Does Canberra have a soul?

This evening, as I enjoyed dinner in my new outside courtyard, I read an article in the Capital Express, a free monthly magazine about Canberra. I've excerpted my favorite bits below...

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Does Canberra have a soul?
By Sarah Hart

"I can't believe you are still living there", says the bloke, whom I will, for the purposes of this column only, call my friend. "I mean, Canberra, like, totally lacks soul, man." I briefly consider punching him in the face, but discard the idea, since he is letting me stay in his house, and one must not bite the hand that gives one free accommodation in Sydney for a night.

I'm pretty sure everyone who's lived in Canberra...will have heard something along these lines...."Canberra? Full of politicians, boring, no spark, no atmosphere, why don't you move to Sydney or Melbourne, somewhere with a soul..." Well, I don't know about you, but the longer I live here, the stronger the urge becomes to shake these ignorant fools until their smug little eyes fall out.

But I don't. ... What gets me is that the definition of soul for so many people seems to include large amounts of dirt, loonies, traffic, and inconvenience. Which Canberra has, by the way...but clearly not in quantities large enough to satisfy people...

I've decided it's just that these Canberra-loathing emo types are too busy being cool and disillusioned to adapt to a different vibe. A vibe that doesn't require a pollution report in the daily news, that has slightly more money and education than the rest of the country...

For me a place has soul if you can live there, be happy, create, grow, fall in love and change. You take soul with you. It doesn't necessarily gather in certain geographical locations, like bauxite, so that one has to go there and wander around until one runs into a lump of it.

Canberra-bashing is a lazy hobby, people. It's too easy to blow in on a visit and whine about the lack of boutiques... or the calibre of coffee... or the cold. Stick around, be quiet and get over yourselves. These are factors to which one adapts, not hard evidence of a 'lack of soul'. If you can't find any soul in Canberra, it might be time for you to sit down with your inner emo and figure out what it is that really makes you happy.
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Ms. Hart verbalizes some of my thoughts exactly. I have lived here for 4 months and have had to 'defend' my new home on almost every trip I've taken. In fact, every time I tell people where I'm living, I get a look. But to me, I make where I live. I have space to breathe, space to think, space to be. And in this space I can be me. Canberra fits me.