Bah - I mean, Boston

So it has come to my attention that I am forgetting to explain the places I'm going, especially to my friends back home in the land down under. So, let me do my best to explain the places I'm visiting - American folks, laugh as much as you like at my mistakes, but do correct me afterwards, please!

So my first major stop on this trip (after just a couple days in Virginia) is Boston, Massachusetts. I haven't been here before, but my cousin from Virginia happened to be working there this week, so I thought, hey, there's an American city I've actually heard of, why not check it out? So I did.

Now, I don't know why, but the name 'Boston' has always conjured up vaguely cosmopolitan images for some reason. Probably I've assumed any city I've heard of would be a large cosmopolitan city. Now, that is NOT Boston's claim to fame. What Boston is, though, I really like.

I discovered that Boston's main significance is historical. The colony of Massachusetts was established after the Mayflower landed in Plymouth in 1620, and the Puritans, fleeing religious persecution in England, settled there. Ten years later, though they formed the Massachusetts Bay Colony in Boston. Its architecture and food today has its own New England flavour, I think. It's easy for us as Australians to think things might be kinda similar across the USA, since our country isn't much smaller, but again the population thing - each region of the United States is pretty different.

Paul Revere, revolutionary

Boston played a pretty big role in the American Revolution, ie. the political and military lead up to America's independence from Britain. (It has been suggested that Aussies are not so patriotic because we didn't fight for independence - in fact, the way some people tell it, a bunch of our governors just got on a boat, took a bit of a cruise, drank a lot and agreed to unite as a federation. Doesn't exactly light a fire of passionate nationalism in their descendants, but certainly seems to have shaped the general Australian culture.)

The Freedom Trail: follow the red brick road

How do I know this? Well, a must-do when visiting Boston is the Freedom Trail. It is a trail of historical sites across the city, such as the Old North Church, USS Constitution ship, Boston Common park and site of the nation's First Public School. My personal favourite was the house of Paul Revere, a local revolutionary figure (made famous in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem "Paul Revere's Ride" in 1861) because I could go in and see a display showing how people lived back when the house was built, and later during the time of the revolutionaries like Revere as well. It is always much easier to imagine how people from another time lived while standing in one of their buildings compared to viewing a museum display.

Old State House and tourists on the site of the Boston Massacre

The other thing of note, for me, was the museum of the Old State House, outside which the Boston Massacre occurred. The Boston Massacre was when frustrated American revolutionaries harassed British soldiers and in return the frustrated soldiers (without orders) opened fire on the people of the colony. All the events are written there for all tourists to read, and even the children's exhibits and fun activities ask, "What do you think? Were the Patriots traitors or were the soldiers taking away their freedom?"

I admire this effort to encourage visitors to think for themselves and make up their own minds, but it's still kind of amazing to see. From what I know there are countries that will always stick to their historical thinking and present the facts in a certain way to justify past actions. It's interesting to think about how different places present their history, as well as the 'facts' themselves.