A Small Place

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorHigh School, 12th grade November 2001

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Fundamental Theme of "A Small Place" Antigua is a small place and A Small Place is Antigua. A small place where once upon a time there was darkness and misery. The people who live there now are haunted by their past and imprisoned by their future. Not long after Christopher Columbus discovered the island of Antigua, it was settled by Europeans. The Europeans, as said by Jamaica Kincaid, "used, enslaved and exalted human beings from Africa to satisfy their desire for wealth and power, to feel better about their own miserable existence"¦"¦"¦.

Antiguans are the descendants of those noble exalted people, the slaves." And I believe that still, after all these years of freedom, they cannot help feeling as if they have been altered.

Tourism in Antigua is especially popular and this small island has not been spared from the flocks of people looking for an escape.

Antigua has served as a get away spot for tourists around the world, with many coming from Europe and North America. It is a place for people with rigorous jobs and difficult family lives to come and try to re-gain their sanity. A place away from responsibilities, obligations, bothersome neighbors, and the same old scenery. A place on this earth that can be considered nothing less than a tropical paradise, where warm waters, brilliant skies, magnificent weather, and happiness are what dominate.

But what about the Antiguans? Do you think they feel the same way? Doubtfully.

To them Antigua is the place where responsibility and obligation begins. To survive, the people must work and you can bet they don't have the kind of high paying job that you do. While you are enjoying their land and taking in their sun, they are working their land and tolerating their sun.