The importance of field notes....

I have had it drilled into me that field notes should always be recorded as soon as possible after the event. In a move to test this theory, I have left it a couple of weeks since my second step into the field, to record the details here.

Of course that is a complete lie. I have just been busy and just a little slack.

The day before the interview I went to the location where I would meet my first contact in the area, and someone who will hopefully provide a road into the community. Hopefully she will turn out to be my gatekeeper, or one of them, for most of my fieldwork. I have come a day early so I don't get lost, so I am no late when it comes to the day. But I have also come to the area because it scares the pants of me. The Aylesbury Estate is infamous in South London for being a centre of low income housing and high crime. Arriving at the South end of this large estate find myself nervous and watchful; 'white middle class fear' I attack myself and force myself to walk on. But the concert slabs of buildings with the fenced of ground floor car parks aand net curtained windows feel oppressive and make my hand sweat. I walk as deep as I dare into the area before turning around and returning home...

I had made contact with a member of a community organisation based in the area called Creation. They are a non-funded group aiming to make known the requests, feelings and needs of the local residents and tennents in the area. Sue (not her real name) has lived in the area almost 20 years, and she loves it.

By the end of the hour long interview, or general conversation with slight direction from me, she asks me where I am heading, and we plan together to walk through the estate, North, to the otherside. As we do she introduces me to the area a little and finally we get onto the subject of crime. She makes no small thing about telling me how bored she gets hearing people talk about the estate in such a bad light. She has never had any problems, and it has gotten better everyyear. Although some of what she says hides a little more of the truth, I am still left feeling silly and pathetic. But, after all, this is what this project is about... how does my understanding of this estate change from my image of it now, to the end of my research. How will this 'place' effect me and how has it affected others.

It feels like a long road... and the first steps, like any good journey, are a little scary.