Ham House Diaries - Sun, gardens and Thai food!!

On Monday as the sun was shining, myself, Zoe, Jennie, Siobhan, Megan, Ben, Emily, Ed, Sarah and Sharmilla took a trip to Ham House to catch up on ideas and get the layout of the day clearer in our heads. As soon as we walked into the garden, we all breathed a sigh of relief and were reassured that they day would be a success. We had forgotten just how big the space was!!! Realising that fitting people in would not be a problem we started to wander around discussing ideas and trying to come up with some solutions as to where people would go and whether we would be able to hear the choirs from the back.

It was really great to get to the house again and to start to visualize the day. The 8 grass squares are a lot bigger than i remembered and they will certainly be big enough for the groups and the audiences to congregate on, have picnics and sing along with the choirs.

We also walked to the river to have a look at the ferry. Ham are trying to make the event as eco friendly as possible and are encouraging people to use alternative modes of transport to their cars. The ferry is a nice idea as it is a part of the community and is also something that people may not know about. It might be difficult to arrange something though as we cannot guarantee the numbers of people that would use it and they do not normally run on Sunday's. It is something that we should think about though, as it would be great to include them.

After the house visit - we went to The Fox and Duck pub to meet the landlady Pretti and to have some dinner. The pub are really interested in the event and would like to be involved. They have recently started a Thai restaurant in the pub and offered to cook for us even though they are not normally open on Mondays. It was a really delicious meal, and Tai, the chef and Pretti were really lovely, friendly and welcoming. It gave us the chance to get to know some of the local residents of Ham and to show our faces. There was a large group of us so if people ask who we are and what we are doing then its an opportunity to sell the event and get people involved. It was a really lovely evening - we all got to know each other more, having lots of conversations and enjoying the company.

I think that it was a shame that there were not many people there. It is important that we are all on board and all take the opportunity to go out into the community that we are trying to celebrate and bring together. I'm sure that there will be lots more opportunities to do this and hopefully more people will come along.