UK Soon!

I went to church this morning the girls there greeted me with ‘well Roberta, how’s the job search going, coffee or tea, there’s the biscuits, sit down.’ How cool is that? I read some history on the church as I walked around, Queen Adelaide started attending church there at St. George’s in Kemptown, I believe in the early 1800’s, and she and her husband were childless, so the line of royalty zig zagged to her niece Victoria. The balconies were built in the church when it became so popular with the Queen here attending church.

You can Google Brighton and Kemptown and see where we are. I got a small booklet in the church lobby,with pictures saying Lewis Carroll lived here and a tunnel in his yard supposedly to the sea inspired Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. One writer was a nurse who cared for resident Laurence Olivier when he was ill towards the end of his life.

Part of the history of the church was to have a pub crawl every bank holiday and call on all the pubs, in a pram race.

There is a fair in the yards of the church and starting in 1990 they have a bed push race, partly sponsored by Royal Sussex Hospital also in the neighborhood, she says the costumes are way out there, but they are in these beds, and just as the sun is setting the whole community comes out and they all have a great laugh.

Then she talks about shops on the corners and my favorite part, “the retirees seem to be a little wacky..you know..in their own ways, one of the things about living here is just the level of acceptance..no one cares what you do, who you are, as long as you get along with everyone else, everyone else will look after you.” Then she goes on to talk about the big gay community now, they  have always been with us, but they are more prominent now which is not a problem, but we used to know them quite well in the old days..and she goes on to talk about the gay pride parade she goes to watch,’ they are all dressed up, I like it actually, I think  it’s a good thing to have here’..The booklet is called Kemp Town Through the Looking Glass, a History of Kemp Town Told Through the Words and Memories of Local People.

The teddy bear woman was also at church and I asked how her list of Teddy Bear names were going for the raffle. She said,”the list has your daughter’s names on it, Brooke Bear and Melody Bear. They will pick the name of the bear this weekend and tell me what it is so I can put the winning name in my pocket.”

I am sorry I will miss the Christmas bazaar, I think it is this weekend.

Then today Csaba and I walked to town for coffee, just missing the rain, and onwards to see Russ at his office. Tonite we meet Fig and Mark. Fig did my cover letter on this website. Thanks Fig.