In between courses

So you might ask why I haven’t been updating my blog very diligently.  I’ve probably just been through (part of at least) the busiest time of year for Bridge Builders.  We have a section during the winter months where we have a course in February followed by a course in March followed by a course in April.  Adding to this were a couple of one-off workshop days.  I just got done with the March course and didn’t really take any time off following it (like I normally do) because I’m now going on holiday for a week.  Following my holiday (in Athens and Greece) I’ll have about two weeks before the next course (a week long course) followed by two weeks when my parents will be visiting.  Needless to say it’s a very very very busy period of time for me.  The only fortunate part of all of this is that the courses are relatively similar in that they are all the foundation course Bridge Builders offers.  The differences between them are: location, people on the course (two are for anyone, while one was just for “Senior Church Leaders”), and trainers.  The first course in February was co-trained by Alastair and Liz.  The March course was done by Alastair and Colin and the April course will be done by Colin and Sandra.  In all of those I’m the ‘observer/assistant.‘

I saw some fireworks from the Chinese New Year, but didn't get any good pictures.  Too much smoke from Leicester square, but fun to watch.

This summer is looking pretty nice considering how busy we’ve been and I’ll continue to be.  Given that I’m taking a week off in between courses means I’ll just be hyper busy for the days I am in the office.  I worked a normal day monday (9-6) and then a longer day Tuesday (9-6 & 7-9:30) followed by a couple of hours before I left for the airport on Wednesday (7:30-9am).  This really isn’t that bad, but coming off of a course where we typically were busy/on from 7am till 10pm M-F with an 8 hr day on Sunday it adds up.  Plus the fact that I got a bit of a cold at the end of the course.  Fortunately I’ve shaken it (as of last night) and have really started to feel better.

Some pictures from Sheffield (the March course).  The conference centre was right on the edge of Sheffield (pop. 1 million maybe???), but had access to a nearby farmish type area.  I took some pictures of the chickens and lambs for the benefit of my mom.  I thought she’d appreciate.  Interestingly the lambs seemed to have numbers which corresponded to a momma sheep.  Some of them were a little camera shy, but I caught a couple off guard.

The real difference between the March course (for Senior Church Leaders) and the other courses is that it is designed for leaders who have a large amount of oversight over many congregations.  Many as in some had responsibility for over three hundred....not light work at all.  The course was then structured slightly different toward the end of the week with a larger emphasis on analysing the level of conflict and appropriate interventions.  The people on this course were really high quality.  Questions were high in quality and very engaging.  They really didn’t let you take a moment off.  Higher stress for Alastair and Colin as co-trainers, but just more interesting for me (at this point).  Had a lot of really interesting conversations over the course of the week.  The one that stuck out to me the most was with a man named Adrian.  Over lunch we discussed the change in British society from being a more supporting society to one that is much more individualised.  From Adrian’s perspective the change came about from Margaret Thatcher’s time pushing for education on a “for me” basis and influence from what England saw from the United States in push for the “individual.”  Interesting to me because England now is suffering from much of the same problems of individuals in the states (have education but no jobs available and saddled with debt from such education).  Prior to Thatcher’s administration the country didn’t have as many higher degrees, but people also didn’t have debt from education.  Now funding for education is in the tubes and people are paying out of pocket in the US and suffering when they can’t find decent work to pay off loans.  Not sure that I see a “solution” anywhere, but it’s a difficult to deal with because the government preaches getting education, but when the jobs don’t follow, it just doesn’t make for a good situation down the road.

Andrew Bontrager was also in London while I was up in Sheffield.  Before I left we went on some walking tours around central London.  Saw a lot of the palaces/guards/etc.. and then some of the older parts of east-central London.  Two tours in all.  Well worth it, but now that I know most of the information so they probably wouldn’t be much interest to me anymore.  Oh well, maybe I can give them for others when they’re around London.

I haven’t really given too much thought to what I might do/where I might go this summer, but a couple of ideas floating in my mind are either traveling around England and doing some hiking (perhaps the three tallest peaks in the England/Scotland/Wales) or getting a continues rail ticket and traveling around Europe going to Paris and going to Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, etc...we’ll see how adventurous I am after I get back from Athens.

I should have some time to update my blog regarding my Athens trip once I’m back since Easter weekend isn’t that far off from when I get back (and I get Good Friday / “Easter Monday” off).  Cheers!

Waiting for Godot

(meant to post this a while ago, but here's a short update)

So I'm into a fairly busy time with work/life in London.  Just finished a week long course that was held in London (in Feb) and will be having two more courses over the next two months.  Basically is a set up of: prepare for course, do training course, recover from course, catch up from where you left work before you left, prepare for next course, rinse, repeat.  It'll likely leave me very ready for holiday time I have coming in March (heading to Athens, Greece) and when my parents come in late April/into early May.

Before the last course I did a little bit of sightseeing.  Some pictures of an ice sculpture made for the winter olympics.

Two pictures of a Roman wall that still runs throughout London.

After the last course I decided to go to a show - waiting for Godot.  It had Ian McKellen, who for those of you who don't know was Gandalf in Lord of the Rings, as one of the main actors.  Pretty darn good seats (cost 11 pounds and were front row - special tickets I got by waiting outside the box office on the day of) where I really could have grabbed the actor's feet at one point.

Ambulance Chopper Lands on the Streets!

So I got to see something I don't think happens very often...an ambulance chopper landed in front of my bus (heading north on the 134 for those who know London) at Tufnell Park.  The streets in every direction were blocked off by the police.  Someone was "under a train" down in the northern line of the tube.  So the tube was shut down for much of the northern line and then above ground the corresponding above ground bus route got shut down from the chopper coming in for a landing.  I didn't stick around to see if they airlifted anyone out.  I ended up beating the bus I ditched home as I walked the same route home.  

A couple blurry shots (sorry I was working quickly) of the chopper to prove it happened (as it's likely not newsworthy to anyone else).  It's just the first time I've ever seen a chopper land in a major city to airlift someone out.  The chopper really blows up a lot of dirt when you are close...

On a lighter note I was down at the British Museum today for a tour called "The British Museum & the Bible."  Really fascinating.  It was organised by the church St James of Muswell Hill.  The guide was from day one tours.  It was just really neat to have items from the museum linked to events that happened in the Bible.  Interestingly enough, Clive, our guide, said that the British Museum typically did not link scripture from the Bible to items on display, but there were a couple of exceptions.  The most interesting part for me was hearing about how different letters Paul wrote were linked to what people could resonate with at the time.  Clive would point out parts of the artwork which linked to the time period (and city) to which Paul was writing.

2010

So it is now the year 2010.  I ended up spending my Holiday relaxing quite a bit and just enjoying the peace of not "having to do anything."  Quite enjoyable, but not as much to report.

The pictures below are from my trip to Cambridge at King's College to see 'Nine lessons and Carols' on x-mas eve.  In short, wonderful experience, LONG wait (queued at 6:20 am to be let in at 1:30 pm for a 3 pm service - no tickets issued, your ticket is waiting in line).  Not sure I would do it again, but great to have had the experience.  The train up to Cambridge was one of the really fast ones...smooth as ever, wish we had trains like it in the States running east/west (I think there is a bullet train DC/NYC).

A cool clock where the grasshopper on top moved as well as the lights (hour/minute/second)...

Proof BBC was there to broadcast it live.

Just a couple smart people on that banner.

Part of the choir which came out early to sing for us.

The amazing fan ceiling.  Largest in the world.

The next set of pictures are from the New Year's Day parade in London... it was a little cold out so I didn't stay for the whole thing (got next to the road, but couldn't really move much to stay warm so my feet got cold.  H.S. bands from all around the States (and one from Japan too) played it it, as well as a float from each borough, and some other randomish groups.  A seeing eye dog training group walked through, but got held up for a little while.  I felt bad for them.  I helped walk some dogs from the Humane Society in a x-mas parade in Boulder last year and know how hard it is to keep 20+ dogs semi-calm in that environment.  Some were in better stages of training than others!!  I also interestingly saw TWO groups from Colorado.  One from Colorado Springs and the other from Broomfield of all places.

Some sort of Donkey society...no kidding!

One dog is very well behaved

Some pictures of the snow we've had after the Holidays...stuck to the trees like nothing else.

Since the new year I've been back to work with Bridge Builders.  We are getting ready to run a course (the foundation course) in early February, followed by another for Senior Church Leaders (meaning Archdeacon/Bishop, etc... not 'old' church leaders :-) ) in March, and another in April.  Between the busyness of courses and life I'm feeling like the next couple of months will fly by.  We are loosing our current host couple, Ed & Phyllis Shirk on 6 February when their three-year assignment ends and they head back to Colorado.  Taking their place will be Darrell and Barbara Jantz (from Oklahoma).  The Jantz's arrive next Wednesday and will overlap with Ed & Phyllis for about a week and a half.  It will be sad to see Ed & Phyllis leave, but that's the nature of living at the LMC, people are always leaving/arriving throughout everyone's time.

We just had a network day yesterday (one off workshop for people who have taken Bridge Builders' courses as a sort of review/expansion of information from courses) on Mediation.  It was focused on the 'healing strategies' part of interpersonal mediation.  Makes me look forward to taking the Mediating Interpersonal Conflicts course Bridge Builders' offers in July.

Another activity I have started helping with is a local night shelter up in Muswell Hill (north of where I live - where I typically shop for groceries).  The shelter is run at local churches in Muswell Hill during 12 weeks in the winter where their main shelter apparently can't take everyone.  The church I am helping with, St James, offered for an initial 6 weeks and then picked up another 6 weeks when the need was expressed again.  I helped with a night shift the night before last.  It consisted of arriving at around 9:45 pm, staying up with one other person while people slept until around 3 am when another set of people would stay awake while we slept until 6:30/7.  Interestingly the majority of the homeless in this area are black immigrants.  In another area of London (south east of where I am), the homeless population is mostly from eastern Europe, such as Bulgaria.  Differs dramatically from homeless populations which I have interacted with in the States where many are war veterans.

Last night I was up past 3 am again because I went to see the movie Avatar in 3-D at the IMAX theatre.  The only showing I could get a decent seat for was at 12:20 am...Tomorrow I am heading to the British Museum for a tour with the topic 'British Museum and the Bible'  Should be interesting, but it won't let me sleep in :(.