Back in Canada

Hello:

I have now been back in Canada for the better part of two weeks. It has been a bit odd adjusting to life back here again, though very good to see everyone again too. Happily, I have found a place to live with my friend Karen in Kitchener for this fall. The job search is next on my agenda.

I've been following with some alarm news of the riots in London (and as of tonight, Birmingham too). Unfortunately, it doesn't surprise me that much, given the draconian measures taken by the Con/Lib Dem coalition in cutting social programs for the poor, rather than raising any taxes for the better off.

David and I have gotten into a routine of calling daily on Skype...most of the time it works reasonably. I'm looking forward to his visit in early September.

I'm enjoying being home, but have by no means forgotten London. I'll be back for visits every now and then...

I think I will close this blog with this entry though.

Cheers,

Julie

Just a week to go...

Hello again. The last few days have been a bustle of activity, with packing, sorting, binning, recycling, and taking things off to be mailed home or given to thrift stores. As of now, I feel like I'm just about packed and ready to go, with the exception of those few items that have to be packed at the last minute...good since I leave on vacation with David down to Cornwall tomorrow morning.

Today I took my last batch of stuff to be mailed home--between my postal and DHL trips, I have spent somewhere in the neighbourhood of four hundred pounds sending stuff home now. I also stopped in at the bank and gave them instructions to close my account at the end of August, called my mobile provider and asked them to close that account, and booked my trip to the airport next Wednesday. Yesterday, I had a furniture and electrical charity store come to pick up our TV plus a few bookshelves. There is so much stuff to cart away and get rid of....it's times like these that one longs for a car of one's own, despite how happy I generally am to be living without one now.

My housemates are all in various stages of moving too, so our house is going through lots of chaos, as our main living area fills up with boxes and suitcases as people's rooms gradually empty out.

Off to Cornwall to see David's sister and family, then Friday we leave her place to do a bit of our own visiting around. Unfortunately, the forecast is predicting light rain Thursday and heavy rain Friday, and we're camping Friday night. Here's hoping we don't have to set up camp in pouring rain.

See you soon.

Julie

Engaged!

Hello! Well, it has been an eventful week. I celebrated my 32nd birthday last Wednesday by going out for dinner to a lovely Mediterranean place called Comptoir Libanais in Central London with David, after which we went back to his place for strawberry shortcake and he proposed to me.

On Thursday night, my housemates (Jen, Esther, and Anne) and Jess threw a surprise party for me, which was definitely a surprise. Jess lured me out of the house by promising dinner in Romford, and then when I called to find out where she was (some 25 minutes late), she told me her ride home had left without her and I should go home and she would bring fish and chips asap. I was about to go straight up to my room when suddenly everyone yelled surprise! and I realized the living room was festooned in balloons and banners announcing Happy Birthday and Happy Engagement. Jen had checked FB on her iPhone on the way home and discovered that I was engaged (I had just posted that) so she picked up a card and banner for that too.

Sunday we met my brother-in-law Ben for brunch. He had been attending conferences in Manchester/Leeds the week before and had just arrived in London for a few days of relaxing before going home. In the evening, there was a farewell party for me at Wood Green, and that's where the photos at the top are from. We had a good time at a very tasty and atmospheric Italian restaurant. The chef is responsible for the paintings of London on the walls, including the one David and I are standing in front of.

Monday, I met Ben and we visited the Victoria and Albert Museum, where we explored the special exhibit on the Aesthetics movement as well as other areas displaying a great variety of silver items (from crosses to crowns to weapons to cutlery). Then we took the ferry down the river to Tower Pier where we met David and then his sister Jo and her family for dinner.

My time here is winding down fast. I just finished my last day of tuition today, and I expect I'm either done or almost done supply teaching. It has been an exhilarating and exhausting week for both David and I, with work stresses and questions about the impending changes facing us compounding the emotional upheaval (both positively and negatively) of getting engaged. I am taking tomorrow off to participate in my choir's concert, and I haven't decided yet whether to be available for work on Friday or not. I am feeling pretty "stuffed," as the Brits would say, pretty good and tired and ready for a holiday. I intend to take next week off for sure, so I can get all my packing done before David and I go down to Cornwall and Devon--in part to see his sister, Christine, whom I haven't met yet.

Hope this finds you well. I look forward to seeing many of you soon.

Love in an Apron

I had a week of holidays last week, and I split the time between spending time in London with David, and relaxing/organizing/ jettisoning things I no longer need in Chase Cross. On Monday, David took me to Cirencester, an old Roman settlement in which he spent the bulk of his growing up years. I saw several different homes in which his family lived, including the home with the creek (called a river by the locals) nearby and the remains of an old Roman wall where David used to play fort as a child. We also met his old next-door neighbours who still live in the same house. They were surprised and happy to meet him, and gave him the scoop on what family members and neighbours are up to now. Despite being quite a rainy day, we had a good time exploring David's old haunts...a real trip down memory lane for him.

Tuesday I went to Covent Garden, where I picked up some souvenirs (professional photos of London, and one of a typical English village scene) while David went to work. Wednesday I was at home doing my organizational stuff--I'm very aware that my time here is running down now! On Thursday, I met David's mom Joan at the Tate Britain, a gallery of mostly British artists. We saw a lovely watercolour exhibition. As Joan is a watercolourist herself, she was able to tell me about some of the artists and their work. We walked to the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square, where we looked at art from the 18th-early 20th centuries. I enjoyed John Constable, and (J.M.) William Turner (whom Joan told me is one of the greatest English watercolour landscape painters).

On Friday David and I went to the Geffrye Museum, a compound of almshouses that has been turned into a museum displaying how the middle classes (or the "middling sort," as they were consistently called in the museum) lived in different periods of history, from the 17th century to the 20th century. One room would be decorated as a 1630's sitting room, and the next room as a 1670's one. Then the following room would be dressed as a 1740's parlour, and so on up to about a 1980's living room. There was a clear progression from very bare and plain in the early 17th century, to much more sophisticated and furnished in the 19th and 20th centuries. Clearly the "middling sort" grew in numbers and wealth and status during that time.

Saturday we saw a musical in West End London called Betty Blue Eyes. It is set in 1947 England, where severe austerity measures and rationing have dampened the spirits of everyone. The wedding of Princess Elizabeth to Prince Philip is just what they need to perk themselves up a bit. The elite of the town are planning a pork roast "private function" for themselves only, trying to keep under wraps the unregistered pig they are raising illegally. Meanwhile, the meat inspector keeps making his rounds condemning animals not fit for meat or meat sold under false pretenses (horsemeat sold as prime sirloin steak, for instance). I enjoyed the show....it was historical, with clips of film and photos of actual posters from the time and showed the class distinctions ("Fair shares for all!"), and quite funny too, especially when a "non-elite" couple tried to steal the pig only to have it shitting in their bathroom and creating quite a stink in the neighbourhood.

Sunday Wood Green had our last formal gathering--potluck and service--at the London Mennonite Centre. A very poignant day for those who have accumulated years and years of memories at the LMC--weddings, funerals, worship services, fellowship meals and more. About the photo at the top, David and I were washing dishes after lunch, and one of our friends pointed her camera at us. David stuck out his belly to make himself look really fat, so that is what we are both laughing about, although in the picture it doesn't really doesn't look that way. As Sue (the photographer) commented when she emailed the photo to me, "Love is finding a man who's comfortable in an apron."

I fly home in 48 days now, and David is planning to come in September for an exploratory visit--to see me, and also to interview with several prospective employers and a prospective school (Regis College--associated with U of T--has a program that combines mental health and spirituality that he is quite interested in).

Take care,

Julie

More Turmoil in the Education System

Hello. Having almost completed the first half of the summer term (they call April to July the academic summer term here), it is becoming clear how much schools have scaled back demand for supplies since Easter. More and more, TAs are taking over classes (if they haven't been cut too) or deputy headteachers and resource teachers and PPA covers give up their normal duties to take over classes. Alternatively, classes are getting divided up and sent to other classes around the school if a teacher can't make it. And teachers are increasingly hesitant to take any sick days at all. I have been glad for two days of tuition a week, as it has been difficult even to get four days of work a week if you're just on supply. There have been quite a few days where I, and all of my friends sat at home the whole day. Due to all of the holidays we had the last five weeks (Easter Monday, wedding, May Day), TimePlan wasn't having to pay its guaranteed staff for eight days, but this fortnight, I've been called in a few times to go to a school that hadn't requested a supply as a support person. I speculate that TimePlan is trying to curry favour with schools by sending freebie teachers sometimes--they have to pay me now anyway, so they might as well get some value out of me.

It is not an easy time to be in Britain, and for my housemates who are planning on staying around for another year, job security is a precious commodity in terribly short supply. The management who look after our house recently changed hands, and there is some question as to what the lease arrangement will look like come September. My housemates then, are all trying to consider different options for what they might do given various options and circumstances. For my part, I am very happy to be saying goodbye to Britain shortly...it just doesn't seem like a very hospitable environment in which to live and work at this juncture.

In the meantime, I am home nursing a cold today, and hoping to be well enough to accompany David on a daytrip to his old stomping grounds of Cirencester (where he grew up) on Monday. Next week is our holiday week, and then it's another 6-7 weeks to go before school breaks up and I come home.

Until next time...

Postscript: It is now six hours later, and I thought it was worth noting that we have just had our first decent rain in about three months. Or rather, I periodically hear thunderclaps and it starts up again, so it may keep up for several hours yet. Fine with me since I'm in today anyway. A good start for the parched plants here.

Hello, and hi again after a long silence. The last two months have been filled with lots of things, and it's hard to know where to begin. I finished one term doing full-time tuition at three different schools, and have now started part-time tuition two days a week, with the intention of supply teaching to supplement my income. In between academic terms was the Easter two-week holiday during which my family ( mom, dad, and Joel) came to visit (their first time in UK).We had a fantastic time, though like North Americans, we tried to cram-pack way too much into the time we had. We spent a week or so in London environs, exploring Greenwich, watching the Changing of the Guard, touring around the city on double decker buses, and taking in all the concerts/shows we could (a choral concert at St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Lion King). Pictured

below, here are some of us at Kew Gardens, a horticulturalist's paradise SW of the city in Richmond.

We went to the Netherlands for my family's middle weekend here, where we had the opportunity to visit some friends from Nigeria whom the rest of my family had not seen in 22 years (I had visited them last fall). Ali and Djurre went out of their way to show us lots of things, and we had lots of laughs, besides getting to know their sons (2/3 of whom were not yet born 22 years ago).

After our brief trip onto the continent, we began our road trip up to Edinburgh. David did most of the driving, for which we were all grateful, since road signs/rules are rather different in Britain than in Canada. We stopped in York for a very brief visit one evening. We participated in an Evensong at Yorkminster Cathedral, and walked through the Shambles and along a small portion of the medieval wall that still stands.

In front of Yorkminster Cathedral

From York, we went to Durham, the site of a lovely Norman cathedral. We walked along the banks of the river in the sunshine.

After a two-hour stop in Durham, we moved on into the Borders of Scotland, where David stopped to meet a friend, and we stopped for lunch. Then David took us to Greenlaw, from which my dad's Robertson ancestors emigrated in 1826. This is the (typically, sandstone) church where we found several distant relatives buried. David was also speculating about my blue blood when he found a connection between the Hume and Robertson families--apparently there is a Hume Castle nearby, though we didn't have time to stop and check it out.

We got to Edinburgh at last, and spent some time our first evening there wandering around the Leith Docks and area, since we were staying nearby.

The next morning, we set out to explore Edinburgh and walked along Princes Street, where we stopped to see the large Jenner's store (think Macy's), before walking along toward Edinburgh Castle, pictured below.

That afternoon, we visited the John Knox House, located on the Royal Mile, before scaling the trail up to Arthur's Seat. It was a fairly steep climb, but interesting craggs and heather(?) along the way. That night, David took us across the Forth Bridge and we looked at Edinburgh from

South Queensferry.

The following morning, we set off for the Lake District. Again, we felt the tension of not being able to stay and enjoy the scenery as long as we would have liked.

This is one of the lakes, where we ate our lunch. After lunch we walked along the trail to the Aira Force waterfall. We drove through Ambleside and got out in Grasmere, with the intention of finding the lake and walking around it. We never found the lake, but we saw lots of sheep and lots of stone walls and stone houses, with the evidence of an abundance of stones all over the area! We were impressed with the narrow lanes and switchback roads also in abundant supply in this area. In many areas, the roads were no more than 1-1/2 lanes wide (British lanes; with North American lanes, we would've been ok:)We stayed in Conniston for the night...the parking regulation stated that starting Good Friday, cars could only park on the street outside the hotel for 30 min at a time. We arrived on Maundy Thursday, so we just made it under the wire...David drove the car around the block for 10 minutes on Friday morning so we wouldn't get ticketed after 9:30 (the regulation took effect at 9 am).

Early afternoon, we arrived in Birmingham. We went to a pub for lunch on the enthusiastic recommendation of our hotel staff. I had an insight into the pecking order in terms of who gets served. Joel ordered two meat items plus a beer, and he got served in short order. Mom and dad had each ordered one meat entree, and they got served next. David ordered a vegetarian meal plus a soda and lime, and he had to wait a bit. I ordered a vegetarian meal (since I was not eating meat or dairy for lent) plus a water, and I had to wait an additional ten minutes after David was served, probably half an hour after Joel was served. I was not a happy camper at all, since this was now a 3:00 lunch. Lesson learned: never eat at a pub if you're a cheap, no-alcohol, vegetarian eater.

We attended a Tennebrae service at a church in Birmingham that evening before heading back to our hotel for a quiet evening.

The next morning, we headed off to Stratford-upon-Avon, where we discovered that masses of people had arrived for the convergence on one day of: St George's Day, Shakespeare's birthday, and Shakespeare's deathday. We walked around town, and visited Holy Trinity Church where Shakespeare is buried. We also took a boat tour of the River Avon, which was quite nice, although hot enough that one woman fainted from heat stroke. The weather was highly unusual for the duration of my family's stay...highs of 17-26C every day and only 5 minutes of rain one day. Heck, it hardly ever gets to 26C here in July or August, never mind April. Here is the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, home of the Royal Shakespeare Company, which has just been reopened after several years of renovations.

We had a lovely dinner with David's family on Saturday night, before heading back to London to the London Mennonite Centre--where we had stayed a week-and-a-half earlier while in London. We are some of the last folks who will be able to stay at the current LMC, as it has been sold, and will be closing in July. The trustees are working to find another place with less expensive real estate, probably elsewhere in London, though it's possible it could move away from London altogether.

Sunday morning, we celebrated Easter at Westminster Abbey. The security cameras were already up, though no the trees for the royal wedding.

Since my family left, it's been a bit slow getting back into work. The first week, we had Easter Monday and the Royal Wedding to chop two days off the week, and this week, we had May Day. Furthermore, today is polling day, the referendum on the alternative vote as well as some local elections, so some schools are closed for that. (I am suspicious I will have a qiet day home today, as it is 9:35 and I haven't gotten a call yet.) Nevertheless, I have no doubt the next ten weeks will fly by. I just booked my flight back home for July 27 this week.

I'm hoping to make a trip up to Iona for the June half-term holiday, and then David and I want to get down to Devon/Cornwall after I'm finished school to meet his sister and tour a bit of England I haven't really seen yet.

David and I are pursuing leads on work for him in Canada. He has a passport, and is working on getting a visa. He has been in contact with a number of people at York and Ryerson Universities, among others. If you have leads on jobs in mental health/public health and/or the immigration process, I'm all ears!

Shalom to you this spring...Julie

Reflections on "The Naked Now"

I have been reading a very engaging and provocative book by Richard Rohr recently, entitled The Naked Now. It is subtitled "Learning to See as the Mystics See," and has provided much food for thought. The dense ideas contained within have caused me to read and reread and reread again many of the chapters in an attempt to begin to understand what he's actually saying. While I'm sure I haven't grasped more than a fraction of what he's saying yet, here are the main messages I am drawing from the book.

Authentic Christian faith is NOT about adhering to a correct set of dogmas, principles or beliefs about God. That is a very dualistic, either-or, win-lose approach to seeing the world, and unfortunately, Western Christendom has fallen into this very trap as much as anyone else. The church tells people what to know more than how to know, what to see rather than how to see.

What Rohr is challenging us to is a nondualistic way of seeing the world, of opening ourselves to being open to experiences, of being willing to hold unresolved tensions within ourselves without needing to find immediate solutions, and to weigh positive and negative consequences without rushing to label, analyze, or judge the "wrong" or "perfect" answer. He calls us to let go our need for control.

I particularly liked what he said about how we transfer our own either-or mentality onto God. This is what he referred to as "the two heels of a Christian Achilles":

1. The individual Christian is told to love unconditionally, but the God who commands this is depicted as having a very conditional and quite exclusive love himself or herself! The believer is told to love his enemies, but "God" clearly does not; in fact, God punishes them for all eternity. This stifles and paralyzes many believers at the conscious or unconscious level, and it should. Such a message will not save the world and surely will not produce many great or loving people. The many loving Christians I have met in my life usually have had at least one unconditionally loving parent or friend along the way, and God was then able to second the motion. There are remarkable exceptions to this, however. I have met a few humanly unloved people whose need for divine love was so great that they surrendered to it--utterly. The Gospel worked for them.

2. Under the message that most of us have heard, we end up being more loving than God, and then not taking God very seriously. Even my less-than-saintly friends, the ordinary Joes on the block, would usually give a guy a break, overlook some mistakes, and even on their worst days would not imagine torturing people who do not like them, worship them, or believe in them. "God" ends up looking rather petty, needy, narcissistic, and easily offended. God's offended justice is clearly much stronger than God's mercy, it seems. Why would anyone trust or love such a God, or want to be alone with Him or Her? Much less spend eternity with such a Being? I wouldn't. We must come to recognize that this perspective, conscious or unconscious, is at the basis of much agnosticism and atheism in the West today.

He describes Jesus call to repent as really a call to change: to have the humility to keep growing and changing throughout our lives. Love and suffering are the two paths by which our inner defenses must be broken down to enable us to open ourselves to nonpolarity thinking, to die to our old selves and open up in new ways to new understandings and ways of knowing.

I have been through a range of emotions today, both joy at some of the ways I feel God is speaking to me through Rohr, and also anger at current world politics--both the way I think the current British government is causing great injustice by forcing the poorest people in Britain (through massive cutbacks of social services and unfair taxation) to pay for the economic problems brought about by the richest members of the population, as well as the whole situation in Libya, and confusion at what a faithful response to such situations might look like.

I think if I read Rohr correctly, it is I who need to be changed: to forgive myself for the ways in which I am complicit in the structural injustices in our world, and to seek to live more justly on a personal level in whatever ways I can.

British English Terms and Their Canadian Translations

I want to record some of the British expressions and vocabulary I have learned in the time I have been in England. Here is a sampling of some expressions:

"I'm not bothered." I couldn't care less.

"I'm feeling knackered." I'm completely exhausted.

"Y'alright?" How are you? (A bit like the Southern US version, except a bit less drawl and much less l in alright.)

"That's a bit dodgy." Looks a bit sketchy to me.

"Essex girls" Teen girls who dress provocatively (read, "tramp") and parade around pubs and night clubs, particularly at weekends

"In'it?" Isn't it?

And here's vocabulary that was either new to me, or used in a different way than I am used to.

loo and toilet--used to refer to the entire room in which the toilet is housed; they don't use the words bathroom or washroom here.

subway--a walkway under busy streets enabling pedestrians to cross safely.

tube--what in Toronto is called the subway; an underground train.

full stop--period.

rubbish bin--garbage can

trousers--pants

pants--underwear

jumper--pullover sweater

rubber--eraser

braces--suspenders

crisps--chips

chips--fries

courgette--zucchini

aubergine--eggplant

swede--turnip

cornflour--cornstarch

playtime--recess

headteacher--principal

aeroplane--airplane

telly--T.V.

flat--apartment

Tom-Tom--Sat-Nav

I fancy--I want/desire

snog--kiss

the Secret Lives of Teachers

I found this book of poetry about teachers in the library at one of the schools I tutor at a little while ago and thought I had to copy down a few of my favourites. I share them here for your enjoyment.

Hands

by John Kitching

Last Saturday, shopping with my mum downtown

I caught a glimpse of Mrs. Brown.

she must be 50 if she's a day.

Her face is wrinkled

and she's gone quite grey.

she's very old-fashioned,

Wears blacks and blues,

Thick, thick stockings,

and granny-type shoes.

But imagine if you can,

My huge surprise.

I hardly could believe my eyes.

There she was in the Saturday street,

Just as usual, greyly neat.

But walking along arm-in-arm

And holding the hand

Of a rock star from my favourite band.

And then I tell you

(I nearly missed it)

He took her hand

And gently kissed it!

And then my mum whispered

In a voice that just carried,

'But didn't you know

Those two are married?

Mrs. Brown's been married to him for years.'

I hardly could believe my ears.

Who would have thought

Rock stars could ever have wives--

Or that teachers could ever

Have such secret lives?

This next one tells you a bit about the status of teachers in Britain.

Extra-Money Activities

by Gina Duthwaite

Mr Count who teaches Maths,

became a comic just for laughs.

Behind the bar is Mme Drench,

who by day takes us for French.

Dinner lady, Mrs. Kipper,

took the job as part-time stripper.

Mr. Smart from Art and Craft,

earns more for brushing floors. It's daft!

Miss Plummy-Tongue, of gentle breed,

who listens to us when we read,

at night is now attending to

the cloakroom and the ladies' loo.

German tutor Herr von Frizz

compiles the local knowledge quiz.

Jack O'Toole O'school caretaker,

got appointed as head waiter.

Mrs. Note, the Music tutor's

ringing bells for 'TIME,' in future.

We hesitate er...to announce...er...

the Head's applied to be a bouncer.

Postcard from the Edge

by Jane Wright

Dear class ______(fill in year)

I'm having __ a wonderful time ___ sweet dreams of you ____a nervous breakdown.

We arrived after 16 ___ hours ____ days ____Hell's Angels helped us fix our flat tyre.

Still the hotel is ____ atop a huge cliff; ____sliding over the cliff ____not built yet

and the views over ___ the sea ____ the bins ____ Tesco's (a major grocery chain) car park

are staggering.

I'd like to ___take in the sea air _____teach the world to sing _____strangle every one of you personally

but the doctor says ____I should take it easy _____I'm a raving loony _____I need help.

You mustn't think ____I don't miss you _____I like you _____because it hurts your head.

But I admit taking this holiday is exactly ____what I needed ____what you needed ____what the rest of the staff needed.

I know that little chemistry experiment was ____an accident ____an act of genius ____an act of sabbotage

and that you didn't mean ____for it to happen _____to blow up the school ____to set my cardigan on fire.

Auntie Jane ____is looking after me very well ____is sick of the sight of me ____has fallen in love with one of the Hell's Angels

and says I should be up and about by ____next week ____next Christmas ____the time she counts to three

otherwise ____she'll have to get the doctor back ____she'll shout for Uncle Alfie ____there'll be trouble.

See you ____soon, I hope ______not if I see you first ____in court.

Your _____loving _____demented ______redundant

teacher,

____________________ (sign here).

Through the Staffroom Door

by Brian Moses

Ten tired teacher slumped in the staffroom at playtime,

One collapsed when the coffee ran out, then there were nine.

Nine tired teachers making lists of things they hate,

One remembered playground duty, then there were eight.

Eight tired teachers thinking of holidays in Devon,

One slipped off to pack his case, then there were seven.

Seven tired teachers weary of children's tricks,

One hid in the stock cupboard, then there were six.

Six tired teachers under the weather, barely alive,

One gave an enormous sneeze, then there were five.

Five tired teachers gazing at the open door,

One made a quick getaway, then there were four.

Four tired teachers faces lined with misery,

One locked herself in the ladies, then there were three.

Three tired teachers wondering what to do,

One started screaming, then there were two.

Two tired teachers thinking life really ought to be fun,

One was summoned to see the head, then there was one.

One tired teacher caught napping in the afternoon sun,

fled quickly from the staffroom, then there was none.

St. Albans and Havering Park

You may have noticed that since I began dating David, I have gone from a weekly blogger, to more like a monthly blogger. Somehow my weekends seem to fill up a lot more lately!

In late-January, David and I made a trip to St. Alban's one weekend, a town established around a monastery named for the first British Christian martyr, St. Alban. It grew up very close to the even older Roman town of Verulamium. Part of the old Roman wall (some 1800 years old) surrounding the town is still standing . Here we are standing in front of the St. Alban's Cathedral.

I love the interesting names the English give to their pubs. In case you can't quite read that, it says, "Ye Olde Fighting Cocks."

We had a lovely lunch at Cafe Rouge in town, and then headed to the Roman Museum to learn a bit about the Romans in Britain.

Here is a photo of the cathedral from a different perspective when we were coming back at dusk.
We had a fun day with less than an hour ride each way. Best part...the train trip only cost £6.80 each.

Last weekend, David was at a workshop for the weekend so I had a busy day at home on Saturday doing all the errands that I never seem to find time to do these days. Then on Sunday, several teacher friends came over for potluck brunch before going for a walk through Havering County Park, just north of my house. The weather was fine, and it was nice to get out for a walk with them.

Jessie, Jess, and Filomena.
Rolling English countryside.

Whilst I hear reports of -30 C and 20 cm of snow back home, we here are experiencing mostly cloudy, mild weather with the occasional burst of sunshine to relieve our SAD symptoms. One of my housemates is taking Vitamin D to lift her mood. However, the trees are all budding, and it feels like spring is around the corner. We aren't going to work and coming home in pitch blackness anymore, so that feels good. And I am looking forward to a visit from my family in April. The Eurostar tickets for our trip down to the Netherlands to visit some Nigeria friends arrived today. I don't think much of customer service in England generally, but I must say, the Royal Mail does a darn good job, since I only ordered them about 36 hours before they arrived!

Hope this finds you well. Take care. J

New Year

Hello everybody. It has been another couple weeks since I posted. What have I done since?

David and I went into Central London on New Years' Eve, but waited too late to get a front place view of the fireworks, as all access points had just been closed off by the time we arrived shortly after 11. So we walked up to Trafalgar Square and watched the New Year in on the jumbotron screen instead. Lots of drunken partiers and piles of rubbish on the sidewalks! I got sprayed by champagne at midnight by one enthusiastic reveler.

I spent that weekend at David's place and we had a really good and relaxing time together. We discovered a mutual interest in Scrabble amongst other things, and tuned in to part of the 12-day BBC special feature on Mozart (over the first 12 days of the New Year, they're playing every single piece of music the guy ever wrote!)

I met my friend Trish (from my Rouge Valley church family)--who was visiting various friends spread around the outskirts of London--in London on Wednesday last week, and we had a good time walking through Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, and Covent Garden and then going to the British Museum for part of the afternoon. It was a nice chance to catch up with her and to receive and send greetings to folks back home.

I went into school again on Thursday last week (the kids had returned on Wednesday) to get organized for this school term, and did a bit of tutoring on Friday. Then I met Trish and David downtown for drinks on Friday night before Trish went to see west-end show, Billy Elliot. Again, we had a lovely time together.

After spending Friday night and Satuday morning with David, I came home on Saturday afternoon, to allow him to spend some time preparing for an interview--which by the time I write this, should be over or almost over. He is interviewing for a public health job, which involves researching/asking questions relative to the government's proposal to get rid of a layer of middle management within the health system and delegate a lot of managing to GPs instead. This is an area of personal concern for David, and he is eager to be involved in asking relevant questions about how this might work, or indeed, what the long-term outcomes of such a decision might be. So he has spent a good chunk of the last week boning up on the current structure of the NHS (National Health Services) familiarizing himself with the relevant information/terminology.

Today I have taken off work, since the school at which I tutor is being inspected by OFSTED today and tomorrow. This is an inspection in which teachers are each evaluated during their lessons as to the effectiveness of their teaching and the school is evaluated as well. It is a high-stress event for all concerned, particularly for schools which have received poor results in the past.

Tomorrow I will be back at my other school, Five Elms again, and then Wednesday I am going to meet the head at another school in order to get started tutoring there in the next week.

Hope you are having a good start to 2011. 'Til next time,

Julie

Christmas with the Armes Family

The UK did have a white Christmas...first time in at least forty years! These two photos are taken just outside my house (above) and on Collier Row Road (the main road I walk along to get groceries).
Greetings...I am back in Romford again after spending Christmas Eve until today with David's family in Letchworth (north of London in Hertfordshire). I took the train up to Letchworth on Friday afternoon where I was met by David and his sister, Jo.

We have had a lovely weekend together. Joan (David's mom) spent a large part of the weekend in the kitchen for the big family meals each of the three days we were all there. Both David and Jo's husband, John are vegetarians, so there were vegetarian entrees at each meal in addition to the fish, turkey, and ham the rest of us had. The rest of us tried to pitch in and help where we could.

I had my first real experience with the crackers that that British like to hand out at Christmas. They're like a wish bone, in that two people pull the cracker and the person who gets the middle (filled) part of the cracker is supposed to win it. It contains a joke and a (gag) toy of some kind--a protractor with shape cutouts you can trace, or a tangram, or a miniature set of playing cards. Another popular tradition seems to be the little firecrackers that pop when you pull the string and send a stream of tissue paper strings across the table at the person at whom they are aimed. Each person's placemat was adorned with both of these items at both the Christmas Day dinner (just family present) and the Boxing Day buffet (to which two of Jeff and Joan's friends were invited).

Stevie, Jeff (Grandad), and (Uncle) David at the beautifully decorated table for Christmas Day dinner.

We had several games of Charades (which I initially heard as Sheraz) as well as completing a 500-piece jigsaw of Europe on Christmas Day, and then the 1000-piece one pictured below last night and this morning.
The three most persistent puzzlers--Jo, daughter Stevie, and yours truly. David and John and Joan also gave us some help at various points along the way.

Canterbury and Snow

It has been over three weeks since I last posted... much has happened. On Dec 2, my teacher friends and I went into London for the annual tree-lighting ceremony in Trafalgar Square of the 70-ft tall Norwegian pine given to London by the people of Oslo for their support during WWII. Then we celebrated Chelsea's birthday by going to a South Asian restaurant called Inamo that enabled us to order our meal off the table. That is to say, it was a touch-sensitive table with drop-down menus that displayed a picture of any selected dish on your plate. You drag and drop your menu selections into the shopping basket and they bring it to you. While you were waiting, you could play battleship with the person sitting across fro you, solve a jigsaw puzzle, look at a map of the area around the restaurant, or view a video of the chefs working in the kitchen.

On Dec 4, David and I visited his parents in Letchworth. We had a lovely visit, and they invited me to spend Christmas with them.

A week ago, we had our TimePlan Christmas social at the Christmas Market in Hyde Park. We went skating at the rink set up for one month over Christmas. It was rather rough, wet ice, and a very packed rink. Funny to watch the Londoners careen around or cling to the wall.

On Tuesday of this past week, David came out to my choir concert on Tuesday afternoon. We sang for a seniors group at a church in Romford, who were very appreciative of our efforts. We sang a variety of John Rutter carols as well as an arrangement of Auld Lang Syne and a few other seasonal pieces.

Friday I finished my tutoring work for the term, and my Bible Study group (from Chase Cross) had a Christas social. Then on Saturday, David and Esther (my housemate) and I went to Canterbury for the day. We saw the Cathedral and did some shopping. Canterbury is a gorgeous town, and was especially so after 10 c of snow fell.

With David, before snow.
Esther and I.

Entrance to Canterbury Cathedral.

This week I a enjoying a quiet week at hoe. Which is good, since the English cannot--CANNOT--deal with snow in any quantity. Trains, planes, and buses are all affected by the snow. I have several friends whose flights have been cancelled, and have heard of someone who sat on a plane for 5-6 hours on Saturday, the third plane in the queue to depart before finally being sent back home and told to return on Thursday. Heathrow has just closed the airport to any new passengers hoping to fly, as it is packed wall-to-wall with people hoping, waiting. There are massive lineups and delays and cancellations on Eurostar services too. More snow and colder weather is predicted for the rest of this week, so it sees all but certain that Britain will have a white Christmas this year. We are beginning to wonder if we might have a quiet Christmas, just the four of us here if even the local trains are shut down on Thursday and Friday this week. I am glad that I had no big travelling plans this month.

Update

Well, I suppose it is time for another update. It has been another full couple of weeks since I last blogged. Last weekend was the wedding celebration of Will, a member of the Wood Green congregation, and staff of the LMC (Metanoia Books), and Yvonne, his Chinese wife. Will is 65 or so and has never been married, and has been a well-loved part of Wood Green for the last three decades. It was clear that everyone was delighted to be celebrating with him....a joy to be there.

I suppose the bigger news for me personally is that I have been dating my friend David now for about three weeks. We have been hanging out as friends regularly for the last ten or eleven months, but despite repeated coaxing from him I had resisted the idea of us dating. I finally decided I had nothing to lose by (to use a British expression) giving it a go. I have decided to press forward in spite of my reservations about the 12 years age difference between us, the complication of a cross-continental relationship, and my own phobias about dating and see where this goes. Theres a part of me that would like to be able to see down the road and see what the long-term prospects of this relationship are, but I know I need to relax and take it one step at a time. I do believe this is where God calls me to be right now.

David is a mental health researcher whose passion to help people with mental health issues stems from his own experience as someone who was first diagnosed with mental health issues sixteen years ago, and who has learned a lot of coping strategies and ways of reframing the way he thinks about things. I met him at Wood Green almost a year ago, as we were just reminiscing today, at the LMCs annual Leaf Party--that is, property cleanup/preparation for winter party.

He is a patient, gentle person with a good sense of humour and we talk about anything and everything. We both tend to analyze things quite a bit, which I realize can be both a good and a bad thing. But I feel really comfortable with him and we genuinely enjoy spending time together. So I continue to commit our relationship to a lot of prayer asking for continued discernment as we move forward.

May you be blessed as we enter this Advent season!

Quiet Sunday

Hello again,

I have been less diligent lately in keeping my blog updated. This is due to my becoming more involved socially with various other groups in the area in which I live. Ill report briefly on the events of the last two weeks.

Two weeks ago now, I joined a Bible study group at the church in Chase Cross that I attend. There were five of us there, all in the late twenties/early thirties demographic. Like the church, I found them a very friendly bunch...they meet every other week, so Ill be going again this Tuesday.

Wednesdays are choir night. I carpool with two of the other choristers, Joy and Connie to the church in Elm Park where we rehearse.

On Monday of this past week, Elaine from Chase Cross Baptist invited Jess and I to come to her house for dinner while her son Mike was visiting fro the Philipines. We suspected her of trying to set him up with one of us...he intimated as much to us. We had a laugh.

On Tuesday, I joined Lyn, Jess, and Jen in going to the theatre to see Made in Dagenham. It is a film about the women machinists campaign at Ford in Dagenham to achieve equal pay with their male counterparts in the late 1960s.

On Thursday, I took up Joys offer (from choir) to come and use her electric piano to practice on. I have been asked to play at a wedding for a friend from the Mennonite church this coming Saturday, and I need to get my chops back in shape again after a long sabbatical from playing more than the odd hymn. I have also been stealing moments on the pianos at Richard Alibon when I find them free before school or at lunch for the same reason.

Friday I met two Newfie teachers who recently arrived here at the TimePlan social, a bowling event. Bowling didn't actually get started until 9:40, so I didn't bother, but I had a nice time with Ashley and Jen.

On Saturday, David and I went to the Lord Mayors Show in central London. It is a 600-plus year old parade that happens once a year, encompassing everything fro a show of the military(Marines, the Navy, arching bands, even tanks from WWII), some commercial enterprises (a fleet of plumber trucks), The Red Cross, the Blue Cross, church groups, representations of the different guilds that used to operate in England--one of which, farmers, had a combine represented in the parade--and lots of officials in carriages, on horses, and on foot.

Today I went to Chase Cross in the morning and opted to stay home this afternoon rather than fight the throngs of Londoners trying to get on the few remaining tube lines that are still open today.

Social life aside, school is going well. My housemate Jen, who had been out of a long-term job since the end of October, has a new job (a reception--like kindergarten--class which she likes--as of January, which they are preparing her for by easing her in two days a week for the rest of this term. They are also giving her some supply work, so she is feeling much better about her prospects here.

Ciao!

Visit to the Netherlands

A full week has elapsed since I returned from my trip to the Netherlands to visit friends I knew from Nigeria and had last seen almost 22 years ago. I had a wonderful time, and it is only because I have been busy with other things that I have not gotten around to updating this blog before now.

I arrived at Schipol airport around 6 pm on Tuesday, the 26th of October, where I was

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et by Djurre and Alis son and his girlfriend. We took the train back to Hoogeveen, about a two-hour trip from the airport, and Ali and Djurre were waiting for us when we got there. Over a delicious meal of soup and scones, we did some catching up...what each of our family members are up to now, etc. After looking at some photo albums, we went to bed, with plans to go into Meppel (a neighbouring town) the next day and look at Nigeria slides that night.

Their house is quite large by English standards, and my room was in the attic at the top of a set of stairs that were very nearly a ladder, they were so narrow. They have a lovely garden in the backyard, and a wall with a door into the neighbours backyard, which they frequently leave open.

The next day, we made the promised trip into Meppel, which, like many European cities and towns, is car-free in the centre. We visited an art gallery and saw the varied works of a talented artist named Jo Alting. In the afternoon, Ali took

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e to see the toy library where she works. For 25 euros, you join this lending library of puzzles, games, outdoor play toys and musical instruents. Their focus is on toys for children with disabilities, e.g. blind or autistic. It was very interesting to see, and very labour-intensive for the volunteers who work there--they have recently stopped keeping 1000-piece puzzles in stock because the labour to count them all each time a puzzle was returned was too much.

Ali and I in Meppel

That night, we had the most wonderful time looking at their old slides of our time in Nigeria, some of which Djurre and Ali had not looked at in decades, if ever. They told funny anecdotes about some of the experiences they had, and some of the people we knew there. It felt like coming home in many respects.

The next morning, we went to the community garden where Djurre has a plot of land. Despite thievery by mice and various other critters, he found two pails worth of produce to bring home. After a relaxed lunch and quiet tie at the house, we went out for a walk...somewhere not too far from Hoogeveen, though I couldnt tell you where. We ended up at a very quaint teashop, lovely spot.

a kerosene la

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p inviting us towards the tea shop on a walk

Then we headed home to celebrate Siebe Jan having passed his driving test that morning. He had already failed once and what with the cost involved--they had already spent about 2000 (almost 3000 CAD) euros on driving lessons and tests--was very uptight that he not fail again. So we celebrated the pass (his examiner told him he drove perfectly, high praise) with Dutch sausages, chips/fries, and several delicious salads made by Daniel.

Djurre and Ali with two of their three sons

On Friday, we drove north into Friesland to visit several Mennonite (or more specifically Menno Simons) sites. We went to Witmarsum first, where he was born and grew up. Outside Witmarsum there is a scuplture of an open church building in various colours to represent the diversity of the Mennonite church today, that was conceived by Alis brother, who is a conceptual designer. Then we went to Pingjum, his fathers hometown where he was appointed chaplain in 1524, where we went inside one of the secret churches that existed around 1600, shortly after Si

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ons death.

Djurre outside of one of the hidden churches, homes with secret meeting rooms in the back during the 17th century

We carried on to Zurich, where I stood on the dike looking out over the Wadden Sea on a very chilly (read windy) day. We had a lovely lunch in the town of Harlingen nearby, another town set on a canal system before heading back to their place to get ready to fly back to London. Their sons kindly took

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e to the airport again for

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y 930 pm flight.

Standing on the dike in Zurich (NL), with the Wadden Sea on my right, and the town on my left.

After an hour delay, and a rush to get to my gate a 25-min walk away (I cant say I am impressed with Schipol organization, in not publishing the gate number until the plane has landed, when it is a long walk and the plane is already late), I caught my plane and the flight back to London was uneventful. Then another almost 2-hour commute back ho

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e to Chase Cross.

Church Retreat

Hello again. I'm recently home from a church retreat in Aylesford. We had a wonderful time at The Friars, the home of a Carmelite monastic order. The beautiful buildings date back to the Middle Ages in a very quiet and contemplative setting.

The theme of the weekend, led by Wayne and Lois (Mennonite Mission Network pastors who are part of our church community) was on relationships--within ourselves, with others, the world and the natural environment. One of the highlights for me was the creative expressions of community that we came up with on Saturday morning in groups. Some people created a board gae while others created a sculpture, wrote a poem or created a photo collage. My group created a song, based on the song, Ubi Caritas. In between repetitions of the theme, we sustained the E and wove other elements around it...a litany of some of the things that people have to learn to live with as community over some vocal percussion, and a Gregorian chant naming some of the ways that we experience and deal with conflict, and then a Bible passage read over the drone, interwoven with the Ubi Caritas theme.

I also quite enjoyed the Cabaret evening on Saturday night. We had a rich variety of acts, everything for musical acts to an excellently dramatic rendition of The Highwayman, to a game show (Call my Bluff, like Balderdash/Dictionary) , and lots of humourous acts too. One I remember is the song one person sang called There Were Ten, Ten Constipated Men in the Bible (to the tune of There were Beans, Beans Trying on some Jeans In the Corner Grocery Store).

For instance,

Noah...who for forty days passed only water

Moses...who took two tablets

Peter....who was a rock

Paul...who laboured for the Lord

Titus...whose name says it all

It was quite a funny song, which she learned for a warden, who learned it from a group of nuns.

Comedy aside, we had a lovely weekend for it. There had been predictions of rain, but we only saw about 5 minutes of rain total all weekend. Sue and I had a nice walk yesterday afternoon, and after returning from that, I led a group of people in a music jamming session. Lots of fun.

It was nice to spend time in a relaxing setting with friends from Wood Green. Now I'm beginning my week of half-term holidays...off to the Netherlands on Tuesday. I will blog after that again.

Auf wiedersehen.

October

It has been almost a month since I last updated this blog. After Europe, I have had very little money to go anywhere or do anything, so I have spent quite a bit of time at home or exploring around my community on foot. Even more importantly, we cancelled the BT pay-as-you-go phone/internet package that my housemate Anne had on September 18, and after more than four weeks, my provider Sky has still not managed to reconnect us. It has been an eye-opening experience. In Canada, there is an attitude that the customer is always right, and usually businesses try very hard to look after their customers. Here there is no such attitude...rather, they only answer the questions you ask, and if you are not aware enough to know what questions to ask, they won't volunteer any extra information to you. The onus is very much on the consumer/client to do all the legwork, to make sure they get looked after. While in Europe this summer, we noticed a much more relaxed attitude towards being out of things as well. If a restaurant was out of the first three things you tried to order, you just had to keep going until you found something that they did have...and no apologies for it either.

I have found good friends in my housemates and the house of teachers just down the road. Jessica (the other house) and I have attended the Baptist church in Chase Cross several times, which is very friendly. We have had several invites to dinner already. I just joined a choir in Hornchurch too. It gives me an opportunity to exercise my voice and my piano skills, as the only pianist is the conductor, who is usually not there for the first 15-20 minutes, and who was unable to make it last week.

My keyboard is being stupid and not writing m's, I have to copy and paste them in (and apostrophes and colons have disappeared altogether...sigh...two-year old Toshiba laptops suck), so I think Ill cut it short here.

Ciao!

Hardship Ahead for Education in Britain

Hello again. The kids returned to school two-and-a-half weeks ago now, but things have been really quiet for those of us on supply. My housemate Jen got one day of work last week when she went in for a PPA (prep teacher) trial day, which instead of the interview and time spent getting to know the school a bit she expected, turned out to be merely a "fill-the-hole" supply day. I got one day of work on Monday this week, supplying in a Yr 5 class in Barking, thankfully at a school I was familiar with. I had a good day, nice kids. However, other than those experiences, neither Jen nor I has had any other work yet, despite calling in at 7 am every morning.

I have spent the time at home walking around my area, getting to know Collier Row, Havering-atte-Bower, Chase Cross, and Romford better. I've also spent a lot of time on the phone with Sky, as we have been trying to cancel my housemate Anne's media package and get mine established at the house. Every person I talk to seems to have a different message, but the latest message seems to be that we have to wait 14 days after the BT broadband is cancelled to set up my Sky broadband. Not sure about the phone. So we are currently phoneless (well, landline-less) and internet-less until that transfer happens. We're watching more TV as my Sky TV could be transferred immediately, since there was no cable TV in the house when I arrived.

As well, we're getting to know our new neighbours, Jessica and Chelsea, two Canadians who are living just down the street from us. We get along well...Jen is out with them today in London doing some touristy stuff...I decided to stay in Romford and get some things accomplished here instead. We're planning a birthday party for Jen on Sunday night with them.

I had dinner with Peter and Muriel, a retired headteacher and his teacher wife--both from Chase Cross Baptist, which I've been attending the last few weeks--last night. We had a lovely time and it was very interesting to get their perspective on the education system currently. They were talking about how schools are doing their best to avoid using supply teachers and paying the agency fees by calling back retired teachers and by moving teachers around internally within the school. Muriel, for instance is a resource teacher, and she gets moved into supply cover if someone is away. I've also heard of EAs being charged (even for several weeks at a time) with teaching a class when the teacher is away, doing all the work of a teacher without the qualifications or remunerative pay (EAs earn approximately half what teachers make). All of these strategies are becoming increasingly common now as schools are under intense pressure to cut costs. Peter's comment was that he is quite happy to be retired now, as it's anyone's guess how things are going to shape up as the budget cuts become more clear. I have heard that government departments are going to be cut an average of 25% with certain departments facing cuts potentially as high as 40%.

Then I asked Anne this morning what she thought the chances of Jen and I getting work this week were, and she indicated "Not good." She said schools have to cut £1, 000, 000.00 from their budget this year, a figure I hadn't heard before. I wondered aloud what work there was going to be for agency teachers this year, and her response was that schools like taking on agency teachers for short-term contracts because they don't have to pay benefits or holidays and they can fire with short notice.

I'm not sure what all of this means for me. For the moment, I'm on guaranteed supply, which means TimePlan has to pay me for 8/10 days every fortnight, but of course it will not be sustainable for them to maintain that for very long if I (and every other guaranteed teacher) is only working 2/10 days. So I shall wait and see what develops.

Lisbon-Home

Our second-last full day of the trip...we got up around 8 and I ate my fruit skewer as Karen packed. Then we caught an airport bus, arriving at Barcelona Airport around 9:30. We ate our pastries from La Mie Calime as we waited for our departure on TAP flight at 11 am.

I was tired when we arrived in Lisbon, so had a nap in our very comfortable hostel room, as Karen went out to explore. We found some lovely things (scarves, earrings, etc) for sale and I found a doll for my young friends Rosie and Dieunnie--a bit too small for them yet, but their mother can hold onto it for them until they're old enough. Then we walked along the waterfront, through a slightly sketchy area towards the restaurant we wanted to eat at. After much wandering and map-reading, we found it, but discovered that it was not open until 8:30 (we had arrived at 7:15). So we walked down the path we had walked up, bought some drinks, and found the metro station. We had considered the bus, but a friendly local told us not to take it--"You'll never get there!" We took a few photos down by the waterfront and then retraced our steps up the slippery cobbled stairs to the fado restaurant.

It was a lovely meal. To begin, we had a deep-fried fish/vegetable snack with bread and butter. Then I had 5 pieces (!) of pork loin with potatoes, onions, and flavoured rice with sausage in it. Karen had medium steak with fried egg and chipped potatoes. As I had way too much food, and Karen wasn't wild about her steak, we traded meals halfway through. As to the music, fado is a type of music that is typically mournful and is frequently characterized by themes about the life of the poor or the sea. There was a guitarist and a Portuguese guitarist (I had to look it up to find out what this other stringed instrument was) as well as two female singers who alternated singing. So there were about 20 minute sets in which everyone put their forks and knives down and listened to the music in between which they'd turn the lights up and resume serving. Karen and I appeared to be the only people there who didn't speak Portuguese, and frequently most of the gathered assembly would join in for the chorus of a familiar song. It was neat to be part of, though it was also the greatest language barrier we faced during the whole trip as we didn't speak Portuguese and they didn't speak English.

The next morning, we had breakfast at Lisbon Story Guesthouse. It really was a lovely place to stay, with an inviting common room with lots of cushions to sit on--just so long as you're young enough to get back up again! The staff were really helpful and even let me print something off without charging for it.

After breakfast, we headed to the Santa Justa Lift, a tower that enabled us to get a nice view of Lisbon. Then we met Ali, a Senegalese man who had friends in Montreal. He was delighted to talk to us, and offered us necklaces--valued at 15 euros each (Karen got an amber one, I got one with a blue stone whose name I don't remember) --within ten minutes of meeting us. We reluctantly took them and turned to say goodbye. As we walked away, he asked us if we could give him some money to help him feed his family. We offered the necklaces back but he was absolutely insistent that we take them, even if we didn't give him anything in return. So I dug 6 euros out of my change purse and we said goodbye. We took Tram 28, an old heritage tram with wood-pannelled walls inside through the hills of Lisbon, the old town. I loved seeing all the Portuguese tiles decorating the outside--and inside--of buildings. Here's a sampling.

After lunch, we walked toward the harbour for a boat ride. We asked an information person where we could go on a short boat ride and she suggested St. Charles Islands. However, when we got to the station, there was no St. Charles listed anywhere. No schedule was printed anywhere and the agents spoke no English. So we finally got on a boat going to Barreiro, that was supposed to be a half-hour ride. We got to a harbour that said San Bento after about 20 minutes and proceeded to sit there for about ten minutes. We finally decided that if it was going to take so long to get to Barreiro, we'd better just jump off here, wherever we were, and have a look around before finding a boat back to our hostel. So we got off the boat and then discovered that the Barreiro train station was just behind the boat station. As it turned out there wasn't much of anything at Barreiro except a train station, we quickly returned to the boat area and picked up the next boat back to Lisbon.

After a quick supper close to our hostel, I grabbed my things to go to the airport. (Karen was leaving the following morning at 8 am. ) We went down to the street so I could catch the airport bus and it arrived almost as soon as we did. Since they took cash only, I paid, gave Karen my remaining euros (she was running low on cash) and quickly said goodbye.

One minute down the road, I realized that I didn't have one bag...Karen had thoughtfully carried it for me and when we hurriedly said goodbye, I forgot to take it from her. I thought about what was in it--a few souvenirs, a bit of food, some books for the plane, my trip journal, and my airline ticket and Gatwick Express ticket (for returning home to London late that night) and quickly decided that it wasn't worth it to me to go back. I knew from previous experience that I could fly just by showing my passport, and I had my reservation number for the train ticket stored on my mobile phone. And since neither of us had enough cash left to take another bus/taxi to the airport without withdrawing more cash if I got off the bus now, I thought I'd just let Karen take my bag home with her.

So I got to the airport, and suddenly thought that given my late flight--I was scheduled to land at Gatwick at 11:30-- and the fact that I no longer had my carry-on bag--that it would be quicker if I just took my knapsack as a carry-on. So I went through security and had my jam from Avignon confiscated--no, I hadn't thought about that being a liquid--and proceeded to look for a crossword book to replace the one I had left with Karen. Just as I was returning to my lounge to await takeoff, I had a call from my mother saying that Karen had come to the airport with my bag and was waiting for me near Gates 37-43. This was around 8:25, and my plane had originally been slated to depart at 9:00, but now it was delayed an hour. So I tried to get back out of security, and had problems with the staff, who didn't want to let me back out and who also made me dump out my bag several times to show them the toothpaste in my bag that kept setting off the alarm system. When I was feeling absolutely frustrated and ready to give up and forget the stupid bag, I finally ran into an agent who helped me. He asked me to describe Karen and then found her. He took me through a staff-only passageway so that I could--without leaving security--accept the bag from Karen. She was standing on one side of a wall that was a bit higher than waist-level and I was standing on the other side. She handed over the bag and I said goodbye again and went on to my gate.

The flight was more than an hour delayed, so it was about 12:40 by the time we got into Gatwick. Knowing that the last train from Gatwick was at 12:30 and that the Tube shuts down at 1:00 am, I knew that I had two choices...pay a fistful of money for a taxi home, or sit on night buses for a six-hour journey home. I chose the painful option of 106 pounds for a taxi. I guess at that time of night, there are only the large van taxis available, no cheaper minicabs, and where I'm living now is out in Zone 6, rather than Zone 4 as Barking was. So we drove to Romford, but because the cab driver wasn't familiar with Chase Cross and the GPS wasn't registering my address since it's a new residential area, he finally dropped me off in Romford. So I caught another cab home for another 10 pounds.

Thankfully when I got to my new house, the key worked and I found all my things waiting for me. To bed about 2:30. So I had an exciting/stressful end to a very memorable trip around Europe.