Rural Europe on the move English_chapt1_6 | Page 34

3 , Finding a Sense of Place' CAMILLE DRESSLER W ith half a dozen other colourful traditional clothes of the your community’s well-being,” Liliana islanders, I am sitting on the Misak people from the high plateau explains. lawn in front of an elegant building of Columbia and she has come to that was once the Big House, the Scotland to share with communities Liliana and her partner Jeremias prestige home of the wealthy such as ours the Misak way of are talking about the need to have shooting and fishing elite that used sustainable development. Their ‘Plan a strong ‘sense of place’ for rural to own the Isle of Eigg. It is a small, de la Vida’ – Life Plan - is constructed development to succeed. Roughly rugged island, with a population of like a tree: “the roots reaching deep twenty years ago, in exactly the just 87, an hour off Scotland’s remote into the soil are your history and your same location, the same discussion west coast port of Mallaig. It is quite a surreal experience. values, the solid trunk embodies was taking place as we – the rebel We are listening intently to a soft- the principles that you want to live population of Eigg - were embarking spoken young woman with luminous, by and the numerous branches are on our journey in community dark eyes. Liliana is dressed in the the actions that you take to ensure management. 30