Apologies for this old picture; as ever, I managed not to take a photo of the class, so have had to resort to this happy memory.
With the trip to Ethiopia imminent, a pause in the activities of Zhvan Theatreand the Holiday Inn classes… hopefully only until I return at the beginning of November. Matilda and I have made some exploratory moves to finding some one to replace me on a temporary (or indeed not so temporary) basis, but in the short time frame we had, this was always going to prove difficult. So what is likely is that nothing will happen, and I just have to hope that we do not lose momentum entirely.
All the more so since, for the first time in ages, we decided for the final session to abandon work on the Journeys script, and just have some fun. It was a small class – with me going away, we decided to postpone the planned recruitment drive for the time being. All the same, we did have one new member, Nafas, a friend of Hamed. She claims to have weak English, but in fact she coped extraordinarily well, even with some pretty intense improv exercises (such as “Alternate Words”.)
We also had Carla. She is perpetually unreliable, but each time she comes she is great, picking up on ideas, characterisations, etc. And Shamym was there, and she has proved to be a consistently reliable presence, joining in as appropriate, but always being positive.
And so we had a most enjoyable session – lots of laughter, and an excellent atmosphere. I should add that the other people there were Hamed and Tulsi. Of course, Aisha was not with us, for one of the dew times ever. But this allows for an Aisha update. Val and I took her to Ruskin College (in the depths of Old Headington) for her to enrol, and we heard later that day that there had been an induction and lunch. The one real bugbear is that there is no provision for accommodation in her scholarship, so lots of people were suddenly engaged in looking for something for her. In fact, Val and I would offer somewhere if all else fails, but we are by no means ideal, so we are keeping this quiet for the time being; if people think the situation is solved, they stop looking.
In fact, we have subsequently heard that she does have somewhere for the time being, provided for her by Greenpeace. Since they were one of the organisation who forst invited her, then encouraged her to apply for asylum, I do feel they have a certain amount of responsibility.
But that is the situation at present, and for the time being Wembley will be hibernating. And I imagine that the daily blog will pretty much alternate between Ethiopia and Forty Years ago.
