David Marsden

Connecticut is where I was fortunate enough to spend nine months in ’89-90 doing the second year of my psychology degree at Central Connecticut State University in New Britain.

I met some great people – Costas, Keith, Katie, Isabelle, Rosalba, Mark, Dan, Jim, Nicola, Gerald, to name but a few – and enjoyed more than my fair share of beer and free pizza at Elmers’ bar and the best calzones in the world at Pizzaworld.

I trained with the soccer team under Shaun Green (I was number 26 out of 25!) and got truly fit for the first time in my life.

I climbed Long’s Peak in the Rockies with Mark, Keith and Mike, nearly died up there in a blizzard then learned to ski when we got down.

Spent Spring Break in Key West and Key Largo and took road trips to New Orleans and Los Angeles seeing the really awesome Grand Canyon along the way.

Finished up with next to no money other than for a flight home and had to survive a week roaming the streets of San Francisco!

I discovered for myself just what a big place the US is. For all it’s faults as nation state – insularity, paranoia, fundamentalism – the people are just like people everywhere. I learned to appreciate what I left behind at home and to better understand what I found.