Category: Uncategorized

Before Paula’s thought provoking guest blog on her life in Africa, I had started to do a guest post about my tourist view during a ‘Safari Lite’ of four different countries in Southern Africa.   Paula’s experiences made me feel so inadequate I shelved the project.  People like Paula and Sheila make me feel quite humble by the amount of energy they put into helping others in need while I spend great chunks of my life travelling for my own pleasure.  And then I thought back to the key themes about which I had planned to write – education and opportunity.

During our travels in South Africa, Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe, we encountered many people who looked after us in hotels,  Safari Lodges, or in the various shops where we bought colourful and beautifully crafted souvenirs.  Almost without exception they were all delightful, friendly and talkative people, keen to ask about our life and also to tell us of their hopes and aspirations.  They admitted that they were desperately trying to improve their English as that was a requirement for just about all the better paying jobs.  I found it really heartening how anxious people were to get on, at the same time, especially in Zimbabwe where unemployment is 80%. I was saddened by the thought that ‘getting on’ would mean most of them leaving their homes and families.

Our safari guides, drivers and trackers were especially enthusiastic about the opportunities ‘Safari Tourism’ has given them.  Just as Exodus Travels train their porters and guides for the Kilimanjaro climb, good safari companies or reserves also train their people.  One of our guides told us how outwith the Safari season, he is sent to school where he learns about nature conservancy and how to protect the animals on his patch.  His ambition was to go to work in a special reserve for rhinoceros – an animal rapidly heading for extinction in Southern Africa.  The breed has been hunted more of less to extinction in Asia, where there is still the ridiculous idea that rhino horn restores potency.  Our guide laughed when he said that the Asian men would be as well collecting their nail clippings.  Ugh!

Another senior guide was busy studying for exams that would let him become a wildlife instructor and possibly lead to research projects.  A driver, who was already a trained guide, was working as a driver simply to improve his English and driving skills; his ambition was to form his own safari company.  He was engaged to a girl who cooked for a safari lodge, with a younger sister a housekeeper there.  They, with help from their families, were building their own lodge that his wife-to-be and sister in law would run to western standards.  All that was needed to make their dream a reality was another season of driving to provide enough money to buy their own Toyota “animal viewer”.   I think Leslie (17 July) would be proud of their ‘dream’.  There were so many more stories of hope and ambition in the Safari industry,  that I ended the holiday feeling not too bad about being a well off tourist in a poor country.

There was however, another side to this desire to get an education and get on.  In Namibia, we were lucky enough to visit a small, traditional village of about eighty people, where nearly everybody was related to each other; sensibly, the young men were sent to other villages to bring back wives.  The age profile was noticeable.  There were quite a few elderly women (possibly about fifty but that is old given the toughness of their lives).  The ‘Village Elder’ was in his early forties and there were no elderly men to be seen as most had died, and most of the younger men were away from the village – either working the land or if very lucky working for one of the Safari Companies, the most sought after work.  The younger women about the village had young families – the unmarried ones being away working in shops and hotels. Everybody lived in traditional mud huts, increasingly with corrugated iron roofs, as the elephants – carefully conserved on the reserves – had destroyed the reed beds that traditionally gave them the insulating thatching for the mud huts.  So that was one downside of animal conservation.  Our Head Man showed us around and told us about village life.  Children from the age of six go to school in the nearest village about four miles away, where they ‘board’ with friends or relations during the week, and then some move to the towns or cities for secondary education.  Our Elder was very proud that his two daughters (but not his sons) were in the town.  His greatest wish was that his daughters should go to University.  I thought,  “What an amazingly liberated, and far-sighted man, pushing his daughters to an education”.   I just about exploded with laughter when he said that if his daughters got degrees, he would get twice as many cows when a suitor came a-courting!

Come to think about it, we never had a female guide, tracker or driver.  Maybe Sheila and Jae will help inspire a generation of females round Kilimanjaro.

 

When US President Barack Obama was in Kenya at the end of July, he mentioned in an interview with Capital FM that climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, the 5895 meter (19,341 foot) peak, Africa’s highest mountain, just over the border in Tanzania, was on his bucket list for after his presidency.  He said:

“I know that there are places in this beautiful nation that I haven’t discovered, so I am gonna make sure I get back, and it is not just Kenya, it is an ecosystem connected from Uganda to Tanzania.  Climbing Kilimanjaro seems like something that should be on my list of things to do once I get out of here. The Secret Service generally doesn’t like me climbing mountains, but as a private citizen hopefully I can get away with something like that.”

So Jae, Oscar and I can consider that we are pretty lucky to be getting the chance to do something that the American President can’t at present.  When I think about it, it must be quite scary doing something you might fail at in the public eye, when you are a famous person.  At least if the 3G climbers don’t quite make it, the whole world won’t know – just our few hundred loyal supporters, who, I am sure, will all comfort us with kind words.

There have been some very famous people on Kilimanjaro. Radio One DJ Chris Moyles famously made it to Uhuru Peak in 2009 along with a team of celebrities including Gary Barlow and Cheryl Cole, to raise money for Comic Relief.  Weighing 20-stone, Chris was certainly not in top-condition for the climb, but he made it all the same!  That makes me wonder why we have bothered about keeping fit and getting our BMI’s into the lower part of the healthy scale.

Just going to prove that money cannot buy everything, Billionaire and Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich, did not make it all the way to the Roof of Africa, and had to abandon his attempt to climb Mount Kilimanjaro after suffering breathing problems…

As did tennis legend Martina Navratilova, who set out to conquer Mount Kilimanjaro in 2010.  Hoping the climb would help her overcome a tough year, the nine-time Wimbledon winner was overcome by a combination of altitude sickness and a stomach infection, which led to her being carried down the mountain on a makeshift stretcher and hospitalised.

Money, fame, and physical fitness may not help you get to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro.  Let’s hope that willpower, determination and the knowledge that all of our family and friends back home are supporting us, may just do the trick!

Today’s guest post comes from Jae’s Exodus colleague, Thidara. She has her own adventure travel blog and you can read about her Kilimanjaro summit climb earlier this year here. Thidara has done the below photo blog post just for us – to give us a taste of the different climates we’ll go through on the Lemosho route.

Kilimanjaro is a rare place in the world where you trek through four climatic zones in under a week.

From a humid African rainforest to a volcanic crater filled with snow and ice, I started the journey with shorts and a t-shirt and I ended it wearing 5 layers of clothing beneath a down jacket. It’s a surreal experience and the Lemosho Route is an unspoilt and crowd-free route up to the summit.

It is a breath-taking journey. Trekkers will pass through:

• Rainforest 800-2800m
• Heather and Moorland 2800-4000m:
• Alpine Desert 4000-5000m
• Summit Zone 5000-5895m

Below are some photos of the scenery you will encounter in each of the climate zones.

Rainforest 800-2800m (Day 1 – 2)

Heather and Moorland 2800-4000m (Day 3 – 5)

Alpine Desert 4000-5000m, Day 5 – 6

Summit Zone Day 7

All of the photos are Thidara’s own.

Thidara has lent us her gloves for our climb – they’ve already been to the top so maybe they’ll help lead us up!?

Stew and I had an outing to the Kent (CAMRA) Beer Festival on a farm near Canterbury one weekend recently with Jae, Oscar and Ivor, when they came for a visit.  We have been going there pretty much annually for more than 20 years, as our collection of beer glasses attests.  I am quite surprised we have glasses that old, given that they are in regular use in our house.  I don’t drink beer, but am quite partial to an occasional glass of cider, and that is served up too.  I especially enjoy going because it is a very pleasant walk across a few fields for us to get there from home, and there is usually good food – including excellent curries – and entertainment too.

This time, there was an extra attraction: we could practise our circus skills.  Jae, Oscar and Ivor had fun trying out various activities.  Jae is a great juggler, and the boys are pretty skilled too.  I decided – in the interests of maintaining my fitness for the Kiliclimb – that I should have a go at a hula hoop, and was extremely gratified to discover that I can still whirl it as well as ever.

I had not tried a hula hoop since 1958.  I thought that was the year of the hoop and have since looked it up on Wikipedia, which states:-

“A hula hoop is a toy hoop that is twirled around the waist, limbs or neck. The modern hula hoop was invented in 1958 by Arthur K. “Spud” Melin and Richard Knerr, but children and adults around the world have played with hoops, twirling, rolling and throwing them throughout history.”

So 1958 it clearly was!  That must have been about the time we got television at home in Hawick – the south of Scotland was not first off the mark in that respect.  Every day we saw news about this exciting hoop craze rolling across the United States, and due to hit the UK imminently.  My little brother Robbie became absolutely obsessed with the idea of having one, despite only being 7 years old.

He set out to do his research and discovered which shop in our town was going to be the first to get hula hoops and on what date.  At that time we got 3d a week pocket money – slightly more than a modern 1p – but worth much more. However, it certainly wasn’t enough to buy a hula hoop: they cost almost £1.  He had to make a visit to the Post Office to withdraw this enormous sum, saved up from money given to him on his birthdays and at Christmas by our Grandparents (£1 each time) and Yanos, our great aunt (10/-  or 50p, on each occasion).

He and I headed off across town on the great morning when the hula hoops arrived, to a shop across from the station (now long gone) where he chose a bright yellow hoop, the minute the shop opened – which resulted in his first moment of fame!  The local Hawick newspaper ran a feature about this exciting new craze sweeping the world, with a photograph of Robbie holding his hoop – the first in town!  We all quickly became proficient at doing the spin, and the article also mentioned that I claimed to have spun it round me over 2565 times without stopping.  I remember being quite upset by the word “claimed”, given that I had had four witnesses counting.

Robbie has always had a keen eye for innovation, particularly in the music industry.  He didn’t attend school any more after the age of 14, but got himself established in the music world while while still a teenager – soon after the Beatles and all that followed them, burst on to the scene.

He has had quite a few moments of fame since then.  His firm – Sound Technology Ltd – is one of the largest independent distributors of music instruments and professional audio products in the UK.  He has also for many years been the Director of Music for Youth – a national music education charity for young people.

Robbie is still a keep fit fanatic.  I am quite certain that he too can still swing a hula hoop.  He is also a big supporter of the 3G Kili Climb, both as far as keeping up morale is concerned and by making the biggest donation yet to our fund raising effort.  Thanks little brother!

Note from Jae: Despite having almost 200 posts on this blog, we haven’t yet had a single one from a man. Well, today that changes as my lovely Da has put the following together for us. Thanks Da (for joining in with the blog – although I’m not sure I’m thanking you for the pics!!).

You never know what you’ll come across in our house these days. The other weekend we have Jae, Oscar and his young brother Ivor to stay. We’re sitting in the living room in all apparent normality when Jae, who has been deep in iPhonery, jumps up and cries, ‘Oscar! Mum! 7-minute workout!’

Oscar immediately gets up and assumes the position (whatever the initial position was). Sheila assumes an approximation of same. (Ivor is nowhere to be seen.) There then begins a volley of instructions from the phone –

‘Shoulder rolls!’

‘Step-ups!’

‘Plank!’

‘High knees!’

‘Push-up and rotation!’

‘Crunch!’

– and a great deal of leaping about, sitting or lying down, standing up and twisting in various directions, accompanied by cries of ‘Is it nearly finished?’, ‘This is still the warm-up’, and the like.

I’ve been instructed to get out the camera to take 3G tee-shirt snaps, so am able to record these girations for posterity, or at least for the blog and the family album – see the below action shots.

I must say, in our youth we didn’t find it necessary to prepare so assiduously for assaults on, say, the formidable slopes of Cathkin Braes or, as has been mentioned, the mighty North Berwick Law. Mind you, we weren’t being sponsored then, so I suppose the burden of responsibility was less. In fact, I am glad to have the opportunity of reassuring backers that no opportunity is being missed to hone our Kilimanjarists to a fine point of dynamic sharpness.

Which reminds me, Sheila and I said we’d mount an expedition this afternoon, through the foothills of the East Kent range. Excuse me.

NB. The app we were using is the Johnson & Johnson 7-minute workout

In June of this year a beautiful tapestry, “The Mystic Hunt of the Unicorn”, the final one in a set of seven tapestries, entitled The Unicorn Tapestries, was hung in the royal apartments of  Stirling Castle in Scotland. This brought to an end an incredibly complex and difficult project which took 14 years to complete. These tapestries were all woven by hand using techniques dating back to the 1400s that require highly skilled, complex, and painstaking work – a labour of love, just like the daily writing of the 3G blog. All seven were commissioned specially for Stirling Castle in 2001 as part of a scheme to restore the interiors of the palace to how they looked in the 1540s when it was home to James V of Scotland, his wife and their young daughter, Mary Queen of Scots.

Four of the seven tapestries were woven in a purpose-built studio within Stirling Castle. Over the years when I went to Scotland to see our step-sister Jan, who lived in Stirling, she took me to see the weavers at work. As she paid council tax she was eligible to pop into the Castle whenever she wanted, free of charge, and this she did and so she saw the progress of the project and pictures gradually appearing.  Sadly Jan died just before Christmas last year and Sheila and I both miss her very much.

After James V’s marriage to a Frenchwoman, Mary of Guise, his palace in Stirling began to change as she introduced Renaissance refinement into the predominantly medieval Scottish way of life. Soon French fashion and ideas arrived in the Scottish court as messengers came back from France bringing Mary bolts of fine cloth, plant cuttings, masons and probably tapestries. We know from inventories that James owned over 100 tapestries; hanging them on stone walls was the only way to keep the huge rooms even remotely warm. We also know that at least two of the tapestries featured “The historie of the unicorne”.  At that time the unicorn was to be seen in the Scottish royal coat of arms and later, in 1603,  it came to England, to take its place in the royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom when James VI, son of Mary Queen of Scots, became King James 1 of England. By the way, since according to legend a free unicorn was considered a very dangerous and powerful beast, the poor heraldic unicorn is always portrayed in chains. But he could by tamed by a virgin, so they say.

Inspiration and know-how for the unicorn tapestries came from the Metropolitan Museum of New York (which has a set of seven tapestries woven in the early 1500s in the Low Countries) and from West Dean Tapestry Studios in West Sussex where some of the weavers teach.  This was the biggest weaving project undertaken in the UK for 100 years and brought together an international team of 18 weavers. It reminds me a little of the daily 3G Kili Climb blog that Jae and Sheila have been writing for over five months now; a big project that is hard work. Fortunately they are supported by friends and family, with guest blogs like this one helping to keep the project going.  Jae, Sheila and team, keep going. The end is in sight!

All regular readers of this blog will know that Sheila, Jae and Oscar are going on a big journey.  They will be travelling well over four thousand miles and climbing 5,895 metres.  However, they are not the only ones taking a journey.  Thanks to Sheila’s efforts, I know that many of the regular readers are taking their own personal journeys stimulated by Sheila’s posts.  At least one – Megan (who blogged about the butterfly effect) – was so inspired that she has booked a Kili climb for her honeymoon; that is enthusiasm!  Others have been inspired to get fit and I believe that more than a few have risen to the challenge of volunteering.  The work that Sheila is doing with Catching Lives is truly inspiring.

I too have taken several journeys with Sheila, many years ago and over the last few months.  Some of you may have read an early guest post I wrote about how Sheila and I ended up sharing a bed-sit and then a flat while at University.  With hindsight, I realise that this was a major journey for both of us, our first, sometimes faltering steps, to independence and adulthood.  Belatedly I must give Sheila my grateful thanks for being there – she was much more practical and resourceful than I, the best possible companion when times were tough.  And these times were tough. Like Leslie and Sheila I had very unhappy times in my teens (the death of my mother and the rapid introduction of a stepmother). These bad memories (and some that followed) had crowded out my memories of earlier times.  Now, after reading Sheila’s entertaining blogs, especially about ‘the olden days’, my own memories have surfaced.  My childhood was not all bad; I feel as if I have regained my childhood.  So I have another reason to be grateful to Sheila.

As a lighthearted example, I have been a bit of a foodie since as far back as I can remember, always keen to taste new food and collecting recipes from all round the world.  My mother was a dreadful cook – even allowing for the post WW2 period and on-going rationing.  Everything she produced was brown, beige or grey.  As far as I can make out no one else in my family has any interest in food apart from listening for the ‘ping’ of the microwave. So where did I get this obsession with food?

Sheila’s recent post that mentioned the food department of Lewis’s (a large department store in Glasgow in our childhood) took me right back to there.  The mystery was solved.  My dad was the Foodie – possibly one of the original.  From when I was about three or four until I was seven or eight, we made a weekly pilgrimage to Lewis’s.  Dad wasn’t particularly well off at that time and yet he was determined to learn about the delicacies he read of in books.  I remember him smooth-talking the young ladies to let us try a tiny taste of this and that. We both agreed that we really liked smoked salmon but it was far too expensive. Instead he bought a large tube of “Primula” processed cheese with smoked salmon.  And then he bough a jar of pimento stuffed olives.  Such luxury.  We went home as excited as two children and immediately piped the salmon flavoured cheese (there was a built in star nozzle) on to little biscuits and placed an olive on top.  Mum and Dad were expecting some friends that evening and my mother was planning her standby of cocktail sausages on sticks – keeping up the brown theme.  She was displeased.  I thought the biscuits – and my dad – wonderful.

So I have had my ‘journeys’ with Sheila.  I do hope that the 3G journey will be as happy and rewarding.   We all can see that it will be physically testing.  Altitude sickness is pretty grim, as I and other guest posters have attested,  as can be physical tiredness, insomnia and cold. However, they will also be on an emotional journey.  How will Sheila, Jae and Oscar feel about each other at the end of their trial?  Sheila’s family always seem close knit and devoted to each other.  Very often, strong friendship is based on respect for the ‘space’ of the others and having a sixth sense of when to back off.  It doesn’t sound as if there will be the luxury of physical or metaphorical space in this trip without the option to go for a walk, take the dog out, or even delve into cyber space. But from what we have read in Sheila’s blog posts, I think if any family can do it, it will be Sheila, Jae and Oscar.

Today’s post is from Paula who volunteers at Catching Lives with Sheila. She first appeared on our blog in a post entitled, “Have You Heard The One About The Nun and The Atheist?“, and has kindly contributed some guest posts since. Here’s her latest:

A few nights ago I was thinking of Sheila’s impending mountain climb. It came to me that there are various stories of mountains in the Bible. I offered to do another blog so here it is – a reflection on mountains.

I guess we are all familiar with the story of Moses and his encounter with God on Mount Sinai. Exodus 20: 1-21   We associate it with the giving of the Ten Commandments, which – when all is said and done – is a simple charter for human living:

• The charter begins with the honouring of our God. Often we try to cut down God to a manageable size instead of simply bowing to the mystery.
• Keeping holy the Sabbath – a very practical commandment for taking time off. It’s even recommended that we give our work animals time off too!

And so it goes on – very practical and human – dealing with respect for parents and the elderly, loving other people, being content with what we have.

More than the message of Sinai, I love a quote from Jeremiah where he says,

“Deep within them I will plant my law, writing it on their hearts. There will be no further need for neighbour to try to teach neighbour or brother (or sister) to say: ‘Learn to know Yahweh’” Jeremiah 31:33-34

I am always moved by the fact that each one of us is so unique and beloved of God, and that His word or spark is written on each of our hearts, whether we know it or not.

Another mountain story I love is that of the Beatitudes Matthew 5: 1-12.  Again this is a great social charter pointing out our obligation to all God’s people. Here we are reminded that the poor are blessed.  It always reminds me of my African trip and how happy the people were with so little. The poor, the bereaved, the hungry, those who suffer injustice – all are called blessed.

My next mountain story is that of the transfiguration Luke 9: 28-36  This is the story of  Jesus’ encounter with his God. It speaks of transformation. His disciples were beside themselves and didn’t know what to make of it.  However they did want to stay in that sacred place for ever – only Jesus was having none of that – back down the mountain to get on with the ordinary business of living.  Hopefully they would remember this incident when their friend was crucified. They didn’t of course…….

It’s these moments in our lives when we are transformed, that we need to put in our memory boxes for when the times are difficult. We all have had them. We often witness this transformation in others: in the faces of delighted little children, in the faces of those we love, in the faces of the elderly, looking at a place of beauty or a sun set, just to mention a few. Often they are momentary – I guess our human psyche couldn’t cope with too much intense wonder.

My last mountain story is that of Jesus’s death on Calvary: John 19.  What can I say about this mountain of intense suffering?  Jesus died for being faithful to what he believed. For him it was a question of personal integrity – and that cost him his life. In some mysterious way His death became redemptive – not only for him, but for us all and the whole of creation. Not everyone would hold with this and I respect that.  However we have all met people of such integrity – and Sheila is one of them.

I shall think of Sheila as she climbs her mountain.  I believe she has climbed all these symbolic mountains throughout her life. She is a woman who lives from her heart – a woman of compassion and of wonder. Whatever life has thrown at her she has transformed into wisdom of heart.

In climbing this next mountain of life, remember you are surrounded and enfolded in love as you do so.

Note from Sheila: I am so proud to have Paula as my friend and respect her enormously. Despite the fact that we are not believers, she continues to care about Jae, Oscar and me, always asking about how our plans are going for our Kilimanjaro climb and telling me that she mentions us in her prayers.  She has never made me feel that my lack of belief is wrong, or that I am diminished by it, which is very different from so many experiences I have had in the past.  Thank you for your support and friendship, Paula.

People regularly ask me about how my training is coming along.  At an early stage the people at Exodus Travels did hand me some pages about suggested training, including working out in the gym and climbing what mountains there are in this country.  However, their proposed training didn’t really fit in with my life – but I do seem to have evolved a programme of activities which fits round my social life admirably!  Many of my friends have rallied round to do active stuff with me, rather than sitting chatting, putting the world to rights – after all, it is possible to do that while on the move too!   I often wonder how I actually managed to fit in time to do a full time job as well – but I wasn’t a Granny-in-training-for-Kili then.

So here is what I did by way of Kili preparation on one day recently.

First off, I walked across Canterbury to my Pilates Class, which is great for building up strength and suppleness, as well as warding off the aches and pains which seem to come with age.  My friend (and occasional Guest blogger) Pat and I fell about laughing when we saw each other at the class: we were wearing identical T-shirts, both purchased at bargain price in Aldi.  I have actually bought a lot of my Kili kit in that great emporium – their wet weather and sports gear is good stuff and very well priced.

The last time that Pat and I wore identical T-shirts was literally half a lifetime ago, on a fun run through the centre of Canterbury.  Pat remembers that it was in 1981, when we were 34: we are both 68 now – and not wearing so badly, all considered.

I then headed off on foot towards Whitstable, and met my friend Anne, who accompanied me from her home in Blean on the Crab and Winkle Way towards Whitstable.  It is a lovely footpath well away from the traffic.  It is probably about seven or eight miles by that route from Canterbury to Whitstable, so we felt quite justified in heading into a pub for a “senior citizen’s” cheap lunch when we got there.

I then said goodbye to Anne and jumped on the bus to Seasalter, where our caravan is.   There are two such buses each day – and I knew that Maureen, who cooks with me at Catching Lives, would be on that bus. Right enough, she was – planning to participate in the U3A swim arranged for that afternoon.  We had time for a cup of tea and a blether in the caravan before another four oldies joined us for a dip in the sea.  It was a gloriously warm day – just perfect for a swim.  However, as we entered the water, the two or three other people on the beach accosted us, asking us whether we knew about the jellyfish.  I had heard that there were some around this year – though I have never encountered one on our beach before.  The other people said they hadn’t swum for fear of getting stung, but we U3A stalwarts were all stripped and ready and were not about to be put off.  I did feel like I brushed against something a couple of times while swimming – it felt rather like a carrier bag full of water, but I suppose it was a jellyfish.  When we came out, we could clearly see one on the edge, and happily one of our number was able to confirm that it was not a stinger: we were all absolutely fine.  I have often seen Portuguese Men of War – enormous purply jellyfish – on the Scottish coast, but never down south.

The U3A group repaired to my caravan for the usual post-swim cuppa – someone had brought some very classy biscuits along too.  I got out the jar which the group had decided to put some money into for the Kili charities each time, by way of payment for the cuppa.  They were amused to see the jar’s label, recently made by Katie: it is now called the Kiliman-JAR-o!  I took the time to count how much is in the jar – nearly £20!  A lovely bit of lolly bringing us that much closer to our fundraising aim.

After everyone had left, I joined my friend Caroline and her extended family at her caravan, which is close to mine, for an Indian take-away meal.  Caroline and I worked together nearly twenty years ago, before she moved out of the area.  It is lovely to have the opportunity to catch up with her occasionally, and we enjoyed sitting outside in the sun with a curry and a glass of wine.

Then it was on to my bike, which had been left at the caravan for Caroline’s use, for a ride back to Canterbury, as the sun gradually dropped in the sky.  A lovely summer’s evening at the end of a fairly energetic day.

So that was one hour of Pilates, a seven mile walk, half an hour’s swimming and a ten mile bike ride, encountering and chatting to about a dozen or so friends in the course of it.  Now that is my sort of training day!  Lets hope it stands me in good stead for Kili.

A long time ago, we learned the list of nine planets by heart. Thanks to a useful mnemonic: men very easily make jugs serve useful necessary purposes. Then nine years ago, the planetary system changed, just like in the song. One minute there were nine green bottles (you could say jugs) hanging on the wall then one green bottle (Pluto) did accidentally fall and now there were eight green bottles hanging on the wall. Henceforth we had to acknowledge just eight planets, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Pluto was demoted to the status of “dwarf planet”.

Well, you can’t help having sympathy with the underdog so it is wonderful to see how thanks to Nasa’s New Horizons space probe, Pluto has come back into the news. Fabulous pictures are coming back to us and tons and tons of new information about the snowy planet.  Even before New Horizons flew past, the Harvard-Smithsonian news blog commented, “A dwarf fruit tree is still a small fruit tree, and a dwarf hamster is still a small hamster.”  So let’s hope the dwarf planet is promoted once again to the premier league, albeit as a small planet.

It was only discovered in 1930. And it was given the name Pluto following the suggestion of an eleven year old girl, Venetia Burney, who lived in Oxford in the UK. On the New Horizons web site we can read the interview she gave in 2006.

Venetia, can you tell us a little bit about the circumstances that happened in 1930 that brought you to suggest the name of Pluto?

“Yes, I don’t quite know why I suggested it. I think it was on March the 14th, 1930 and I was having breakfast with my mother and my grandfather. And my grandfather read out at breakfast the great news and said he wondered what it would be called. And for some reason, I, after a short pause, said, “Why not call it Pluto?” I did know, I was fairly familiar with Greek and Roman legends from various children’s books that I had read, and of course I did know about the solar system and the names the other planets have. And so I suppose I just thought that this was a name that hadn’t been used. And there it was. The rest was entirely my grandfather’s work”.

The minute I read that I thought, three generations. Just like the 3G Kili Climb story!  Oscar was talking with his mother Jae when she said that teenagers could from this summer climb Kilimanjaro with Exodus. He suggested that they could climb together. And then Jae had a word with her mother, Sheila, asking if she would like to do it too. And that was the beginning of this amazing adventure.

And there is another parallel. The euphoria the scientists are feeling at the success of New Horizons’ Pluto fly past is similar to what we shall all feel when the 3G Kili Climb team can report back to base that they have made it to the peak of Mount Kilimanjaro. All the way up, Jae will take pictures, and after her recent instruction in Kenya, we know they will send back brilliant photos too. It will have been worth the wait for us lazy bystanders down below.

Note from Jae: I hope I won’t let you down with the photos Leslie – I won’t be carrying a heavy DSLR up the mountain but I’ll definitely try and get some good pics. Also – I saw this super post from one of my favourite Facebook pages this week (IFLS), and it felt appropriate here!

 

One thing is for sure – we will not get lost up Kilimanjaro!  I just Googled “Lost Kilimanjaro” and what came up were references to the snow cap gradually being eroded because of global warming, the guy who had lost his legs climbing the mountain and people having lost their luggage during the flight there.  I suppose the last of these is a bit of a worry.  We have been advised to take our warm clothes and walking boots on the plane and essential items as hand – not hold – luggage, in case our kit disappears into the ether.  At least we will be easily able to identify other lunatics heading for Kili when we get to Heathrow by their outfits, intended for sub-zero temperatures!

It is good to know, therefore, that there seems little possibility of us getting lost on Kilimanjaro.  A few people who climbed the mountain many years ago have told me sad tales of being misdirected on Kili – but nowadays the ratio of guides to climbers is such that getting lost would be nigh impossible.  Exodus Travels will provide us with one guide or assistant guide for every two climbers, which is lovely.  It means we can go at our own pace and not feel we are keeping others from going at theirs.

I have not been such a good guide to some of my friends recently!  My friend (and yesterday’s guest blogger) Mary visited us recently, and we recalled the time last year when I got us lost on a cycle ride between Seasalter and Faversham.  It was my fault for trying to take a short cut across a field instead of keeping to the well marked cycle path.  Mary, however, is one of these people who always finds something wonderful in every bad situation.  What she remembers is not my stupidity, but the fact that in a corner of the field she came face to face with a fox a few yards from her and they both stood stock still looking into each others eyes for a minute or so.  It is up there as one of her most exciting wild life moments!

More recently, I arranged to meet up with Irene, a friend I made when doing a teaching course in the early 1980s.  We had not seen each other for about thirty years, but she got in touch having read about 3GKiliClimb in our local paper, the Kentish Gazette.  She agreed to meet me for a country walk and pub lunch, so that we could catch up.  I think she envisaged that more of the chat would be in the pub than on the walk, but we got so engrossed in conversation that we got totally lost, and ended up walking for three hours.  Poor Irene!  She ended up having to squeeze down overgrown paths and climb over high gates.  She finally drew the line at walking through a field of horses: fortunately an alternative route got us speedily to the pub, before she collapsed!

Irene has just retired from being an extremely successful headteacher at a local school – I used to read about her in the local paper – and I was absolutely enthralled listening to how she had made a school in a very deprived area into an outstanding one.  Her most interesting innovation was in having piped classical music in every area of the school at all times.  It was possible for teachers to switch it off in the classrooms if appropriate – but the default position was good music in the background.  I can imagine that her school became a more peaceful and calming environment for many troubled children as a result of this, apart from the educational value.

I don’t think Irene holds a grudge against me for getting us so lost.  We were put right by two fishermen we met, who turned my map the correct way up, to help us find the pub, when we were miles off our course.  However, she did suggest that we didn’t meet again until September when KiliClimb will be over, and I will not be marching across the countryside quite so frenetically!

I am looking forward to meeting new people to talk to during the climb.  It is funny to think that by the time we get to (or fail to get to) the summit, we will probably have spent more time with some of these unknown people, than we have with many of our friends.  I can understand why many folk say that they have formed lasting bonds with other climbers, given how closely we will be living with them.  Just as well it will not be me holding the map, though, given recent experiences.

Today’s blog post comes from Mary Rennie. She’s the one in the beige velour tracksuit bottoms in the Blogging Jogging post. The Millers spent a lot of time with Mary and her family in the 1970s and 80s, and she has stayed firm friends with Sheila. Here are some of her memories of the early days…

Thankfully, the age at which one becomes “elderly” and settles for a quiet life seems to be an ever shifting phenomenon … these days, the papers are full of marathon running centagenarians and skydiving nonagenarians, not to mention friends who have decided to scale mountains when one had assumed that that their pursuits, while certainly never sedentary, were slightly less adventurous!  My own little sister (64), always the shy and timid one in our family, is in New Caledonia – half way through a round-the-world journey with her husband, in a small yacht.

When Sheila and I met at Toddler Club in St Dunstan’s Church Hall nearly 40 years ago, with our babies, Jae and Joe, there was no indication of such latent intrepidness.

As young mums, life revolved round our families.  We both shared a passion for the outdoors (and thrift) so summer outings were often to the local PYO fruit farms.  The children would be given punnets and the instruction from Sheila “Eat as much as you like – they weigh the punnets, not the children!”  Jae, Joe, Gwen and Amy came home red and sticky with strawberry juice – poly tunnels were still to come, and strawberries were grown on the ground, with straw to protect the fruit.  We made jam, summer puddings and pavlova, and filled our freezers, (a fairly new phenomenon) with strawberries and raspberries.

Our expeditions were often on our bikes, acquired when Gwen and Amy were babies.  In the late 70s, children’s bike seats bore no resemblance to the range of hi-tec, safety conscious accoutrements on sale today.  Ours were potentially lethal folding bits of metal with a very thin plastic covered foam cushion for the child to sit on, but thankfully no-one came to any harm.

We shared the ups and downs of family life, pregnancies, baby sitting, house moves, DIY, learning to drive, the 3 day week and power cuts, and above all, friendship and support.  In our spare time, we went to yoga, then aerobics (a new import from the US!) – these days, we are evangelical about pilates …

Came the day, Sheila announced we had to start thinking ahead to going back to work.  Computers were beginning to loom large …  we enrolled on a BASIC  (Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) computer programming course at Canterbury Tech, rapidly becoming the most unpopular duo in the class (we were the only women, very keen to learn and did all the set tasks in double quick time.  This meant the tutor was unable to slope off to the canteen as much as he’d have liked to!).  I am sure this is why, a few years later when I’d moved to Wiltshire, I landed a job at Galileo, a start-up computerised reservation system for airline bookings – they must have been impressed by the reference to the BASIC course on my CV!

My family move to Wiltshire was a huge wrench, not least because it meant leaving behind such a good friend … however, I am happy to say that distance has been no impediment to our friendship continuing and I was at the caravan in Seasalter last weekend with Sheila – bike riding and fruit picking were high on the agenda!

Catching Lives is one of the charities for which 3GKiliClimb is fundraising – I have been a volunteer there for over a year.  Some of the things we provide are:

• Food (Breakfast, Lunch, Food Parcels and referrals to the Canterbury Food Bank).
• Laundry; 2 Washing Machines, 2 Condenser Tumble Dryers and we supply the detergent. Clients are responsible for doing their own laundry.
• Toilets and Showers (We supply a variety of toiletries and clean towels)
• Storage (Rough sleepers have access to a small area wherein they can store belongings that they can’t carry with them; or are particularly personally valuable)
• Postal Address (essential for claiming benefits, looking for work, or registering with a GP).
• Use of a Telephone
• IT suite (Computers and internet access)
• Mental Health Outreach Service
• Advocacy and Advice Services which include specialist advice on:
  • Homelessness
  • Housing
  • Welfare Benefits
  • Income Tax
  • Domestic Abuse
• Access to ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) lessons and literacy classes
• A variety of structured activities (inc. Film Club, relaxation classes, gardening)
• Signposting to all manner of agencies.

You can see that a really comprehensive service is provided – that is what 3G are raising money for – but there are extras too. Sometimes things, which you think may not really take off, do, and this year many of our clients have become very enthusiastic about art, design and sculpture.

For several months, whenever I was at the centre, there would be at least one table of people absolutely engrossed in creating items for an exhibition, which was mounted in Canterbury in the spring.  The aim of the show was to try to change the public’s perception of homeless people.

The exhibition was reported in our local paper as follows:

Catching Lives clients Jimmy Wicks, Ed Bryan, Zeph Smith and Antonio Ramos with their artwork

Homeless people in Canterbury say a pioneering art project has helped turn their lives around.

It has been taking place at the charity Catching Lives, with some rough sleepers saying it has lifted them out of the depths of despair and pulled them from the brink of suicide.

The scheme, backed with a £15,000 EU social fund grant, has resulted in a variety of artworks, which will go on display around the city this month.

Twelve people have contributed to the exhibition, which is called City Ciphers and includes drawings, textiles, photography, music, sculpture, collage, creative writing and a unique 6ft map of Canterbury.

For homeless people like Zeph Smith, 40, getting involved has been a lifesaver.

He said: “I am a recovering alcoholic and have been at rock bottom – close to topping myself.

“But when I got into art, I started to find it really therapeutic and feel like I really have benefited.

“I’ve started to go to college and had some very positive feedback.” Jimmy Wicks, 61, says his life collapsed after losing his job in the security industry, leaving him in debt and eventually homeless.

He said: “I lost everything and ended up living in a tent. I was in Shropshire at the time, but was born in Canterbury and lived in the city until I was 18, so came back here.

“I’ve really enjoyed being involved in the art project and have really got into drawing. It’s got my motivation back on track and now I’m looking for a job.

“Without Catching Lives, I’m not sure I would have survived.”

Antonio Ramos, 31, fell on hard times after losing his job as a chef in London and had a nervous breakdown because of depression.

He said: “The art project really has given me a lift. I was even invited to give a talk to medical students at Kent and Canterbury Hospital about the therapeutic benefits of art for the homeless.

“That is something I would never have been able to do before because I was quite shy.”

Ed Bryan, 46, said: “I never thought I’d be made homeless and am a proud bloke and didn’t initially want any help. But Catching Lives has been incredible supportive and I’ve really enjoyed contributing to the musical side of the project, helping to record a CD.”

Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District   –   by Gerry Warren

In addition, we had another artistic surprise one morning at the beginning of April, when we arrived to do our our usual Wednesday cooking.  Overnight a mural had appeared on the outside of the building – we really love it!

There were rumours that it was a Banksy and we were wondering if it needed special protection, when Catman, who lives in Whitstable, claimed responsibility for this great piece of urban art.  He calls it ‘Pigs Might Fly’ and subsequently donated his original design piece painted on a piece of marine plywood – on which he based his mural – to Catching Lives to be auctioned.  It raised a four figure sum, which was a fantastic amount for us to receive and also inspired several of our clients to attempt making large artworks along similar lines.

So, as you see, life is full of surprises at Catching Lives: we never know whether we will be the beneficiaries of a crate of unwanted asparagus, a box of men’s underpants (they were very popular!) or a mural on our wall, thanks to the amazing generosity of so many people!

Note from Jae: I love that mural – if I’m in Canterbury for the weekend, and go out for a jog, I always find a route that takes me past it. I was just looking at Catman’s Facebook page and saw this fab picture of penguins jumping into the sea in Kent – just as you do Ma!

At the weekend the Hopkins Family went to the Bedgrove Dynamos Presentation Day at Aylesbury Town FC’s ground. It marks the end of the football season which tends to define our weekends for all but about six weekends of the year. The league season finished (for the boys and for the professionals!) over a month ago, but we then hit the “tournaments” for a month or so before we get to presentation day!

For most of the year our weekends involve training on Saturday mornings, and matches on Sunday mornings (this year David has been coaching a kids team that none of our boys play in, so sometimes that’s been four matches in four different places). These activities are interspersed with watching football on the TV; playing football on the pitch beyond our garden gate; going to Aylesbury Town FC or MK Dons to watch live matches; and playing FIFA on the Play Station. Occasionally we push the boat out and go to the pub to watch an especially important match. And somehow we jam homework in amongst these things – often it manages to have a football theme!

I used to watch football with Da when I was a kid – both on the TV and at Priestfield Stadium (home of The Gills) which we could get the train to from Canterbury. Actually, I used to watch lots of sports with him – I think that when he realised number two was a girl two, he thought he’d teach number one about offside rules, lineouts, and the order to pot snooker balls in! Good preparation for a houseful of sporty lads in years to come.

The truth is I don’t mind at all. I love that the boys are all so active; I see how they organise games with children of all ages out the back; how they resolve disagreements; see them understanding the power of teamwork; and I’m sure that regularly winning and losing at sport is a useful life lesson.

Football can have a positive effect in poorer nations too. It can serve as a tool to bring communities together, and a give people a sense of pride, as well as encouraging fitness – and opening up a conversation about health in general. One of the projects you are helping us fund with the 3GKiliClimb sponsorship is in Zambia. It is run through Baraka Community Partnership and supported by Exodus. You can read more about the project here. And if you’d like to read a first-hand description about the football being supported this article by my colleague Gina (of the Cornrow Five, who joined Ma and Da for the Refugee Tales walk) explains how even a football-o-phobe can be sucked into the celebration of the game when surrounded by proud, excited Zambians.