Oops. Has it really been over a month? I think what has happened is that I keep thinking about writing, then think about how much I need to catch up on that I just get discouraged and put off writing. So. I convinced myself to write by saying I’d do a super-brief re-cap instead of something extensive.
So what’s been going on in lovely Walker? Well, I sprained my ankle for one which was a real shame since I had just gotten cleared to play in the qualifying rounds of the FA Cup with my team (they’ve since gotten knocked out). My ankle still isn’t normal yet but it doesn’t hurt as much or as often as it did initially. I also have to concede that the recovery is probably slowed by my own decisions, decisions such as the one to walk the cobblestone streets of York (yet again), then walk miles around Edinburgh, climb a volcanic rock, and then go camping. Meh, nothing a little Ibuprofen couldn’t get me through.
But yeah, that’s what I’ve been up to. It was nice to take a day trip to York where I had spent so much time and to show my flatmates around. They now appreciate Mr Sandwich as much as I do. I had both of my go-to sandwiches – #7 (Chicken and cauliflower with a mint mayonnaise) and #36 (cheese, pickle, lettuce, etc) – so knowing that I’d only spent 2 pounds total on lunch and dinner made me a happy camper. As we walked around town I thought about all the friends I’d made in York and about how none of them were there anymore. Then I looked up and saw one of probably two people I know still in York. What a small world.
The weekend after York my flatmates and I headed off to Edinburgh! I had been to Edinburgh over 5 years ago with History Club but I could remember that I liked it. We went to loads of places – the Dungeon, the Dean Gallery, the Loch Ness 3D experience, on a tour of the vaults, and then a ghost tour all in one day. The next day was epic. I’d found a tour online called TheHairyCoo.Com and holy moly it may have been one of my greatest ever life decisions. It was a FREE tour (well, you tipped what you thought the tour was worth and/or however much you could afford) and it took us through a good bit of the Highlands in a bright orange minibus driven by a local guy named Donald. We stopped at the Wallace Monument in Stirling and I could fairly vividly remember the hike up to the monument 5 years ago. Then, we stopped at Doune Castle where they filmed Monty Python and the Holy Grail!! It was glorious. Don let us borrow coconuts to clap as we galloped around the castle. Next on the tour was a stop in a town called Aberfoyle for lunch where we saw birds of prey, then it was on to look for hairy coos! We saw loads and it was wonderful. Finally, we stopped in Falkirk where they have this giant wheel that simultaneously raises and lowers boats. Apparently what happened was some engineers wanted to connect Glasgow to Edinburgh by water. Instead of starting at a common point and working toward the cities, they started at the cities and planned to meet in the middle… but then when they got to the meeting point, they realized they were at different elevations; thus, they built this neato wheel, which is apparently very energy efficient, running mostly on solar power.
After a long day of the Highlands, Abby, Laura, and I stopped at a pub for some cheap grub. Ah how I missed very-average but cheap greasy food! Sunday morning I woke up early to find the gravestone of Adam Smith, who was apparently just chilling down the road from our hostel. Crazy. Laura and I then went on a free tour of the town while Abby met up with a friend. After we reunited with Abby we decided to climb Arthur’s Seat, a volcanic rock not too far from our hostel (don’t you just love Europe? Hostels are near dead economists, volcanic rocks, castles, vaults, etc). The climb was not fun times for my ankle, but otherwise it was great. We took a route that was different to that us History Clubbers had taken 5 years ago, but looking around I could remember exactly where we had been. Craziness. Anyhow, if anyone ever comes to visit me in Newcastle, I’d be very open and willing to make a trip up to Edinburgh seeing as it’s only 1.5 hours away by train. How great is that?
After Edinburgh, it was back to good ol’ Walker. It was half-term here which meant the kids got a week off from school. Did we get a break too? Not a chance. On Monday I was sent to run an activity by myself to the west of Newcastle. What was I doing? Oh you know, the usual stuff – making kids ride a bicycle with a generator attached in order to 1) inflate balloons (so that I could make sweet balloon animals), or 2) power a stereo. Yeah, I was pretty cool, until the man with a robotic fire-breathing horse came along. Then my balloon swans, rabbits, elephants, etc. seemed a lot less impressive. I did the same thing on Tuesday, but luckily Abby was with me so I wasn’t on my own since there were tons of kids. Wednesday I was still at Common Ground, and then Thursday was yet another adventure.
On Thursday I got to go on my first Kids Kabin trip. 5 of us adult/staff/volunteers took 6 young volunteers camping. But this isn’t your average “take the kids camping” kind of trip. We actually made these 12 year olds carry a decent amount of stuff in the camping packs we allowed them to borrow, such as tents, their sleeping bags, their roll mats, etc. It was hilarious to see what they brought; one kid brought 3 pillows, almost all packed like 10 bars of candy, and some even packed 2 litre bottles of soda. Apparently they didn’t realize how far they’d have to carry it. Now 4 miles isn’t that bad, but when you’re a 12 year old who hasn’t really ever done anything like this before, it can seem like 100 miles. Anyway, I didn’t tell you where we went camping yet. Get ready for it – we went camping along Hadrian’s Wall, out past an old Roman Fort at a place called Housesteads. The bothy – a little stone house where people can come and stay for free – was a 4 mile hike from our minibus. Yet again, not a fun time for my ankle, but otherwise it was great. The kids were pretty good for the most part and were quite patient, at least in comparison to the younger kids we usually get during our sessions. They all helped us cut firewood, etc. One kid even gave us a hilarious bedtime “scary” story that included a character named “Gordon…BaDorgan” who was the chef for a vampire who served… meat that was still raw (aka rare?). Greatest plot ever?
Sleeping was pretty unpleasant. There were 4 single beds and a double bed, so there were 4 people on the beds, 3 on the floor, and us 4 girls squished horizontally onto the double bed. It took the kids forever to calm down and go to bed, but one of the kids talked in her sleep/was coughing up a lung, and others were just plain still hyper or snored really loudly. By 1am however, most had fallen asleep. That’s when the door opened and we opened our eyes to see someone walking out. Our director, Will, had mentioned potentially going for an early morning walk so we assumed it was him… until we saw him sitting up on the floor. Apparently, some people had decided to go hiking at midnight. They were otherwise very nice and sensible, but it was a pretty funny moment, though also very confusing at the time. In the morning, we had some tasty bacon and sausage stotties, then headed back to the minibus. The kids were much less whiney this time around and we made good time in getting back. The ride back to Kids Kabin (about an hour) seemed to take ages since we were all tired from hiking/lack of sleep, but we did finally return home, which meant I survived my first Kids Kabin trip!
Now that half-term is over, it’s back to the usual grind. The kids at KK are trying at time, but amazing at others. Common Ground is getting better for me. I’ve taken on random little organizational projects around the office and though it’s nothing to do with casework or anything, it means that I’m in the office more often as opposed to in the tea/waiting room, so I do get to hear more of what’s going on with the casework. I’m slowly getting more responsibilities too which is great. Common Ground is an interesting place. Some days it’s really cool to see how diverse the people there are. On so many occasions an asylum seeker will come in speaking a language none of the volunteers speak, so we’ll just go around the waiting room asking if anyone can translate and 9 times out of 10, someone can translate for us, whether it be from Arabic, Farsi, Swahili, French, or something else. The range of needs is broad, but not really all that surprising. Some just need a phone to call job centres, their solicitors, or housing authorities. Some need money, others need clothes, others need food, others just need someone to talk to. It can be great to work there on days when people receive good news, like notification of status being granted, but yesterday was one of those sad days when someone received bad news that she would not be granted status and that an appeal was unlikely to be successful, so comprehensive were the reasons for denying her status. When it comes to situations like that all we can really do is give the person some food and say “I’m sorry” which is tough. We also had a woman come in yesterday to speak to one of the staff members who was not in. We asked what is unfortunately a fairly common question, “Do you think you can manage until tomorrow?” and she gave the common response “no,” so again all we could really do was give her a bag of food. Sigh.
Well, now that I’ve left this off on a terribly depressing note, perhaps it’s time for bed. I’ll try to be better about updating this!
