Community

The frost was on the meadow this morning.  Winter has arrived.  But I realize that I have the warmth of community here in Oxford.  I have become a part of the lives of many people.

The IFES community

The IFES office buildings.  We work behind the windows on the third floor (or second floor in Britain.) The people have been very helpful in getting me settled in and in encouraging me as I adapt to a new culture.

We meet daily for prayers. Today we prayed for preparations for the next World Assembly in 2011.

During the summer we went on 

several picnics in a local church yard.

We had a farewell party for one of the people at the office.

SAGE

I have gotten involved with a Christian environmental concern group.  We have gone on a preaching weekend and will host a table at the local green fair in December.  This photo shows some of us on a short walk in Keynsham.

The Wovercote Community

Once a month the local pub hosts a music, poetry and storytelling evening. This past week the group included six guitars, a banjo, a mandolin, a couple of dulcimers, and a squeeze box.  I even told the story of the enchanted toll road

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At a barn dance in the Village Hall, the local Morris Dancers performed

and the rest of us joined in.

American Voters Abroad

I have taken advantage of this being an election year and joined a group of American Voters Abroad.  We meet periodically in local pubs to discuss politics and get to know one another.  I met someone who had been an Air Force wife in the Philippines and another young woman from Alaska who gave us real scoop on Palin.

Another, and possibly most significant, community that I have become a part of is my church, Woodstock Road Baptist.


On the bank Holiday in August, one of the church members organized a day to a local public farm.  The kids played on the swings and went through the petting zoo.  I went to the pick your own area and found a few strawberries even at that late date.  They were planted on shoulder-height platforms under awnings.  This made the picking somewhat easier, put I miss the rigor of having to stoop over for the sweetness of the fruit.

During the school year the church offers lunch after church on Sunday.  This is one of the cute kids in the congregation.

This summer, the church had a picnic on one of the rainiest days of the summer. The women did their thing in the kitchen,

 
and the men did their thing at the grill.

                                                      The children had their faces painted

and some of the adults got into the fun of the event, creating their own commentary on life.

Just this past week end I went to London with the church women for a regional women's conference.  Can you imagine me going to spend a day with 3500 other women?  Being in a different country brings out strange parts of a person.  Though I must admit being around all those people was a challenge, but I heard Helen Roseveare speak again and had a good dinner with some friends from church.

On the bus on the way back through London, some friends from church told me to look to the right.  I could see the famous Gherkin building through the side streets.  At the last possible moment I got this shot.  You can see the building at the mid right of this photo.

I look forward to enriching these relationships through the rest of the year.  I can imagine that these relationships will be the thing I will miss most when I leave.

Trip to Shrewsbury

This past Friday I set off from the Oxford train station, transfered at Birmingham and arrived at the Shrewsbury station just after noon.

My first stop was the river cruise.  It was a pleasant sunny day.  I was joined by two other women. The riverside was green with parks public and private.  At one point a group of five or six young men gave us a wave.

The scenery included  bridges, 

many for pedestrians,

and a few for automobiles.

Next I went to the Shrewsbury Castle.  It is now a museum of the Shropshire Regiment, the one that surrendered to Washington at Yorktown.  The castle was once a private home and even now has a wedding book with photos of all the couples who have been married here.

The gardens were magnificent, especially when you realize that this part of the castle would have been the basic reception area, with mud and dirt and horse dung.  The difference is amazing.

Across the yard is Laura Close, the highest point around.  Very good from a military perspective.

I was interested that the castle was built on high ground and on the river.  It is so close that the original timber fortification at this site was undercut by the river. The stone lookout, from which this photo was taken, replaced the wooden structure.

I then walked across town to the Shrewsbury Abbey.  I did not take any photos because they asked for a fee to photograph inside the abbey and the outside photo was blocked by cars.  But I did buy a couple of Brother Cadfael books and other mementos at the shop.  The church did a good job of being a place of worship and a tourist attraction.  As I sat in the pew and looked at the beautiful stained glass over the alter, I felt that I was breathing in a holy atmosphere.

On my way back through town, I saw this building. It was once a Presbyterian church and is now the offices for a woman's organization.

I also came across this shop that sold nothing but hats, and elegant ones at that.

Many of the stores have been here since the Victorian times.  In fact, the 1984 version of A Christmas Carol was filmed here.  They changed the signs and brought in snow.

I spent the night a the Sydney House B and B.  A little out of the way when one is walking, but the price was right.

The next morning, after a full English breakfast, I trudged over the river and up the hill to see Darwin's birthplace.  It is now the County Assessor's Office.  I was rather surprised to see the obvious opulence that Darwin was born into.  For some reason I had thought that he worked himself up from nothing.

With helpful instructions from a local, I found St Chad Church, where Darwin was baptized, and one of the few round churches. A woman decorating the church, echoing the tourist information, informed me that Darwin eventually attended the Unitarian Meeting House, because they were free thinkers as opposed to the congregation at St Chad who were bold in proclaiming what they thought.

The interior was beautiful.  They were decorating for the Harvest Festival and the organist was practicing.  I had a time of quiet contemplation at the end of my journey.

I then made my way back to the train station and on to Oxford.

Preaching weekend in Keynsham

On Saturday September 20, eight people from SAGE, an Oxford Christian environmental group, traveled to Keynsham to participate in a Green weekend and preach at small congregations in the parish of St. John.

We had lunch in the church hall and then spent time arranging the rest of the weekend.

We set up a table for SAGE in the Baptist church

and the Methodist church.

Our host is the Vicar of St John's Church.  Much of the building is from the 14th century, though the pews with doors on them date from just 200 years ago.

The stained glass windows are from much earlier.

The churches in the area had interesting banners.  One featuring Noah's Ark and another creation. 

During the afternoon we went for a walk.

We visited the ruins of the local abby.

While going through a park in the center of Keynsham, we saw Himalayan Balsam, an invasive species,

A fish ladder up the rapids of the stream that runs through the park,

And a marvelous spider web.

We even saw several hot air balloons.  They are made in nearby Bath and are often seen overhead.

On Sunday we fanned out across the parish and preached from Colossians 1:19-22 with an emphasis on the creation that was accomplished through Jesus.

Finally we gathered for a harvest service 

at a local farm

We had a community lunch and gathered in the farm yard for a group photo.  I am on the end right.

Oxford Bus Company

This past weekend I took a vintage bus trip.  The driver sits in a self-contained compartment that you can see at the front of the bus. Since he has no contact with the passengers, a conductor was required to  issue tickets and ring stops.

I rode in the lower level of the bus to the company's central garage.


They had a new bus painted in the manner of the original horse drawn trams from 125 years ago.

We boarded a contemporary bus and went through the bus wash. This is the picture of the blue brushes coming by the window. Very exciting.

Then we walked through the maintenance garage.  The sight of a double decker bus up on a set of jacks was quite something.  

I had seen the notices that that particular bus is covered by closed circuit TV, but it is more covered than I thought.  We learned that each bus has as many as eight cameras.  

We also saw the nerve center of the system, a computer room that keeps track of all the buses via GPS.  The computers are connected to Google maps so they can bring up the exact location of a bus in real time.  They attempt to keep the schedule going, rerouting buses around floods or traffic jams.

The Oxford bus System is the greenest in England. The sign on the back of this bus reads, "A sexy particulate trap thingy makes this exhaust cleaner than a vicar's sermon." New buses are made by Mercedes and have scrubbers  to reduce exhaust fumes.  This works.  I do not even smell the exhaust when a bus draws up to the stop. In addition, the acceleration, breaking and speed of each bus are regulated to save on gas.

We then boarded the vintage bus for our trip back to the city centre. I made my way up the stair to the upper level.  The ceiling was low and the aisle was narrow.  The conductors had to be small and agile.