from home.
Stuck with each other like a pair of cranky old buzzards arguing over a dead mouse.
We’re too much alike, and too different for words, but there’s nothing else to talk about, so what can I say.
We is all there is.
Wonder what it’s like in other places. Open space, ocean views, tumbleweed? Dysfunctional homes, hidden violence, addiction? Aye, here too.
But at least Govanhill is a weird moveable feast, like a train station concourse spread over a few square miles.
Everyone’s leaving or everyone’s arriving or halfway between the two.
This overworked, undersized constant crowd of limbs and masks and bikes and prams and fireworks being let off in the street, ffs.
Lorry drivers, dog walkers, shelf stackers. Trans activists, trade unionists, migrant workers. And those young minds who entitle themselves and whose main entitle is themselves.
What a main road we have too.
Charismatic wee Romanian deli, new Italian bistro, hardware store with floors and aisles invisible from outside.
Silversmiths, tattooists, Asian outfitters, organic grocery and community food bank.
Primary schools, building sites, pubs sometimes open but mostly closed, and right at the top is the best one of Glasgow’s ninety three parks, dear green place and that.
The supermarket chains, the global fast-food brands that gie ye the dry boak.
Great institutions like the library and the swimming pool yet to reopen.
The start-ups, closed downs and gone for evers.
Miles and miles automatic, recent rain now rising.
Dry afternoons and wet evenings becoming drier, wetter too.
So it’s me and you Govanhill, like it or not, in it together, together as one.
Not walking on air, soaring over the rooftops or flying through the heavens but down here, swimming on the pavement.
It’s our nature, and everything has to be true to its nature.
I thought Govanhill was expanding but turns out it’s collapsing.
By collapsing, I don’t mean the buildings and by expanding, I don’t mean more buildings.
I mean Govanhill is shrinking and Govanhill is also taking over.
It’s everywhere. When I’m outside I’m in and when I’m inside I’m out and vice versa.
My flat is Govanhill, a tiny Govanhill, with the same unruly parts, raggedy bins, boarded-up corners and fresh layers of dust.
Fewer funky places to snack, right enough, and no real evidence of recent renovation.
It’s not just Govanhill either. Bet it’s the same where you are too. Balornock all over the shoap, Kelvindale round every corner, universal Provanmill.
I mean, we’d like to get away, away from home, this never-ending home. A wee holiday, trip up north, a weekend break, take care, see you soon, bye bye.
But the travel’s not essential so there’s nowhere to go and we cannot escape, inside or out.
Stuck in yer ain midden, it’s not funny. You know what it’s like, claustrophobia, climbing the walls, walking the same floors day after never-ending day.
That’s why we’re all meditatifying, practising emptyheadness, learning empty’s good, empty’s your friend.
Anyway. There are worse places to be, I suppose. And always reasons to be cheersful.
I’m lucky Govanhill is always there when I open the door and still there when I close it again.
I’m grateful it’s nowhere else and it’s all there is, inside and out, the place that won’t leave me alone.
So aye, cheers Govanhill for keeping going and keeping me going. For staying the same by always surprising. For the constant reminders it’s not all shapeless shapes and vegan brunch. (Nae offence, calcium-fortified plant milks.)
Cheers for looking like me and looking nothing like me.
All us lonely souls coming in and out of lockdown means there’s an epidemic of people talking to each other on the street. Watch yourselves.
Saturday morning on a pavement in Govanhill, strolling along as you do, shops a-bustling, cyclers a-pedalling, the smell of fresh bread from somewhere overhead.
There’s a girl in front and her wee pet dug is lying on the pavement panting in the sun and looking at her as if to say, there’s no way I’m getting up hen. She’s tugging on the lead and the dog’s like, no chance.
He’s going nowhere, eh?
That was me, walking past, piping up in that old Glaswegian way. Talking to strangers, friendly approach, salt of the earth, pain in the arse.
And she looked at me like I’d farted in her face.
So listen, Edinburghovians, Englandashians, Strathbun-go-gos or whatevers.
This is Glesga. It’s what we do. It’s not our fault.
We know you middle class always socially distance from working class, service sector, lumpen proletariat.
You can never understand us for a start, with the glottal stop and weird dialect and all that terrible swearing.
What are we like, eh? Nuggets and jakesters and freakballs, all nicotine fingers and knives of Stanley.
But, you know, we built these streets through famine, immigration and poverty. And we have the teeth to prove it.
So nae luck, strangers. There’s no one to talk to except you and us and all that’s in between.
Just don’t ever ask about Celtic or Rangers or football at all in fact, especially when we’re drunk, because we know too much and you’ll probably end up crying.
Then I kept on walking and passed other people but couldn’t think of anything to say.
So I made my way home and closed the door and got back to business as usual.
Everyone’s world has shrunk. Now we’re either pacing the floor in the flat or circling the streets in early morning, early evening and sometimes in between.
Seeing more of the neighbourhood, at least, so Govanhill is expanding.
Walking around with these feet and shoes, we own these streets, we have to. Yours and mine, this public space, nae cooncil developer or private investor.
Bestride that path like a colossus, go on.
Maybe stray into Langside, Mount Florida, even the Bungo, though I need a disguise round there these days, a mask or a visor in case I get jumped by a vegan and punched in the kidneys.
Or Shawlands, I like Shawlands, even lived there for a while in a big wonky flat in a tenement block that was sinking into the ground.
Shawlands has pubs, shops, fishmongers, nightclubs, five-a-side pitches and Young’s Interesting Books.
But it’s too quiet, nothing happens and everyone walks around wearing earphones.
No hundred languages, food you’ve never seen, flymen at the lights to tap you a fag.
So we keep walking, because we have to, through the streets of Govanhill.
Wee Betty with her mask and bag talking to Agnes and Mags at the bus stop. Kurdish guys outside the barber shop, crates of mangoes on the pavement, a crowd dropped off at the street corner after a day’s work labouring or crop picking.
Tiny Govanhill Park, a few streets away from Victoria Road and not a middle class changemaker in sight.
Romanian, Slovakian, Bangladesh, Pakistan. Kids on bikes or the swings or playing cricket, women in headscarves talking, laughing.
Nan’s famous hot and cold takeaway, backcourts that don’t have committees or websites. Over to Riccarton Street, maybe Bennan Square, four in a block with big gardens, space to grow.
And from there Polmadie, Myrtle Park, across to Toryglen, King’s Park and beyond, where there be Castlemilks.
Later, I’m turning down Allison Street and two young guys walk past, faces swelling with alcohol, and one of them asks in Russian I think if I know where the nearest bank is and I’m like yeah just down there at the corner mate and he says cheerski or nostrovia and salutes me.
Cheers, Govanhill 