Where are you from?

So, Sacha Baron Cohen's new movie ‘GRIMSBY’ (titled ‘Brothers Grimsby’ in the USA) is due to be released this month. Being a Grimsby lass myself, and like most of the town, I’m both excited and apprehensive about it. Grimsby is very rarely shown in the best light. I live away from home now, and people often want to know where my accent's from. When I answer “Grimsby”, I get a lot of grief. Even people who have never heard of it before come back with the original witticism, “sounds a bit grim!”. Well to be honest, it can be. But then again, not at all. 

One thing us Grimsberians have that a lot of other UK towns don’t have is a definite sense of identity. Although we are often voted the worst town in the Uk, we are also proud to say we have the best fish and chips - according to booking.com we have, so it must be true! We’re fish and chip snobs. 

Us Grimsby folk get a lot of stick, but what we’re bloody good at doing is laughing at ourselves. Our famous football chant is a prime example. Other teams' supporters used to take great pleasure in singing “You Only Sing While You’re Fishing!” at us. What did the Town supporters do? They took the song and sang it about themselves, “We Only Sing While We’re Fishing!”

One of my proudest Grimsby moments was in 1998. The Mariners were having a cracking year, and to top things off, we were going to Wembley for the Football League Trophy Final (also known as the Auto Windscreens Shields Trophy). One week before the match, The Grimsby Evening Telegraph were asking for town supporters to go to Blundell Park, not to watch a game, but to record us singing our famous chant. My Dad and I were season ticket holders so we just had to go. On the day of the match final, as we were leaving Grimsby, there was a great big sign reading “Last one out, switch the lights off”. The whole town were heading to Wembley - it did take us 120 years to get there, it was blimin’ exciting. Thanks to Donovan’s 19th minute goal, we won! The atmosphere was electric. Then they played it, with 30,000 Grimsby Town fans singing their hearts out over the top of the recording. “We Only Sing While We’re Fishing” actual made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and put a tear in my eye. 

Whenever we drive back to Grimsby and I see our landmark, the Dock Tower, I remember moments like that. So however this movie portrays us (and I bet we’ll all know people, have family members, or know places that are pretty accurate), we can bloody laugh at this too and hold our cod-heads up high!

Grimsby - Dock Tower