Perspectives

On our field trip the other day my tutor remarked that I had a special kind of perspective not being from around here. At the time, I said it was just a different perspective. It's been challenging at times to figure out what's going on, to not know the trees or the places or any thing around the places I've been reading about. It has, in so many ways, been starting from scratch. I don't think it's any kind of advantage and upon further reflection, I think it actually puts me at a disadvantage. These places I've been reading about and visiting have no meaning for me. I know nothing about them, I have no connection with them, no prior anything. So I have to construct things. That takes a lot of work, a lifetime, you might say. I remember the first week hearing about our trip to Orford Ness. That meant nothing to me. It was a fine place to visit, fascinating to hear Rob speak about it, fun to wander about, but at the end of the field trip I left the island. I could take it or leave it. I can make something of it, or it can be a place I visited once. After this course, I will leave England and while my knowledge of the country and in particular East Anglia will be greater than it was before I came, I don't know what that will mean for me. I won't have the opportunity to see these places, to pass by them, to hear about them, to visit them. In some ways, that makes me a tourist here--just passing through. I don't think I have the advantage. At least, not in the way this course has been taught. If anything, it's a constant game of playing catch up and then still missing out on things.