Back to the Wall of Corn - Appreciating Penzance

OK, so Portugal was amazing, but let's get back to life, back to reality, and back to Cornwall!!

I'll be honest, I've been quite up and down recently (even with the amazing weather!).  Some days are a lot more of a struggle than others, and some days I stop focussing on the moment and I start worrying about tomorrow - mainly about not having and not being enough.  Not enough energy, not enough money, not enough positivity, not enough social 'juice'.  Even though I've been so looking forward to having people to visit, when I feel low I worry that I won't cope.  Everything feels like too much.  But praise God for friends who listen, sisters who phone, neighbours that take me out for ice-cream, a family that knows me, a husband who hugs and praise God that He has enough for me, every day.

So, when it comes down to it, most things I worry about turn out absolutely fine.  A great friend from university came to visit last week and it was such a gift.  She blessed me tons with her generosity and company - now that hubby has started work (hooray!!) it was amazing to have someone to explore, sea swim, enjoy the sun, and have a drink/tea/cake/lunch with. Yeh... also to have someone who appreciates food as much as me! haha!

What was especially good was to enjoy Penzance and see different sides of it other than just work.

We bought tasty pies from The Cornish Hen Deli and ate them in Morrab Gardens.

We volunteered a little and went to some events that were part of The Penzance Literary Festival including a talk by the Penzance Amnesty International Group and improvisations by the youth theatre group at The Acorn.

We swam in the Jubilee Pool, a huge, outdoor, seawater swimming pool.

We drank tea and ate amazing cakes at The Lost and Found Cafe

And... we ate a delicious lunch of mackerel at Mackerel Sky, where I work.  I'm not just saying it because I'm a waitress there, it really is a very good place to eat.

So for all you tourists heading this way this summer, there's quite a lot of good stuff in 'PZ' to check out - don't diss it before you try it! :-)

All in all, last week made me appreciate the place I'm living quite a lot more.  Hooray for that.

And now my family is here for a visit, all the better!

Dancing the Colours of Portugal

Here's some of my friends dancing in the town square in Lagos, Portugal

Portugal 2 - getting connected

I mentioned in the last post about us not making any plans for the second part of our time in Portugal.  We thought mayyybe we'd get a coach across the border to Spain so that I could show Llewellyn Sevilla, where I lived for a year.  But we weren't sure.

As I said, we didn't have the money, or the local knowledge to book anywhere in advance, once our stay at the luxurious apartments was over.  But I've also always wanted to have a bit of a spontaneous adventure.  Nearly all my travels abroad have been as part of team, with most things - especially accommodation - planned for me.  Although I've been to a lot of places, I've not done the 'proper travelling' thing.  I also have read and heard a whole lot of stories of people who free up a few days/weeks/months, and then ask God each day where He wants them to be - and trust that He'll provide the means for it to happen.  I always thought that sounded like an exciting way to live, and so I was really glad when Llewellyn also suggested it, before I'd said anything.  We're learning to trust Him to provide for us financially in Cornwall, so why not take another 'step of faith'?

Neither of us were particularly worried about it - I think if it had just been me I might have been - mainly safety wise - but since there was the two of us we thought worst comes to worst we can sleep on the beach...

At the festival we'd both immediately noticed Alana, Isaac, and their friend Peter... partly due to their dreadlocks, tattoos (and Peter's humongous beard!) and soon got chatting to them.  Before long Peter was playing his didgeridoo with us in the square, Isaac had joined the drummers and Alana came out dancing with us in one of the bars.  When Alana asked what we were doing once the festival had finished and I said I didn't know, she invited us to come and stay with them.  Funnily enough, her mum didn't know this had happened, but had also noticed us and felt like she should also invite us to stay!  Seemed almost too easy, but of course we said Yes!

So after our time in lovely Lagos, we took the train back east to Faro and were met by Isaac and his dad who took us to their home in the countryside north of the city.  When I saw their place I smiled because it had a whole load of my favourite things... , a campervan, a hammock, and a roof terrace!!  Happy Katrina. One day, one day, I'm hoping and praying for all those things :-)  Oh and two dogs and a cat, which Llewellyn is praying for. Haha!

Isaac is an awesome drummer and his dad organises rock concerts, so Llewellyn got to talk lots about music and watch tons of Youtube videos with them.  Happy husband.  One of their best friends is an amazing tattooist so we spent quite a bit of time at his studio.  And yep we got tattooed.  More happy husband!  We talked lots, ate lots, went to the beach, went to a craft festival, ate more, watched 'Falling Skies', drank port/whisky/wine/cider, prayed, chilled, and laughed a lot.

I also discovered some other random (or not random, depending on how you look at it) connections, like with 24-7prayer but also, a few years ago I stumbled upon a blog by a lady living in a rural community in Portugal and it was one of those blogs that make your heart hungry for adventure and for wanderings and for  a life lived outside the box.  Anyways turns out that the lady who wrote the blog is one of their good friends, and one of the main reasons they moved from Italy to Portugal!  AND I met her sister while we were there - an amazing craftswoman who's married to the tattoo artist! Crazy.

Love it love it.  love connections. love people that you feel immediately at home with. love an adventure.

Here's to many more!

Portugal 1 - getting there

So, you might have figured out from previous posts, and from Facebook if you're on there, that we've just been to Portugal.  Last year some time, I think at the end of the summer, when I was still working for my church in Brighton, I overheard my friend Kirsty on the phone in the office.  Kirsty heads up Movement in Worship, and someone had called to ask her if she'd be interested in being involved with a festival in Portugal.  Although I only heard her end of the conversation, as soon as she was off the phone, I told her I wanted to be a part of it!  You know when you just get that feeling in your gut that tells you to go for something?

Forward a few weeks to October time and I was set to be part of the team of dancers and drummers that were going to lead workshops in the festival, and do stuff out on the street.  But I thought it would be great if hubby could come along too, and if so, that we could then have a holiday afterwards.  Llewellyn had never been anywhere in Europe, as having a South African passport makes things a bit tricky.  But we'd decided that he was going to apply for citizenship, so, as they weren't too pricey, we decided to book plane tickets for the both of us, in the hope that everything would be sorted by then.

Well, as you might have read in an earlier post about the trials and tribulations of applying for citizenship, it wasn't a quick or easy process.  Once it had been approved, hubby had to attend a ceremony, then apply for a passport - which included tracking down the one person in Cornwall who's known him for more than 2 years - THEN he had to go to an interview in Plymouth to prove he was who he said he was, which ended up being less than 2 weeks before our flight date, and THEN wait for the passport to arrive in the post.  Preeeetty tight, you could say!

We were fully prepared for the fact that his passport might not have arrived in time.  BUT, amazingly, it did, with a week to spare.  Hooray!!

Orange trees in Faro

It was our first trip on a plane together and first trip abroad.  We decided to leave our 'holiday' part unplanned - partly because we didn't have the money to do book anything, and partly because we both wanted a bit of an adventure and a chance to be spontaneous.  We prayed and asked God to line up some people and/or places for us to see in those few days.

And you know what, He did!  but more on that next time...

Porto de Mos beach, Lagos

We flew into Faro from Bristol on a Wednesday morning, and meandered our way slowly by foot and by train to Lagos, a town further west along the south coast.  It took all day, but we did have beer stops, and sampled locally caught sardines and squid, and sat in the sun.  Lovely!!

The large team of dancers and drummers from the UK and Germany got to stay in some amazing apartments, not far from the beach, which was such a treat.

A lot of us hadn't met before but there was a great atmosphere from the start with everyone excited about being there.  Before he knew it, hubby was roped into becoming the fifth 'Psalm Drummer' for the next few days!  What's great about Movement in Worship and Psalm Drummers is that they are both like a big, cross-cultural family, more than an organisation.  And the way they train people to improvise means that it doesn't matter whether you've drummed/danced together before or not.  We kind of go with the flow, and bounce of each other, and ultimately try to express our love for God with movement and rhythms.

Which is what we did, over four days in Lagos, at a festival in the ampitheatre, in the main square, and in one of the bars!  What I love about drumming and dancing is that you can do it anywhere, and it will always capture people's attention and imagination, and it's easy to invite people to join in, so that each occasion becomes unique and a communal/collaborative event.  I especially loved the way that any time children walked through the square they'd be the first ones to stop and watch and start moving to the drumbeat.  We always had plenty of percussion to hand out when that happened!

The festival was a chance for Christians from all around Europe to gather together to worship and learn and get inspired.  Not loads of people came in the end but hopefully those that did went away feeling blessed.  To be honest though, I much preferred dancing out in the street and in the bars, because it felt more natural and more 'real'.  So often the church hides away in a corner and keeps it's creativity and expression for Sundays and for its own congregations.  If we really believe God's given us freedom and life and love and colour then doesn't it make sense to share it?! :-)

Roland's Rhythm

Roland’s got a rhythm in his toes

Where they’ll take him next, not even he knows

His toes follow his nose to the salt of the sea

Where the crash of waves fills his ears

And the sadness on his shoulders disappears

...For a while at least

And he strides out east

In search of the sunrise

Waiting for the rays that

Shimmy and shimmer on the sand at lowtide

And the rhythm in his toes

Dances his feet

To the tune of the lightening sky

The morning star

Sings a song of hope

That awakens the beat in his guts

In that innermost part

Where words aren’t enough

Where the hurt and the passion

The questions and the dreams

The laughter and moans

And hunger for home

Combine together

To make him nearly explode

Until a drum is set before him

And the beat in his heart

And the rhythm in his toes

Pour out through his hands

Echoing soundwaves into the air

Causing people for a moment to abandon their cares

Roland’s got a rhythm he can’t help but share

And that’s why we love it

When he drums

In the square

Katrina Quinn, June 2013

I wrote this for a guy we met in Lagos, Portugal.  We ended up drumming several times in the bar where he worked and he joined us drumming out in the town square and at the festival we were at.

Jumping love

I love jumping photos

And I love the people in these photos

And I may well love Portugal too