Sunday, 25 February, 2018
Its been a mad few weeks. I was housebound with either a mild flu or a nasty chest virus. After a week, I went out to an event at the Hackney Museum — Making Her Mark: 100 years of women’s activism. Not feeling as well as I’d hoped, I didn’t take a lot of time in the exhibition and managed to sit through a presentation called Radical Portraiture, which examined various portraits of women involved in the early days of feminism – a movement which has strong roots in Hackney. All of this led to women finally getting the vote. Apparently, there were many years before that where a large percentage of men couldn’t vote either – it was considered a privilege only for the upper classes of Britain. I plan to go back and look more closely at the exhibit and visit some of the other events during Women’s History Month (March 2018) – it’s the centenary of the 1918 Representation of the People Act, which gave the vote to some women for the very first time.
I had booked a table at the new Brook vegan restaurant for Lisa and me. We ordered four dishes, two of which I quite liked. I’m not a keen fan of veganism – in this case there was a little bit too much deep frying. I think the brunch menu might be better, with some fresher, more salady options!
I really wasn’t well enough to be out yet but it was a welcome change from my housebound existence since this started. I no sooner began to feel more myself than Krish got sick too. What a crazy month for the two of us!
Being sick did mean I was home a lot and I made a new doll and a Valentine’s heart for Krish.
I had two events this month that I wanted to be well enough to attend. The first was an assessment day for a new volunteer position with Bump Buddies I’m considering becoming a mentor and, when trained, Ill be paired with a mother-to-be, who is in need of extra support. I’m not sure how I will feel during the training. My knowledge is pretty strong but needs a bit of brushing up. Also I have zero clue about the experience of pregnancy or childbirth in the UK. Localising what I already know will be my biggest challenge, and that includes finding some humility, as well as learning to listen and adapt what I know to this new environment.
The assessment day went pretty well and I’ll be going every Wednesday and Thursday until 15 March for a four to five hour session each day. A bit daunting. I was probably thirty years older than the oldest person in the new mentor group so fitting in will be the other challenge.
My other event was Esmeralda finally making it back to the UK after being away for fourteen years. We spent part of Thursday and part of Saturday together, exploring a little. I’ll save that for the next blog post.