Meet the twins

It's an odd idea, twinning towns; two places in completely different parts of the world with no apparent relation to one another are linked, supposedly with the goal of fostering better international relations and cultural understanding. Ok, but is the process of choosing a twin completely arbitrary, as it seems to be? Bath, for instance, has four twins (actually that would make the lot quintuplets then, wouldn't it?).

But does Bath have anything in common with its European siblings, or is it the black sheep of the family? Itchy set out to do a little internet-based research.

Aix-en-Provence, France: This is an easy one, they both have hot springs and Roman baths. Trés bon.

Alkmaar, Netherlands: This one was a bit tougher, but we did find out that John Lennon's first guitar was made here, so that at least connects it to England, if not exactly the West Country.

Braunschweig (or Brunswick if you're English), Germany: Another toughie. The only thing we could come up with is that they both have a really big church that either, in Bath's case, used to be a cathedral and now isn't or, in Braun's case, was never a cathedral to begin with but is still called that. Also, both towns begin with the letter B. You decide which is more significant.

Kaposvár, Hungary: Ok, Itchy is officially stumped on this one. Wikipedia couldn't help us, and the city's website is all in Hungarian. As a last resort, we decided to run the site's welcome message through Babelfish, the online translation tool, which came up with: 'Kaposvár valamennyi burgher on behalf of with love greeted You the flowers city-state Kaposváron!'

It all makes sense now.

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