John Gibson: Hold on, it’s early doors for Leith!

See me, I mugged Methil good and proper here the other day. Proud of it? You’ve got me wrong. Easy to take a swipe at that port and its inhabitants.

But the Fife resort isn’t alone. What about my home town, the ill-named “Sunny Leith”? Our proclaiming pair sing of the sunshine on Leith and, in the Sixties, the Walker Brothers also stormed the charts with a dirge titled The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Any More that can be applied to the Leith I found when I ventured down the Walk last week.

By Lothian Bus. You’ll find all human life on a 22 (the 35 is also an eye-opener for stragglers from the airport). I found shuttered shops, a plethora of Polish eateries and the much written-up handful of fancy restaurants with their fancy prices. Bookies shops galore and the obligatory charity shops.

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There’s talk of Leith’s regeneration but deprivation was more evident on a day when the rain and cold hardly helped.

There is, though, a haven of hope on the Shore at Mimi’s. Husband-and-wife duo Mike and Michelle Phillips arrived from uptown 18 months ago to launch their cafe with home-baked scones and cakes.

So tasty that a recent extension, that’s brought with it a drinks licence, has doubled capacity to around 100. Baker Michelle, encouraged by former cabbie Mike, is wildly optimistic.

“We are creating a cafe culture here at this section of the Shore and the ongoing slab-laying renewal of the road and walkway shows that the City Council are supportive.”

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So it could be that the sun is gonna shine some more on Leith. But “regeneration”? On anything resembling a grand scale, it’s still at the pie-in-the-sky stage.

Not the sort of pie they’re noshing at Mimi’s.

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