Party!

Vajraloka, May 2022

UJ is back! She notified me of her return flight, arriving at Birmingham on a day with absolutely no train service because of the strike, and at the same time as I was due to play in a badminton match. A friend kindly offered to meet her at the airport and drive her home. We exchanged Christmas gifts - a mug with a cat design for her, chocolates and a body scrub for me. Her family is not in too bad a situation despite living in Kyiv, because they are in an old apartment that uses gas for heating and cooking, so despite the power cuts they are warm. She tells me that Kyiv has also improved its missile defences so they aren't too badly off on that front either. Still, she is glad to be here rather than there.

In the past, the Christmas Day celebrated in Ukraine corresponded with that of the Russian church on 7th January. UJ tells me that because all things Russian are now distasteful there is a move to celebrate on 25th December instead. But this year, our amazing local coordinator who is devoting her whole life to helping the refugees arranged a party for all the Ukrainians in the district, and their hosts. The Pump Room was the venue, and such was the demand that there was no room for hosts! This very much disappointed UJ who was keen for me to attend, and in the end I did go for a couple of hours, which was really all I could tolerate.

The local MP was also there and made a little speech - he has been very helpful in trying to get the right visas and accommodation and no doubt much more I don't know about. Children ran about and screamed in the way that children do when they are excited and having fun, one little boy had a major meltdown when his helium balloon escaped, there was a high speed collision between two of the children, but on the whole harmony reigned. Before I arrived a violinist and a singer had performed, I sampled some of the traditional Ukrainian Christmas dishes, a local ukulele band played, and I left before the disco.

We lost the badminton match that I was playing when UJ arrived, but the same players plus UJ convened for a pub quiz on Sunday night. We didn't win that either, but it was fun and we're planning to do it again in a fortnight. I had to forgo the next badminton match because I had a tooth extracted which had shown up on the latest X-ray as Not Very Well. My dentist is lovely. After I had childishly complained about having to endure the procedure and then pay for it we got down to business. The tooth was actually broken (horizontally) which hadn't shown up on the X-ray, but he got it all out without any fuss, and sadly agreed with the orthodontist that another extraction would probably be needed. So, more fun with teeth to come.

After dosing myself with painkillers UJ took me to the cinema that evening. She had asked a couple of times whether I wanted to see the latest blockbuster Avatar 3D movie, and I had said no, but when she asked again I realised that she just needed some company, so there I was on Monday night with my 3D glasses. It's actually the first proper 3D film I've seen - I went with Lola II and Sister D aeons ago but that wasn't a proper movie with a story, just a demonstration of what 3D could do. Avatar was an extraordinary and astonishing visual spectacle, and I have no idea how it was made, but it was much too long and I wasn't particularly interested in the story. In fact, I found myself feeling sad that so many people and animals were portrayed as being violently killed or maimed, and wondered why this continues to feature so prominently in so many films, while showing something as relatively innocuous as smoking (or even vaping) is now completely unacceptable.

A trip north followed, to see H+B and also the man I met at the Shrewsbury Folk Festival who was interested in mum's button accordion, but subsequently decided he didn't want it. We had a nice chat, he's volunteering at the Festival again but I'm not, he handed over the accordion and maybe we'll be in touch next time I'm back up north.

Vajraloka, May 2022