Kids on the street, kids on the beat

I'm just wonder what everyone else's beats are, or what beats you might be interested in in the future, or what beats you've already covered. I was put on the cop beat at the Star-Bulletin in the middle of January, which is a difficult beat since the police here are notoriously tight lipped. Before then, I was the education beat reporter at the Pacific Daily News. It was a little easier, since the DOE headquarters was down the street from work, and every day I ended up walking over to the DOE offices to hang out and talk story with people, sometimes getting story ideas and developing relationships with sources. Before that, I was the business reporter for the PDN. My father is a hotelier, and was vice president of the largest hotel on Guam. Through my father's past work (he moved off the island years ago) I was able to connect with business sources through the name familiarity. They trusted my father, so I can't be that bad either. What always scares me is moving to a new area. I'm struggling now because I'm haole (foreigner in Hawaiian) and the trust just isn't there, because I'm not from the islands and I can't even spell street names. It's going to take some time before I build a rapport, it seems. Have you guys ever experienced that feeling in your beats? How have you dealt with it?