shotleyfieldsforever

This is your correspondent live on location at Fontanarossa Aeroporto, Catania. Not exactly the most exciting place to be. The duty free is generally expensive and I can buy my exceptional Grappa cheaper on Amazon. As seems usual in Italy personal space is at a premium, I have had mine invaded with remarkable frequency since I divested myself of my outerwear and removed my belt in order to make my way tentatively through security. As gates are posted and announced, queues form and, as most of the flights are internal, the queues are friendly and disorderly and even Ryan Air appears almost European in its laid backness. As I sit here however having consumed the most expensive sandwich in Italy and drunk the most expensive beer, served by the least affable serving staff in Italy, I find myself book in hand engaged in my favourite pastime, people watching. The babel here babbles away with hand gestures accompanying words in order to emphasise the points being made by the inte...

My Mum was an aspirational working class Mum. I paid the price for this. Ballroom dancing? I had two left feet! Elocution Classes? My accent always gave me away! 11 Plus? I failed! But borderline so I sat it again! Grammar School? I was expelled! But in the end my class of origin was, slowly and painfully, put behind me and I became middle  class. I’m sure that my Mum was proud when I became a Vicar but she was probably prouder of my children when she became a Grandmother. So in the end my class of origin and my current class didn’t really matter. All she ever wanted was to be a Grandmother and indeed she was. But whether she would vote for, or accept, Rebecca Long-Bailey’s aspirational socialism is quite another question, Sure two of her great grandchildren are now at University, as were her Grandchildren, yet her aspirations were mainly for her own family, rather than for her class as a whole, so I suspect that, whilst she would be pleased to have seen us a...

Janet Elizabeth Smith 16 th  March 1948 – 21 st  December 2017 We have lived with MS for forty years.  Janet was diagnosed in 1978 before our youngest child, was born, we have addressed the limitations it imposes on both our lives, and we like to think, risen above them. After my retirement to become a carer, we have travelled widely and there have been some memorable moments: Back packing with a wheelchair across Spain and across to North Africa, faced with the steep flight of steps in Tangiers our request for assistance was met with the comment, Aah! You have this woman? Having boarded the wrong train at Malpensa, in Milan we were faced with the most amazing Ascensori, operated anonymously after requesting assistance in faltering Italian via an intercom on the wall. The wheelchair and its inhabitant having to be carried bodily up the steps and into the Aeroplane, that happened twice, once in Schipool and once in Gibraltar. So we have trav...

So, we are the 5th richest nation in the world? And we are leaving the European Union? Well, currently I am living in Sicily. In the UK, in my home, in Consett, I average 0.5 megs internet speed. Here in Sicily I get +20 megs, instant communication. No buffering. No hiatus. Instant and unbroken communication. I can email. I can text. I can watch movies on my iPad Pro. I can surf the web. Download is immediate, instant, faultless and damned near perfect. From my apartment, from the coffee shop, from the bar, from the terrace with uninterrupted sunshine, from the street, just about from anywhere! So, what to say? The service here is a government service, provided by the state, the same state that Richard Branson sold his Virgin Trains to! So now all the UK Trainlines are state owned, by the French, German and Italian States! When the Labour Manifesto suggested providing a state guaranteed internet service, people voted Tory. Booze ups and breweries come to mind. ...

Today as we walked into Town for our morning coffee we passed crowds of tourists heading towards the Greek Ampitheatre. As we settled down to order our coffees we entered into conversation with a lady sitting next to us. It turns out that the tourists were on a World Cruise which lasts until April 19th. The cruise ship was the Queen Mary II and after Taormina their next port of call was Haifa with trips to Jerusalem, Nazareth and the Sea of Galilee. We couldn’t help reflecting how their four hours in Taormina compared with our four weeks? It reminded me of the old gag, ‘If it’s Tuesday it must be Belgium. I must say that I rather prefer walking through town each day and being recognised, occasionally greeted and welcomed to our coffee stop by a waiter who recites our order, as regulars, old friends even before we can offer our attempt at ordering in Italian. Ordering coffee is one thing however but I would have some serious work to do before I could preach in Italian, alth...

Lunches are long ..... and where possible people sit with their backs to the wall! This is Sicily so, after an interesting Eucharistica, concelebrated with the Lutheran minister for Sicily, lunch was taken in a small family restaurant just off Corso Umberto. Here people are still well wrapped, leather jackets and padded and quilted coats and scarves. Even though the temperature is well into 16 degrees and there is wrap around sunshine morning ‘til evening, people are still well wrapped. Meanwhile, aware of minus figures being reported from home, we are wandering from breakfast to lunch in shirt sleeves. Etna is covered in cloud but around the Island the sky is postcard blue. I sometimes see sermons posted on facebook. Often they are very good. Learned, thought provoking, theologically literate. I am sure that my Lutheran colleagues sermon was of this order, She delivered it from a typescript from the pulpit, I preached as well, at the joint service the unfortunate co...

Corso Umberto is still busy in January. The sales are on, discounts of 70% are not uncommon. But 70% off Sicilian prices still mean that goods are too expensive for a retired clergyman to consider purchasing. The views out across the Straits of Messina are magical with the sun glinting on the blue of the Mediterranean. Whenever I look out from the terrace I imagine that I can see the Orca. Whales that have left the waters of Greenland to winter in the Mediterranean. To date no sightings to report but we keep watching. However we are not here just to whale watch. We are here to assist in maintaining the Anglican presence in this rather special corner of the world. We arrived in time for Epiphany. Of course 2000 years ago the Magi, wise men, just showed up in order to show the Christ child to the world. Today however it wouldn’t be that easy to just show up from Persia to Bethlehem. Apart from the fact that Persia no longer exists, and Iraq the land of the Euphrates stru...