Something most people wouldn’t know about me if I didn’t tell them is that I’m from Newfoundland. I lived there for around five nonconsecutive¹ years and I’ve visited a few times since then, but I don’t often identify myself culturally as a Newfie.

But it’s still there. I might say “three” instead of “tree” but I enjoy The Mummer’s Song as much as anyone, probably more than most, and the strange beauty of the little towns and villages sprinkled along the coast is unlike anything I’ve seen in my brief experiences in other rural areas. But this set of photos from Greenland by The Big Picture is pretty damn close.

My home town’s Come Home Year celebrations² are taking place right now. I opted not to go, but these pictures give me a tinge of regret. I think I would have liked to return, if only for a while.

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1. Despite being born there I lack the distinctive melange of influences that is the Newfie accent due to my early departure at barely a year old. Staying in Ontario for the bulk of my early formative years, I lived a mostly normal life until my parents decided that they missed Newfoundland and moved back there. Those years were troubled for me; I had a small contingent of friends but I was decidedly an outcast in school, with my head buried in books to avoid the laughter that rang in my ears, whether fictional or figurative. Though I likely would’ve encountered the same neuroses and social pariahism during those years without the isolation, both geographic and emotional, Newfoundland offered me and that isolation was a big factor in my becoming a nerd, something I consider a plus, I still hold some (restrained) antipathy toward the island. [↩]
2. Which are exactly what you think they are. [↩]