IT’S OUR COMMUNITY EVENT (February 2008)

 

The alarm goes off, I hit the snooze button. The alarm goes off, I hit the snooze button. The mobile goes off, it’s John “Be there in 10” so I jump out of bed, open the curtains and the sun beams in. SO! the day begins.

As I drive to St Margaret’s church hall I’m sure I’ve forgotten to do something.

John is there already and he’s in control (although doesn’t realise).

Organisations begin to come through the door and are directed to their allocated tables.

It doesn’t take long before everyone’s in the hall buzzing around erecting noticeboards chatting to each other and queuing for a free Smoothie to build their energies for the long day ahead.

Four Towns Bus!
I catch sight of the Four Towns’ bus going past the entrance so make a mad wonder-woman dash to the road and watch in admiration as Steve reverses the huge vehicle into a small road and then into the entrance of the car-park. The bus is parked up and Steve prepares the upper deck for our local Storyteller Andy Jennings.

“It’s 10.55am and we’re going to open the doors so stand by your beds people” announces John.

The face painter for the day Norman Lowe is given a nice sunny corner to perform his artistic miracles and John and I take one final look around the room before we do open the doors and we notice that everyone is talking to each other, now! in another setting, this would be called ‘Networking’ but today it’s about getting to know your neighbour and directly connecting with the community and ok! Networking too.

Good Vibes
It’s not unusual for groups to talk to each other at these events but what does appear to be different is the atmosphere within the hall, the whole room felt warmed by everyone’s positive vibes so by the time local residents entered the building they could feel the positive energy and see the cheerful faces.

I knew at this early stage that the event would be a good one.

Paula and Julie were our door managers and made everyone feel very welcome with their meet and greet patter as well as giving directions to all the activities taking place.

Church Tours
The church tours seemed to intrigue many people to go into the church itself and to be allowed to have a go at bell ringing resulted in an unusual sonic landscape, and much to Gemma Hamilton’s amusement Lynn Ledbetter seriously considered joining the Church Bell ringers group.

As more and more people came through the doors it made John and I really proud of everyone that had contributed to the day and that so many were working hard to make the day as fruitful as possible.

With traditional Teas and Buns on offer there was a perfect opportunity to participant in a little food hygiene check but of course there was no need to worry as the church ladies and gentlemen had the whole kitchen area covered admirably and the cakes and buns were delicious (not that I had that many).

So picture the scene, we’ve got 20 local organisations and many people through the door, the sun is shining and the church bells are - sort of – ringing and then the Signing Choir and entourage enter the building.

Lowestoft Signing Choir
After a little organising (by them, not me!) they are ready to perform. Five songs later there wasn’t a dry eye in the room, they were brilliant and touched so many people that several local residents wanted to join the group. The Choir also made a request for people to dig deep into their pockets as they needed funding for the cost of a coach to take them to London so they could enter into a competition. And what made the day a success for me was to see the co-chairs of Lowestoft Together – Margaret Oldham and Sue Henderson in discussion with Bob Russell to how they wanted to help by donating £100 toward the costs and I had a chat with Suffolk County Councillors Allyson Barron & Malcolm Cherry who both agreed to give £1000 between them from their locality budgets.

JUMP and £50k!
So after JUMP - Junior 2 Adult Unbiased Mentoring Project - were presented with their cheque for £50,000 awarded to them by Lowestoft Together, I was extremely proud to be able to stand on the stage to thank everyone for attending and to see the choirs faces when Liz Betts, who signed for the deaf members that their plea for funding had been met.

For me, that really represents the values of the two Funders – Fairshare Trust and Lowestoft Together, we are here to help local organisations to help themselves and in turn better help to serve the community.

My final words go to my colleagues at Waveney Community Forum who have had to cope with me flapping around the office for several weeks and supporting me in everyway and of course to my co-host John Ellerby who has been the steady rock SO needed when organising such an event, John’s humour and controlling attitude enabled me to sweep through the day as if I organised events like this on a weekly basis

Thanks John and thanks to EVERYONE for making our community day so successful, you should all be very proud of yourselves because without you all there it just wouldn’t of been an event at all

Claire Taylor-Crisp

North Lowestoft Fairshare Trust

Community Development Officer