Workaway West Coast- Community & Cultural Exchange

In celebration of UK Volunteer Week we have started out on a new endeavour in community & cultural exchange. We celebrate two years in Argyll this month and are hoping that the restoration of the gardens and the move towards sustainable living will allow an opportunity to share this journey with many people from many places.

Our first house guest this month is Luc, a gap year student from France. He has been improving his English and learning about living in Argyll. We have tackled invasive rhododendron, built a home for the family hens and tried to catch fish to feed us. He uncovered another little bridge across the stream so it has been named ‘Luc’s Bridge’. It is almost the same construction as ‘Ben’s Bridge’, lower in the garden which was uncovered by 15 yr old Ben, a garden helper and family friend who visited last year. He and his mother were among the first of many friends to work with us in the garden. They planted the seed of using the garden for volunteering and community building and it inspired us to see them working together, they are both great gardeners.

Take a seat

Now the seed has germinated and our children are already practicing their fledgling language skills by playing board games and eating together with our visitor. Next week we hope to receive a Magician who is travelling the UK coast on his bike, performing pop-up busking events and raising funds for sustainable farm projects in Ghana. We have been overwhelmed by applications from volunteers all over the world and the children are becoming very interested in helping select volunteers, mainly using criteria based on whether they are likely to know how to play Pokémon!

So another chapter of this journey begins. A new community of travellers to share the path with, it is certainly going to be interesting and I look forward to opening our home and sharing our passion for this wonderful landscape with those who seek to know it better.

The Off-Grid Blogger

So, my blog has been viewed in all but one continent and by thousands of people. Weird really, I wonder how many of them I might know or how many feel they know a little bit about me through my blog? The internet is such an odd thing, we give away so much of ourselves but usually only the parts we want to. I carefully navigate away from anything that is likely to make me feel too vulnerable or let people see too much of the bad sides of me. I don’t whinge, whine or cry digitally. I don’t bleed or scream digitally. I share joy when I can, convey a little of my pain and suffering from time to time, but rarely do I seek mercy,  look for forgiveness or even ask for help. I don’t tell all the stories I know or share the pain of those I’ve listened to, I keep the appalling, tragic and sad mostly to myself. Nobody would read the blog otherwise. The internet, like I say, is weird. 

Fortunately I can switch if off. I say fortunately because I have a choice. My job, my family and my friends do not require constant digital relationship. For this I am thankful. My kids are still at an age where I don’t need to text them and we can enjoy marshmallows at a real world fire pit. This time is perhaps closing quickly, I wonder about the inevitability of this. Maybe I’ll just have to learn to build an off-grid space into the online minefield, perhaps with a sign on the door reminding us “Switch off for a little while if you can, if nothing else, do it because it helps you to switch back on”.

Take a course in good water and air; and in the eternal youth of Nature you may renew your own. Go quietly, alone; no harm will befall you.

Keep close to Nature’s heart… and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.

The mountains are calling and I must go.

John Muir

 

Everything is new, well most everything!

A long time, in fact almost four seasons since I hung out on my blog. I’ve been busy journeying again, 500 miles North but we still cling to the West Coast. We found ourselves in Argyll, Scotland and have been reestablishing roots and planting seeds for new roots to grow. Literally and philosophically. I’ll write more about the real seeds soon but let’s say I’m pretty proud that the first homegrown salad is starting to sprout already. I am now a grower, it’s official! We also had flowers in the garden in January. Yes, Scottish winter produced flowers. I was also confused.

Actually, we have found ourselves regularly feeling a little like aliens in a new land for many reasons and more than once a bit confused!  This is Scotland, I know Scotland, I was born here, right? Although there are often sounds, smells and humorous happenings that are reminiscent of the Scotland I grew up in, this is most definitely a very new experience. We are in Wild Argyll, it’s wild indeed, but simultaneously  more peaceful than anything I can ever remember. A daily contrast which has not yet ceased to amaze.

My partner on this journey was busy trying out his new midge hat (I’ve not seen him in it since) and unpacking our van when a group of local kids got curious and came to call on the Little Browns. The first seeds of friendship come easily to children.

The first smiles and hands of friendship were not too far behind in the adult world and for that I’m thankful. The delivery of a delicious fresh stuffed crab pulled from Loch Fyne a few hours before will forever make me smile. As will the first ferry trip to a local event across the loch; I now conclude that every child in the village was on board! Scotland is synonymous with hospitality in my mind and I have not yet been disappointed. Moving is not easy. I am possibly still grieving the daily abundance of friendly greetings which used to pave our pathway as we walked to school. I still miss those who I’ve come to know as sisters (and brothers) and I’m ridiculously thankful for Easy-jet and Skype.

I often reflect on the feelings which accompany the resettlement process when I think of my World Cafe friends in Gloucester; many of whom do not have the privilege of the native tongue or a van full of familiar belongings. The fact that it was our definite choice to make a life-changing move, is one for which we are unspeakably grateful. Choice is perhaps the pinnacle of freedom. It certainly makes it easier to treat all the ‘newness hurdles’ as positives. I particularly wonder how my mothering friends who have arrived in a new land, carrying the vulnerability and hurt of experiences of war or worse, can be urged to remember the importance of looking up and smiling when dropping off children at the gate of an unknown school for the first time? That, on top of the massive newness hurdles they face, they should remember to wear their best face on such occasions. Never underestimate the difference a friendly smile in a playground, or even an invite for a cup of tea, can make to someone who is ‘new’. Tea seems to work everywhere (see earlier blog on topic) and I’m glad it can be that simple. Well done Argyll. Thanks! It’s good to be here.

The Captains of Our Soul- Gloucester’s Invictus Year

Festival, fun & bunting the city’s looking stately

Graffiti art and Scrumpty, sand volleyball and pimms

Rugby colour all around, excitement felt so greatly

Top designers bins with bells on, we are flying in the winds

 

Out of the night that covers me,

Flags flying ,pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my City’s unconquerable soul.

 

In the fortunate clutch of circumstance

We have grasped the Scrumpty Story

Under the bludgeonings of chance

In this City’s new found Glory

 

Beyond this time of splendid cheer

Pimms & Whisky in the shade,

We’ll tell the tales of our Big Year

Now a city unafraid.

 

Gloucester’s season, time and date

A city rich & worthy, we’re high up in a cloud

A city changed, new master of it’s fate

The World Cup has made us proud

 

As we put up the bunting

As we take our place upon the stage

Just take a little pause to ask

Do we pay the Living Wage?