Why are so many people so anxious to get away from the small town or village where they were brought up,and to make for the big cities? They usually describe their hometown as “boring” or “ dead,”or - the harshest criticism of all - as “provincial.”
If we examine the question from a distance, as if we were viewing the whole country from a long way off,we start to get a clue about what it is that lures us into the big cities.
The main point to notice about big cities is that they are big: there are a lot of people,and there are a lot of things going on. If you look down on a city, literally from a great distance,from an airplane at night, you will be struck by the incredible brightness of a city:there are so many lights that you cannot help feeling that all the bright things of life are down there waiting for you.But a feeling of disappointment will set in shortly after you land,because you will discover as you drive into the city center from the airport that the lights are just that:lights, miles and miles of street lights and neon signs.They are not in themselves sources of joy and happiness: city lights are not friendly, they are merely lights.In fact, the effect will probably be to make you feel lonely and isolated.
And yet the city lures us, because it is not provincial like the dead little town we have left behind us.
“Provincial” is in fact our way of describing not the town but the attitude of the people. In our little town,we know (or think we know) everybody. And what we know about them is that they do not want to go anywhere,or to do anything outside to normal routine of their everyday lives. Unlike us, they have no sense of adventure,no longing for new experiences or new horizons.
So we look down on them, pity or despise them, pack our bags, and make for the big world which we know is out there,where the bright lights are. Then a curious thing happens. We find a job, make a small circle of friends and acquaintances,and move into some cramped accommodation. Gradually we get to know our section of the city, its shops and its people,and for a while, we begin to feel at home. It is small enough, our part of the city, for us not to feel lost or anonymous.
We, in effect, create another little village for ourselves within the big city.
The ultimate irony comes when we rent a television set so that we can stay in at night and watch exactly the same programs that our despised country cousins watch.Soon we too become “provincial”, and others who live round us will be glad to get up and leave us behind.