Earlier this year, I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to go to Barbados for a holiday. I made a few friends, did quite a few things and got to experience a non-European culture. My point here is, Barbados has a mixed reputation internationally- government corruption, crime, violence and cost of living being highlighted. On the other hand, there’s my experience of Barbados: the people I met, the things I did and the places I went. In short, facts versus personal experience.

Barbados is on the whole a poorer country than many, with 14% of the population living underneath the poverty line. As well as this the crime rate lies also at 14% , and there is a 4x higher likelihood children die at childbirth. The facts show that people generally live a worse standard of living compared to the UK.

However, taking in my own experiences from Barbados I can see the other side of these facts shown. While people generally had less, smaller houses or more basic meals, people were happy to make do with what they had. My friend Green makes the effort every Friday to take his daughters to the beach in Holetown. Also, though the crime rate was high, I never felt unsafe at any point in Barbados, and Andy always told me it was the ‘gangstas’ who you’d get in trouble with, and only if you looked for trouble besides. Overall, from my experience people- despite having less- were happy with what they had, even on the bus people smiled and even sung songs with one another: you wouldn’t see that on the tube?

To conclude, I believe the relationship between knowledge and personal experiences is that they can further the depth of one another, and provide greater insight into the true outlook on knowledge.