Home Sweet Home ... BUT

Finally I arrived at home yesterday after 5 weeks away. BUT it is only a short visit to see my lovely husband, do the washing and pack again. I am going to leave for Germany tomorrow. There will be a conference in Darmstadt from Friday to Sunday. After a stop over to see my family in Bochum on Monday and Tuesday I will head off for a campaign in Hong Kong on Wednesday for 3 weeks.

Halloween in the call room

My students and I had to work on Halloween day. So I decided to decorate the room a little bit and we had a best costumes contest. It was really fun!

Training at the Kent University

Last weekend I stayed for three days in Canterbury (southeast England) to present our Training at the Kent University. My first campaigns were in Marlborough and Oxford therefore the buildings that the training and the seminars took place were really lovely and nice to look on. At Kent I felt a little bit like visiting the Ruhr Universität Bochum because the buildings were like there build in the 70^th and look like boxes.

The university is situated on a hill so that you have a really fantastic few on the city and the cathedral.

I stayed for this weekend in a nice B&B which was only a 10 minutes walk from the centre so that I had the chance to have a little walk through this tiny town on Saturday.

The way to the office

Our office is based in Chipping Norton which is around 20 miles north of Oxford.

My journey to the office is fantastic not only because driving against the current – in the morning there is a traffic jam towards Oxford and in the evening all are leaving Oxford – but because of the lovely countryside.

I go through the historic town of Woodstock and many fields. The last 2,5 km are through a small path where I come across cows, pheasants, squirrels and other beautiful creatures – I gave some of them names. :)

These last 5 minutes make me feel happy every day and show me that life is wonderful and there are so many things that want to be explored.

Emmy - our office dog

Pete’s dog Emmy is our office dog and she is really cute.

Sometimes you have the feeling that she isn’t in the office because she is so quite and good and in the next moment she jumps up with a bottle in her mouth and wants to play – great.

She likes lying in the sun or like here in front of the heater.

Everyone loves Emmy!

My first campaign or SMILE WITH YOUR VOICE

After joining Vikki for one week at Marlborough and Claire at Trinity I got my own campaign to run over two weeks in Oxford. John did the training at the first two days and then I managed the rest of the two weeks. I was a little bit nervous at the beginning but I think that´s normal. I decided not to think about all the possible barriers but to use my common sense and my experiences. It worked well: The results of the campaign are fantastic, the students liked me (Although they were sometimes a little bit surprised at my procedure and games – e.g. we all collected frameworks and rules and at the end I invited them to sign these on the poster, another time I showed them a stick under which everybody should put a finger to hold it in the high of my nose. The aim was to bring this pole in 5 minutes down to the floor without losing contact. They looked at me and smiled but it took them two trials to hit the target.) and I feel good in the things that I do – That’s the way life should be.

I am now in the office since one week and will stay here for 3 more.

BBQ with my colleagues

I am now for 5 weeks with RBA but in the first 4 weeks I only know a handful of my colleagues.

My first days I spent in Edinburgh, then I went with Vikki to Marlborough, afterwards I had a campaign in Oxford with Claire at Trinity College and then I run a campaign on my own in Oxford with Lincoln College. Since my first day I was only for a few hours in the office.

So it was a great opportunity that John made one of his legendary BBQ at his house and most of my colleagues joint this event. It was a fantastic funky BBQ where I got to know nearly everyone and I can say: It’s going to be a great time with these guys.