In Public Space

In Public Space Part 1 - Transcription

SUMMARY KEYWORDS community, area, dream, work, part, offered, people, postcode, story, homes, place, ambit, loved, recognized, country, various different types, living, culture, peace, neighbourgh

I see the red light. Testing Testing 1, 2, 1, 2 This is radio DJ Rock – welcome to the show yes, and todays runner up we have Toni who is the grand prize winner of a conversations with ME. [A man sings a song in Eritrean]

Community, to me the community is your area and where you're from. Me where I'm from - I'm from Eritrea. And what we came here to do is look for freedom for my community I want them to have freedom and also community can be like a neighbor and in our community, we just want love. There's no violence, we just want peace and happiness.

For me, a good community is a diverse community where we each value one another because I fiemly believe that everybody has something to bring. And it's really important that that is recognized and encouraged. And it's where people reach out to one another. So I suppose I'd like to think of it as an extended family where people can feel they belong. And as Isay they've got something to offer to the community because we're all valuable.

02:21 The road that I lived on while I was the only young person that was single, queer, brown or South Asian descent and everybody else, families and older people and people from various different Caribbean islands and things. Everybody was like, initially a little curious, who is this strange little young thing? And, you know, I had lots of various different types of butch women come in and you know, day in and all that and it's not necessarily a world that some of the neighbours were used to particularly the older ones. But you know what, there was never any friction, everybody just, I took time to get to know who they were. And they took time to get to know me and I was there for about 10 years. And it took about two to three years, but we became chill with each other.

As a community midwife, we working in areas and so that is our community, our people, our ladies, so that was my community. Im also a community worker in that I interact with various people in different communities, different cultures, different religions. I worked in postcodes ladies with the higher postcode -They saw me as the servant and do this and do that and come at this time and don't come at that time. The ladies in the poor area, they waited for me to come. They welcomed me in their homes. They offered me cups of teas. Muslim community, always offered me food. I loved eid. Because I ate in every house.

04:29 I thoroughly enjoyed working with poorer people, they were more appreciative than the rich ones. And that was okay with me, because I gave us much care I thought as I thought people needed sometimes I would – and this isn’t even - part of my role, but I would even teach them to cook and give them recipes for them to try out. You know so I just felt a part of them.

05:24 Like people together holding hands. From different backgrounds, different communities, different races, different religions, different faiths or beliefs. Hold their hands together to come together for peace. Form a sculpture doing that. Not just in my area though, city center too, people can visit there, and you can get a message from there. I’m not from this country, but in my country there was a lot of peacekeepers. There is a lot of peacekeepers but in my country I didn’t see this here. But in this country it different, they respect each other they understand each other, and that’s what I like. So this is the making of England is great. I Like it. That's what I like

No police, no drugs, no violence, no murder, no fights. No police, no drugs, no violence, no murder, no fights. No police, no drugs, no violence, no murder, no fights. No police, no drugs, no violence, no murder, no fights. No police, no drugs, no violence, no murder, no fights. No police, no drugs, no violence, no murder, no fights.

06:44 I would like- I don't know if this could be classed as art – but I would really like like a youth club like a community centre not necessarily just for the youth. But for the people where anyone from our country and outside of our culture to be able to come and partake in to have a good time. If they wanted sort of like advice or you know like counselling sessions or if they wanted someone to chill or somewhere we could host different events. Yeah, that will kind of be my dream. So just to kind of have that centre for Eritrean people that other people and other cultures can share as well.

07:28 I volunteer at a place called The Welcome in Lincoln green. My dream would be that it does exactly what the name is that - people of all nationalities or ages or cultures could come and find a welcome there that they can come and be accepted and loved. Not judged. When we first opened up again, towards the end of the lockdown was that people would just have a place to come where they wouldn't be isolated in their own homes. They could come on they could talk as they needed to talk or not talk if they didn't want to talk but have a hot drink, or cold drink, or fruit. It would be somewhere to escape, where they would just come and feel part of it. So my dream would be that that would snowball and they would be many places in the local community where that can happen where people feel that they are part of valued a special because everybody is special. We will end up being so busy. That it's too smaller premises to fit everybody in.

08:47 I Moved in back in March. It's been mixed. Obviously living in working with 20 odd people it's both advantages and disadvantages. Obviously not everyone sort of gets along with each other. But we do try our best to work around it and make things work and in the community.

09:14 I'd like to see a place for people that people can be proud to see. The place offers so much potential and each each person community has inspiring or unique story to tell. Hopefully a positive collective well informed investment for the future. And I can see it happening because we do have Regeneration around the area. I think there is a lot of potential. So I see a place that’s proud to live in and also we need to break down the perceptions. The negativity people associate with people living in the inner city areas. There's just so much to celebrate. There's so much diversity, so much uniqueness, no persons the same. We have lots of blocks of flats in the area, and I look to those blocks of flats and I think each window tells a different story – no story is the same. Its our job to find out. What is really there. Don’t judge from appearance. Look inside each window and theres loads of storys to tell.

10:45 Sometimes it's perceived I’m abit of a nosey neighbor - those are the labels that you can place on me. I’m a bit of a curtain twitcher However, I'll hear something that doesn't sound normal im really good at recognising sounds in my home in my community. On my if and if something doesn't sound like it should be there, I will look and if something is going on that shouldn't be I'll also make my presence known because that is also part of community safety and making sure that the area is you haven't got somebody crazy coming along. You know breaking windows and you know being you know. So and then sometimes some people are just arguing and well, its funny. And it just can't help but watch it but I don't judge them I try not to judge them publicly anyway.

[A Man Plays A Tune on a guitar]

In Public Space Part 2 - Transcription

SUMMARY KEYWORDS children, area, live, nice, trampoline park, god, baby, green spaces, challenging situations, push, problems, kids, life, hope, building, council, bird, top, song, sing

00:12 So when I lived in the Burmantofts area, I lived in a little maisonette down there in the 90s. And I liked the maisonette, but the area that it was top end of Torrie road. It was a bit rough if I'm honest and I was on the top floor there's only two floors, and I was on the top floor, but people used to come in and urinate in the entrance and that wasn't very nice when you've got a young kid and taking them up and down the stairs in the front. So that was a downside, but the maisonette itself was very clean and tidy and it was very spacious. So I lived there for a few years. And my children, both my son and my daughter went to St. Peter's c of E school and that was an excellent school. They had a good ethos of we care and they did instill that into the children and academically it was a good school as well because the teachers were very focused on children excelling and doing their best and they had things like black history after school studies and things like that, which was good because not many schools did that. And they you know, they, the children had to have a uniform so they I was looking very smart. And if you had any problems, you could go and approach the head teacher and so on and so forth. So I was really happy that both of my children went there. Now. Surround some surrounding areas of Lincoln green were a little bit more often a bit rundown. I would have stayed if there was better if the council have paid more attention to the housing

02:01 I just think this area gets people forget about it the council don't put any money into this area whatsoever. Now I've been here seven years, and there's nothing in this area for children. I don't feel like the council do enough for the kids around here or fighting the problems, severe problems and there's a lot of problems - drugs is a massive problem.

If you start putting money into kids within like six seven years years old, You can push them in a different direction because they're gonna want to they're gonna want to learn they're gonna want to progress have a better life. My kids started dancing when they were five or six year old and now my daughter's dancing at school and she's gonna be a dance teacher because it's her passion. That’s what you got to do. You have to force them to get into these classes. Get them all dancing!

04:46 Welcome to Roxby Close Community Gardens! [A collection of children shout amongst themselves interviewing]

05:08 [Jaya sings a song in Bengali] I picked this because it reminds me of growing up it reminds me of my mum and my aunt other you know nice people that sang this song or you know said this. Sometimes they don't sing it they just say in words and it's just about a little baby bird. There's nothing complicated. There's nothing amazing about it. It's the baby bird and what it likes to eat. But I remember the hopeful eyes and the faces and the smiles as they are saying that the poem. When I'm doing it and I'm singing it to the children, especially particularly to young children, babies you're singing it with hope - you think oh gosh I hope you live a healthy life and grow and I hope your 10 fingers stay 10 And I hope you all have all the good things, and blah blah whatever it is that you're hoping, you know as just as you think in the silly little words about a little tiny bird wanting to eat a teeny tiny fish. You just do it with so much hope and smiles and the look in your eyes and things and it's like that's why I picked it.

06:19 I was part of the family. Most of them didn't call me a midwife they called me Gloria and I treated as though they were part of me. So every baby that I cared for, every mom became a friend and every baby weas effectively mine

06:47

There’s words from a song that say all my life you have been faithful. You have been so good, so good with every breathe I take I will sing with the goodness of God. And we have been a family through quite a lot of quite challenging situations. And that has been my experience when I trust in the God I know who is a faithful God, then I could cope with any sort of situation because we have to understand that not everything is under our control. And it's often about the way we respond to things rather than actually what is going on in our lives. So that has been a mainstay of my life for many years now.

07:41 So when I go through hard times, I'll always kind of say to myself like you can get through this, but it relates to there's like a saying in the Bible, which is God will never give you more than you can bear. And so when I do go through certain things, and I just think that was the end on top of me. I refer back to that and obviously know what God has given me something that I can go through. So I'll come through this no matter what.

08:10 when you read my book, I think - I'm not so sure if it's the opening in the introduction, Psalms 121 - I will lift up my eyes onto the hill from whence cometh my help. I that everyday and it got me through when I had difficult situations – like a delivery in the dead of night, or at midnight and going out in the community all by myself. I would read that because without that I could not function

09:19 Out in oxton field I would go from a daily walk there and would appreciate the green space. Being around trees- being around nature because I live in a block of flats that is very, very important to able to have some green spaces as well as they should encourage more urban gardens, urban spaces because it's good for your health and well being also good for the environment which obviously environment is very very important to take notice off to address those issues, which keep coming up in our community.I think those green spaces are able to support the quest to the area becoming a great place to live as well as environmentally compliant.

10:12 So, I've been trying to put across to the manager about maybe doing like a garden service for people who you know, don't do it or can't get around to doing it and it'd be nice just to have a couple of guys just go out. Build the grass driven down, you know, things like that he just gets because we only really have one job that gets us out of the building, because we live in work in the same building. So apart from going out to the shop or wherever we're in here like pretty much 24 hours a day. So it'd be nice to sort of be able to get out a little bit more. Give other people a bit of opportunity too.

10:56 We have to share, through art, or tutelage, or whether it's through food, with a person living in the area. And also, you know, if youre not happy about something, just do something about it. Don't complain about it. Do something positive, something positive

If you could have any new building in the area, what would that building have in it? Adult Trampoline Park!

Pillar 1 - Jaya - TRANCRIPTION

SUMMARY KEYWORDS neighbour, recognising, hopeful, music, safety, sang, inequality gap, favourite, singing, word, faces, feel, baby, person, song, various different types, bird, Manchester, sound

like feeling like I'm part of a local community where people know each other even if you're not sat chatting, or going around to their yards and houses, you know having dinner and tea and stuff being able to say hello and recognizing faces. And occasionally, you know, petting the dog or whatever, just feels nice because then it feels like people see you and they know you. And then if something happens here, somebody might go, oh, where so and so, safety. In one word as the community means safety to me. Like family you don't get to choose your neighbors. I think being a good neighbor is remembering that the people next door - your neighbors are not you & they're not like you in any way.

And they're also trying to live like you're trying to live and have a roof over their head. A good neighbour I think, is someone that tries -at least as much as possible- to consider not just their boundary and their needs and you know how they like to see the lawn and all that kind of stuff but recognise that people exist and anywhere people exist, there's going to be a difference. Sometimes, it's perceived that I'm a nosy neighbour. I'm a bit of curtain twitcher, and a bit of a noosy neighbour. Those are the labels that you can place up on me. However, like I said, in the previous answer that I've saved, sometimes I'll hear something that doesn't sound normal. So I'm really good at recognising sounds in my home in my community on my street, and if something doesn't sound like it should do, I will look and if something is going on that shouldn't be I'll also make my presence known because that is also part of safety and making sure that the area is you haven't got somebody crazy coming along. You know, breaking windows and you know, all of that kind of stuff. So, and then sometimes some people are just arguing and it's funny, but I don't judge them. I try not to judge them publicly anyway, just in their mind and have a little giggle. When I first moved I was the only person while I was the only young person that was single, queer Brown of South Asian descent and everybody else was families and older people and people from various different Caribbean islands and things and everybody was like initially a little curious, who is this strange little young thing? And, you know, I had lots of various different types of butch women come in and you know, day in and all of that and it's not necessarily a well that some of the neighbors were used to particularly the older ones, but you know, what, there was never any friction. Everybody just, I took time to get to know who they were. And they took time to get to know me and I was there for about 10 years. And it took about two to three years, but we became chill with each other. There's nothing more hopeful than music. Because music is the most universal language. And it allows everybody to be able to in one way or another, hear, feel and see each other music. Like sometimes there are chords and I can feel it building my body, in songs in a certain type of music. Sometimes music just take you back somewhere. The festivals, when you know parties, moments anywhere, there's music, it's just so hopeful because you're dancing. I mean even even a funeral where it should be or considered the most saddest moment. You put on that person's favourite tune. And it just gets you thinking of all of their all the nice stuff that you did with them. The fact that this was their daft favourite tunes. There's nothing more hopeful than music. So, I'm going to pick a Bengali nursery rhyme. I'll do it first, right so that you just get an idea of what it is. And it goes only:

[Jaya sings a song in Bengali]

I picked this because it reminds me of growing up it reminds me of my mum and my aunt other you know nice people that sang this song or you know said this. Sometimes they don't sing it they just say in words and it's just about a little baby bird. There's nothing complicated. There's nothing amazing about it. It's the baby bird and what it likes to eat. But I remember the hopeful eyes and the faces and the smiles as they are saying that the poem. When I'm doing it and I'm singing it to the children, especially particularly to young children, babies you're singing it with hope - you think oh gosh I hope you live a healthy life and grow and I hope your 10 fingers stay 10 And I hope you all have all the good things, and blah blah whatever it is that you're hoping, you know as just as you think in the silly little words about a little tiny bird wanting to eat a teeny tiny fish. You just do it with so much hope and smiles and the look in your eyes and things and it's like that's why I picked it.

SEED 1 - Strawsummer TRANSCRIPTION

It’s called straw summer It only grows in June because that’s my birthday out in nature in a field So it basically spins around and then when you touch these bits it feels fluffy and when you touch the red bit in the middle and you smell it it smells like strawberries.

And then these are like for things to help you feel better This one is for when you feel sick This one is for adults This one is for if you break an arm or leg This is for snack and this is for dinner

SEED 3 - The Flying Dandelion TRANSCRIPTION



In the middle of the forest it’s the flying dandelion, it likes to fly, it has different dots, it feels smooth but then very dotty.

SEED 2 - The Funny Plant TRANSCRIPTION

The funny plant. The plant is really big and is orange. It grows an egg basically in the egg is an orange. And then it lights up. Basically if you eat it in the forest, you light up.

SEED 4 - The Money Plant TRANSCRIPTION

The money plant because that makes more sense you know, like instead of putting stuff like lavender that looks like lavender or like a rose for a flower that looks like the colour rose. I’m putting something that, it’s the most obvious thing. So money plant, I mean I know there is already a plant like that but…

00:27 
It’s going to have light green leaves a bit more like dull green though, not bright light green, a bit more dull. I feel like that symbolises what happens to the plant after the money is taken. It’s just going to be cut down even if it’s a tree, it’s going to be cut down just coz we getting more and more of the money. It’s like a leafy plant but instead of a branch it’s a leaf. And at the tip of the leaf there is going to be money, probably like a pound, a note basically not like coins coz coins is heavier.

01:03 I do think it will be like a standard apple tree or something but like I think it takes more time to grow. It would be ideal to put near houses coz people would not even feel like going to banks or like wherever they work so they get money. It would be ideal to keep it inside your house so you get money without even getting up.

SEED 5 - Lilac TRANSCRIPTION

Okay my plant is called Lilac and it’s a unique flower, they go an reunite all the flowers after the butterflies open up their wings and it releases pollen dust that helps other flowers to go up. In my garden which is in Lincoln Green.

SEED 6 - Bite Bee TRANSCRIPTION

It’s called biteable so if any bee goes in the sunflower, the sunflower will just bite it. In the brown bit is suppose to have some little insects, so the insects on the brown bit, the bees come. The other bugs in the brown bit will bite the bees and they will protect the sunflower bite bee plant.

00:37 umm, So the yellow bit, is some humans might get the yellow bit and then they might use it for tea. And the green bit is for the plant to stand and grow. It’s like the side of the banana peel. I would like it to grow next to Heron Food and that’s all.

SEED 7 - Blue Rose TRANSCRIPTION

This is called a blue rose, umm… it’s suppose to carry photosynthesis to make food to itself umm… And also it mainly helps butterflies to carry pollen for itself. It’s kind a disease for bees coz it contains a special type of pollen, I can’t remember what it’s called but you might as well see that it's called a blue rose because of course it’s blue and it’s my favourite colour.

00:23

You would probably find it somewhere that is directly towards the sun because no shade can block it from the sun’s rays and you could probably find it like near a local park that’s very umm, very new and not many children play there. yeah…

Pillar 3 - Gloria - TRANSCRIPTION

SUMMARY KEYWORDS midwives, midwife, ladies, midwifery, baby, community, practising, write, home, visited, care, diaries, give, organisation, behaviour, working, woman, day, scared, realise

My name is Gloria Hanley and I was a community midwife, based in Leeds 17, 8,9, and 7d for 30 years before I retired- a job that I loved dearly and its had its ups and downs but I have no regrets about being a community Midwife. We could work working in areas as I mentioned earlier, and so that will be our community, our people, my ladies, so that was my community. I'm also a community to worker- in that I interact with various people in different communities, different cultures, different religious people. And also, I serve on various organisations, volunteer organisational boards like police racial harassment. Nurse Association, the churches, West Yorkshire Ecumenical Councils so you can split me in many parts. As a community midwife when a woman is pregnant, from a positive pregnancy test, and she sees her doctor, she is immediately assigned a midwife. And that midwife, probably not so much so today but in the ages, that midwife follows this lady right through her pregnancy until she has given birth, sometimes at home, most times in hospital and care postnatally right to protect the babies about a month. I did not refer to any of them as patients because they weren't sick. So the become your friend, you know them and you know, the whole family and you interact with them. They most of them didn't call me midwife - They call me Gloria, you know, and I treat it as though they were part of me. So every baby that I take care of and for every mom that I cared for, to become became a friend, and the baby would be effectively mine. So I'm one of y'all one of the things I am an African Caribbean woman, a black woman and I was working in the community. In the 80s when racism was high on the agenda, and so at some homes, I was refused entrance to the homes. Most times out of sheer ignorance until I explained to hem for the need of a midwife. You know. So that that was the downside. Sometimes I felt threatened because of some of the partners behavior, not only threatened and scared but it didn’t stop me. I used to put on a brave face and defuse incidents. Especially racial incidents with a sense of humour. And it worked for me. There was never a day that I didn't want to go to work because I'm too scared.

05:02 I worked in postcodes ladies with the higher postcode -They saw me as the servant and do this and do that and come at this time and don't come at that time. The ladies in the poor area, they waited for me to come. They welcomed me in their homes. They offered me cups of teas. Muslim community, always offered me food. I loved eid. Because I ate in every house. I thoroughly enjoyed working with poorer people- they were more appreciative than the rich ones. And that was okay with me, because I gave as much care as I thought people needed. So if those of in the richer area didn't need the care, id give them their basic care – and this isn’t even - part of my role, but I would even teach them to cook and give them recipes for them to try out. You know so I just felt a part of them.

And in houses where I visited where there was already a toddler. I would always play with the toddler first before I look at the baby. I was part of the family Christmas, Christmas Day. I didn’t eat Christmas dinner in people's homes but I will always go home at the end of the day. With my uniform pocket stuff mince pie – I was offered the rum, but resisted. Every year midwives issues with diaries and when finished your visits you put it in the diary at the end of every day, I would evaluate my visits and I would write outstanding things in my diary in red so just in case I have to make any comparison. And I kept these diaries for every year I was practicing midwifery. So one day I thought I need to get rid of these diaries and I went through them and I looked at them before I got rid of them I thought I’d write a book . I wanted to write the book to leave it as a legacy for my children and my grandchildren. To let them know that it was not all plain sailing. And so it's written there because memory fades and some things you can't recall. So it's in writing. And it was also because of some of the racism that I experience so that I could send a copy to the head of midwifery to say this is what I experienced. Please don't let any body else go through this.

One of my major reasons – apart from age because I could have carried on but midwifery changed an awful lot. We were given time - we were timed – about 20 minutes in a home. And I I couldn't come to terms with working to time. I was there to give care, and my care was holistic, whatever ladies wanted, I would give it to them. We had hours yes from nine to five. But very often I'd be driving home at seven o'clock in the evening. Sometimes I'm driving home at seven o'clock and a suddenly realise Well, I don't know what happened but something would tell me that something wasn't quite right with the lady and I would turn around and go back. And when I got there, they would say Aw, thank God you've come because – and they would tell me the problem. Now when we were given time allotted times I couldn't do that. I had to be out of that house in 20 minutes. And I felt very uncomfortable working like that and that's when I told myself tend to go well.

One thing I’d hear, when I was walking down the road, or back to the area I was practicing in is- is people saying “Midwife I wish you were here, come back because the care is not the same” And that saddens me. One of the things that I would love to see reinstated. One midwife assigned to one woman.I mean, on my case book, even if I had 200 Ladies, I knew the names can't remember their names now mind you, but I knew their names, and I knew the needs and now ladies are not the same a midwife they can see a team of midwives. And I believe that's a negative thing. Because when you're having a baby, you need to relate to the Midwife. And Midwife is giving holistic care.

Now midwives are more or less doing a job. And I think women are losing out what women need to do is to be more vocal. Say what care they are expecting and what care they want to have and even get to stage where they with demand what they want? Because having a baby is a frightening thing. Bringing a baby home from the hospital is a scare thing. The mother is scared of the baby the father if he's present is scared of the baby. And it midwives aren’t visiting as often now because midwives are only around for a couple of days where they will return to? Whereas previously, they had our telephone number, visited 10 days regularly. And now they're missing out.

My Psalms 121 - I will lift up my eyes onto the hill from whence cometh my help. I said that everyday and it got me through when I had difficult situations – like a delivery in the dead of night, or at midnight and going out in the community all by myself. I would read that because without that I could not function.

SEED 9 - Mystical Magic Tree TRANSCRIPTION

My plant is called mystical magic. So the ground around it is like a pinky purple and the tree is like an ombre pink and purple and the tree itself like the branches I mean the bush is a blue with like a darker blue which goes into a lighter blue. And, on the tree is kinda like a plum but it’s a pink and purple and it’s basically like a wish tree/healing tree. So, if you take a bite out of or put it in whatever you do it grants wishes you could say. On the sides of it is a dust, I guess it’s just for aesthetics you could say. Well to be honest you would find it in a hospital garden, but every hour it kinda relocates so it’s hard to find but it goes like into an area where people are less fortunate so it’s kinda like a helping tree I guess you could say.

SEED 10 - The Sweetness Tree TRANSCRIPTION

The name of my plant is called the sweetness tree. It’s a very tall tree and honeycombs hang from the branches. The honey from the honeycombs drip down to the ground and then people can and drink the honeycomb to heal their bitterness. If someone is feeling sad or angry they can drink the honeycomb to feel more better.

00:27 I would plant my plant near gardens that have a peaceful vibe, or near tense areas like the hospital if someone has a bad health and they are very distressed about it they can drink the honeycomb to feel more better.

SEED 8 - Rosa Core TRANSCRIPTION

It’s a glow in the dark rosa core because I thought of a rose at the start, and I thought I should put my name at the start of a rose. And then I thought of like, this looks like solar panels. So like, It’s neon like, it glows in the dark. I would rather like keep it inside because if it’s going outside for too much it would loose it’s colour. I would like put it in a top shelf, umm…because I wouldn’t want it to fall down because it’s not really that big. So if it was like planted somewhere in the inside I would make my own plant. So It would be planted like near other plants maybe where I usually plant them. I’d get like a new pot, I’d plant like umm, this plant separately because I don’t want them too close together and just mushed up together.

Pillar 2 - Sally - TRANSCRIPTION

SUMMARY KEYWORDS dream, important, life, community, feel, treat, scene, snowball, cooking, cook, neighbour, place, talk, mainstay, extended family, thankful, nationalities, dancing, Lincoln, family

00:30 To me, a good community is a diverse community - where we each value one another because I'm firmly of the belief that everybody has something to bring, and it's really important that that is recognised and encouraged. And it's where people reach out to one another. So I suppose I'd like to think of it as an extended family where people can feel it as long as you say they've got something to offer to the community because we're all valuable. And Well, my faith is the base of my life. So the verse for me would be love your neighbour as yourself. And I think if every time I stopped and really thought, would I want to be treated like this, then that would really help.

The way we treat one another. So we should be important to each other. We had a lovely example of our neighbour who was actually 90 last year, and he was quite a private gentleman, but through lockdown we found out that he didn't like cooking. So as we cook for a family, we said for several days of the week, we would cook for him as well, because as in my mind, I think if I didn't like cooking and was living on my own, what would I want somebody to do for me? So I think that for me is a really good principle is taking care of each other and more than that - so say treating your neighbour as you'd want them to treat you. There are words from a song, that say all my life you have been faithful all my life you have been so good, with every breath I am able, I will sing the of goodness of God. We have been as a family through quite a lot of quite challenging situations.

And that has been my experience. When I trust in the God I know who is a faithful God, then I could cope with any sort of situation because we have to understand that not everything is under our control. And it's often about the way we respond to things rather than actually what is going on in our lives. So that has been a mainstay of my work for many years now.

I volunteer at a place called The Welcome in Lincoln Green and my dream would be that it does exactly what the name - its that people are all nationalities, all ages, all cultures come and find a welcome there that they can come and be accepted. And loved, not judged. Able to dream when we first opened up again. Towards the end of the lockdown was that people would just have a place they could come where they wouldn't be isolated in their own homes. They could come and they could talk as they needed to talk or not talk if they didn't want to talk but have a hot drink or cold drink, a biscuit and fruit where they just come and feel a part so my dream would be that that would snowball. And there will be many places in the local community where that can happen where people feel that they are part of it, that valued a special because everybody is special, and that they could come and find that place when it can be so my dream is as I say, we will end up being so busy that it's too smaller premises to fit everybody in.

So, for me, it would look like I think, almost a street carnival scene where people were dancing and clapping all in their different modes, some of them some more more able dancing than others, but that's fine, because we all have an individual way of expressing. So we have a scene of great joy, where people are joining together in celebration of their community that they live in.