People do disparage this city of ours. They make fun of our attempt at city centre housing especially as flats in nearby Leeds can command prices of a million pounds.

They say that Leeds, like its football team has been this season, is top of the premier division, while Bradford languishes at the bottom of the pile. Well, that may be the case but at least Stuart McCall's lads are nice.

Bradford may not have the booming economy of its bigger and brasher neighbour but people are generally more friendly. But it is only being away from the city that has made me realise how much I really do like it.

I am a Bradfordian born and bred and being away makes me homesick. I miss the sights and sounds. Of people rushing by and not speaking to you, of crying babies in cafes as their mothers are too busy chatting and smoking to bother with their troublesome offspring. I miss the colourful shalwar kameezes hanging from the washing lines in the front gardens of back-to-back houses and the children rushing out of school and on their way to mosques.

Now in the news I hear that Bradford is the heroin capital of Europe. Of course it is - we have pioneering women like educationalist Margaret Macmillan and, er, my mum.

She is definitely a heroine as she is looking after Toddler while I am away on important business in the north east. Off course, I feel terribly guilty about this and wonder what lasting damage it will have on him.

But I don't want to make myself ill thinking about this and instead I put my important business away and rushed off to see a movie which would not only divert attention away from lack of Toddler but also bring back memories of my Asian roots.

The film was the acclaimed East is East. Friends, both white and Asian, said it was fantastic and highly recommended. "It's so funny," said my pregnant friend. So I paid my money and, amazingly, managed to get in at student rate though at a zillion years of age I shouldn't really qualify.

Here in the north east there are not many Asian people and when I do see the odd brown face, I have to restrain myself from running up to them and shouting 'oh brother/sister/auntie' though I have never clapped eyes on them before. The film has been oft-featured in the press so I was expecting to know half the plot already. True, it was weird seeing the 'family' coming to terms with life in Seventies England with a Pakistani father and English mother, and knowing that they had all been in Coronation Street and EastEnders before.

The youngest member of the cast, from Bradford, was very good but the film was not at all I expected and I am sorry to say that I didn't find it in the least bit funny.

Too much swearing, Seventies-style nonsense, stereotypes and urinating but then the moment of glory. The fair city of Bradford was mentioned in the line: "Everyone is happy in Bradford."

The only really funny thing I found about East is East is that, frankly, it is not. But it is right about one thing. I am happy in Bradford.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.