For Dopers Who Grew Up On Islands

In My Humble Opinion
1

I had a few questions, because I recently was able to spend a week on a small island (Nantucket). I thought-this is cool! But after biking around the place (and seeing the limits), I definitely felt cooped up. So I had a few questions:
-did you feel trapped on your island?

  • did you want to leave, as soon as you became an adult, finished school, etc.?
    -did yo ever feel confined (like I did)?
    -or did you love living on your island?
    I always thought that people who live on islands were different from mainlanders-do you feel the same way?
2

Interesting question, and one I have wondered about too. Growing up in southeastern Idaho, I often thought “Thank god this place isn’t an island – as soon as I’m able I am getting in a car and driving away from here forever.” That’s just what I did, too.

3

I grew up on This Island Earth, but I don’t know if that counts.

I did not grow up in Hawaii, but in my 2-1/2 years there I met locals who not only had never left Hawaii, they had never left the main island of Oahu. Some of them simply could not imagine even going to a neighboring island. I always thought that strange.

4

Does Great Britain count? The only reason I ever wanted to leave was the weather.

5

A friend of mine who lives in Hawaii has a vacation home… on a different island. That baffles me totally.

6

Technically I grew up on an island, because it has “Island” in its name, but it’s around 800km long (and 200km across) so it never felt small. Though it did feel isolated.

7

Well, I can see that actually. Each island has its own “flavor.” Kauai is probably my favorite outside of Oahu. I like my city envirionment, and I would probably insist on living in Honolulu again if I were to live in Hawaii again. But a little getaway place on the north shore of Kauai or maybe on Maui would be nice. Easy to hop over to, not far like the mainland.

8

did you feel trapped on your island?

No, I love my island and find it beautiful. That said, it didn’t offer me what I wanted to study, so I had to leave it.

  • did you want to leave, as soon as you became an adult, finished school, etc.?

Yes, not necessarily because of the island environment, but because of my high school environment. Had I stayed, I wouldn’t have the independence and experiences I had to get out of my shell (a shell I still have). I’d be more or less following the same cliques, with the same notions they already had of me. New people, new place, new chance at life changes.

-did yo ever feel confined (like I did)?

Nope.

-or did you love living on your island?

My ideal job would take me back to my island, or at the very least, my region (Caribbean).

do you feel the same way?

I’ve seen two extremes… One is to become very very insular, even in the way of thinking… and the other to explore, explore, explore away! But still, yea, different from other mainlanders. A very good example is hurricane season. In the mainland, people plan evacuation routes and what to pack to leave the affected area. In an island, there is no “escape”. Houses are either built to withstand, or things are added to lessen the impact, and public refugee places are in place and pre-known. The whole Katrina thing was completely puzzling to my parents and I.

9

I grew up on Vancouver Island. Never felt trapped, never wanted to leave (I eventually had to for work). I love the island and would move back in a flash if I could find a good job. Living on the island was a huge part of my identity and yes, I did always think mainlanders were different.

10

Theres also a lot of different types of islands - I grew up on the South Carolina coastline, and I *was *on an island, but it was huge, and connected to at least…(remembering) 4? other islands that were also huge, and a lot of smaller ones, and all of them were part of the same suburban sprawl.

The only time it was really noticeable was when you needed to go “inland” for vacations, or get to “downtown” for something specific - and then you were at the mercy of the drawbridge operator. I remember some epic traffic jams and waits trying to get off the island.

On the other hand, our island was big enough to have multiple shopping centers and doctors’ offices and entertainment facilities, so even if the bridge did break down or get stuck open (which it did once or twice that I recall) it wasn’t like we were in any sort of hardship at all.

I did spend the immediate post-Hurricane Hugo year on Edisto Island, and I DID feel cooped-up there. It was very small, and very insular, and everything else interesting (in other words, all my friends) were more than 45 minutes away, which was way too far to casually visit. I got very tired of the tiny grocery store and even tinier library, and I knew all the pizza delivery people and most of the residents nearby by name. I never got tired of the beach, but I certainly would not want to live there permanently.

I do find it very interesting to meet people who grew up very far from the ocean, or adults who don’t know how to swim. I remember being young and meeting someone from Idaho? Iowa? and they couldn’t swim, and this was their first trip to the seaside. I remember being totally baffled that was even possible.

11

Born and raised on Oahu, Hawaii, leaving when I was 24.

did you feel trapped on your island?
Never. I always loved being there and it wasn’t unti my 20s that I was open to permanently relocating to the US mainland.

did you want to leave, as soon as you became an adult, finished school, etc.?
Many kids do as a part of the transition from childhood to adulthood. I never did. I thought I’d live there for the rest of my life. I was aware of what the rest of the country had to offer; it just wasn’t enticing enough to leave.

did yo ever feel confined (like I did)?
No. Honolulu’s a large city, with nearly a million people, and it’s not a tiny island. I sometimes wished I could check out a big box store like Target, Best Buy, or IKEA, which didn’t exist in Hawaii when I was a kid, but it’s not like you had to do without things because those stores weren’t there.

I did feel psychologically isolated from the rest of the country, but then the internet came along and made bridging that a lot easier.

or did you love living on your island?
I loved living in Hawaii. I really am grateful that my childhood was spent there and that I still have ties there. If I’m able to, I’ll retire there.

I always thought that people who live on islands were different from mainlanders-do you feel the same way?
I think there was a widespread notion that mainland people were better-educated, more refined, classier. Like they were all like Martha Stewart, and dressed well and spoke clearly and were just better off in life than Hawaii folks. No one felt shortchanged or had a persecution complex or anything – it’s just that they were “mainland style”, and that style had those qualities. We had our own laidback island style, which did not.

I always thought that was bullshit, especially when a relative of mine made fun of her kids for “talking mainland style.” You know, enunciating their words, not using pidgin, that sort of fancy thing. I think people use it as an excuse for their own lack of polish or to shield their insecurities.

12

I currently live on Vashon Island in the middle of Puget Sound. No bridge. But there is regular ferry service, I commute every day by ferry and bus to downtown Seattle. It’s not confining, because I leave every day to go to work. On my days off I feel zero desire to leave. My kids love living here. Maybe they’ll feel different when they’re teenagers.

13

I’m from Long Island, so technically this thread applies to me.

-did you feel trapped on your island? Two out five NYC boroughs are on Long Island. I was raised within walking distance of Queens. Also, a fair number of bridges connect us to the mainand. It was faster and easier to get to Westchester than the eastern or southern shore of the island. No, I did not feel trapped

  • did you want to leave, as soon as you became an adult, finished school, etc.? Not really.

-did yo ever feel confined (like I did)? Isn’t this the same as asking if I felt trapped?

-or did you love living on your island? I miss the climate.

I always thought that people who live on islands were different from mainlanders-do you feel the same way? Humans seem so irrational to me that I don’t feel qualifed contasting subgroupings. Best guess would be not really. Long Island seemed alot like any other suburb of NYC from what I picked up.

14

I suspect there’s a big difference between a small island and a large island. I live in Queens , which is on Long Island. An approximately 120 mile-long island with bridges and tunnels and trains is going to be very different from a 2 mile-long island with a single grocery store. I have gone months without leaving Long Island- if my job is located in Brooklyn or Queens, I don’t have any need to leave. On the other hand, there is a smaller island called Broad Channel (still part of Queens) where people have to the island to do anything and a lot of the houses are built on stilts over the water.

15

A lot of how one feels about it also has to do with the island’s geography, population and socioeconomic development. South New Zealand, Puerto Rico, Nantucket, Oahu are quite different from one another and from St. Croix, San Andrés, Mauritius or Pitcairn. It has been said that islanders tend to know their geography better than continentals because chances are you may have to cross the sea at some point, and a lot of important stuff is always happening over on the continent.

KarlGrenze sums up pretty much the situation for many of of us from this island, who see opportunity to be found elsewhere and have the chance to pursue it; yes, that means we resist the insularist worldview. But that would apply to someone of similar temperament in some cow town in the middle of Wyoming or in some rustbelt 'hood – you want to see other places, other people, other way of doing things, and to go places and do things where you don’t have to worry you’ll be spotted by someone who knows your mother.

Insularism is not just about water.

16

Grew up on the main island of the Philippines. I realized I was in a small country only when I started reading children’s Atlases and 'paedia.

But now that you started it, do Chileans somehow feel they’re living in a long and narrow country?

17

While I didn’t grow up on an island, I’ve spent a week on Natucket, I"ve spent a week on Hatteras Island, probably a few others.

I’m curious about why you felt cooped up. I never did. I’m curious what it is in your expectations that made you feel “cooped up.”

18

I live on an island now (16th largest) It’s huge when you drive it and apita to get off it. Sometimes it is claustrophobic.

19

When I was about ten years old, I told my cousin we lived on an island and scared him to death. We lived in Montreal.

ETA: For those who aren’t aware, Montreal sits on an island in the Saint Lawrence River.

20

I lived on Staten Island for seven years in my twenties. The only time I ever felt trapped living was right after 9-11. Literally. City officials shut down the ferry and bridges making it impossible to leave for a week. It was awful.