A New Perspective for Familiar Places

Do you know people who have been to far flung countries in the world, but hardly visited different parts of their own cities? People who could tell you exotic details and histories of other culture, but might not know if anything significant happened where they live?
I am one of those people. It’s only since the last few years that I’ve realised it.

When you live somewhere, you think you’ve got plenty of time to go around and see things. There is no urgency to do something right now, because there is always tomorrow. It’s home. You will be there forever. No need to hurry. While for a lot of people that is true, in my case it’s not. Home is not a fixed place, or even a fixed country. So far I have lived in 3 countries, and no doubt there will be more in the future. So getting complacent about it means that when I do move away, I probably wouldn’t know much about where I live now.

From a superficial point of view, I am not really a big fan of Bristol. It’s not big enough or cityish enough to suit my definition of a city (think London, NYC, Berlin), public transportation is dreadful to say the least, and historical background doesn’t include the type and events of history that I am interested in. So I haven’t bothered exploring much.

But lately it has occurred to me that there maybe plenty I would like if only I see it as a traveller, and not as a resident. There maybe unexplored gems in the city somewhere, or fascinating stories that I have missed out on, by going only to my regular haunts and routes and nowhere else.

So a new goal then for the next year is to Explore Bristol. I don’t intend to get obsessive about it, but every once in a while, I will make the effort to go out and visit new places that I haven’t been to, and see how that effects my perspective of Bristol.