I grew up in Kalgoorlie which, in those days, had a population of less than 20,000 people. My family and friends were in that town, I went to school there and eventually worked there. Everything I knew and needed was in that town.
One day, as a young man in my early 20's I was in a conversation with someone who had moved to Kalgoorlie a few years before, and another person who was a visitor. The visitor asked the person who had only been there a few years how he coped with the isolation.
I don't think I heard the answer because I was struggling with the concept of describing my home town as being isolated. Isolation was not something that was part of my thinking. Everything that was familiar to me was there. If anything, Perth was isolated because there was nothing familiar or comfortable about the city.
It is valuable for us to think about those things become familiar to us as we grow up, and reflect on the way that sense of familiarity affects the way we think, and affects the way we look at other people.
This process is called cultural awareness.
It can be very easy to see someone who is different to us because of the colour of their skin, the way they speak, the clothes they wear, their hairstyle, or the car they drive, and to automatically judge them as if their difference was a fault.
Cultural awareness involves first of all looking at ourselves and understanding how our upbringing and culture impacts on the way we think and on our behaviours.
I suspect there is nothing wrong with growing up with a sense of not being isolated, but I may well have been dismissive of my friend's feelings of isolation because I was not self- aware.
Being culturally aware of ourselves is the first step in helping us to be more welcoming of those people who are different from us.
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