E16 CANNING TOWN
St Fidelis Friary Killip Close - mc
St Margarets Chapel Bethell Avenue -mc
Anchor House 81 Barking Road - MC
St.Matthias Kimberley Road - MC
Canning Town Evangelical Church Cliff Walk - MC
Keir Hardie Methodist Fife Road - mc
Old British Flag pub, now Black Church Victoria Dock Road/Bridgeland Road? - mc
E16 CUSTOM HOUSE
Custom House Baptist Church Prince Regents Lane - mc
Varley Christian Centre Varley Road - mc
St Annes RC Church Berwick Road - mc
Lighthouse Christian Fellowship Lawson Close -mc
E13 PLAISTOW
Rowntree Clifford Close - mc
Forrest House
Society of St Francis 42 Balaam Street
Harold Road Centre Harold Road - mc
St Martins Boundary Road - mc
Word of God 738 Barking Road - mc
Newham Hospital Quiet Room
East London Buddhist Cultural Centre 33 Maybury Road - mc
Sikh Centre 2a Lucas Avenue - mc
Upton Cross Centre Claud Road
E6 EAST HAM
Hartley Centre Barking RoaD - mc
St Albans Wakefield Street [west end]
Latimer Hall Cleves Road
Jehovahs Witnesses 65 Napier Road
[take pic of Flanders Field Pavilion and Playing Fields run by Bonny Down Baptists] - mc
Jehovahs Witnesses 183 Green Street - mc
St Edwards Primary RC School Green Street-by WHFC - mc
Islamic Centre 72 Selwyn Road
Al-Hira Centre 241 Plashet Road
Islamic Centre 98 Plashet Road
Vishura Hindu 446 Green Street - mc --- turns out this is a hairdressers...
Islamic Centre 175-179 Plashet Grove
Madina Masjid 225 High Street - mc
Masjid E-Taupid? 248a High Street - mc
E12 MANOR PARK
Froud Centre Romford Road Toronto Avenue - mc
Little Ilford Baptist Church Sheringham Avenue
Gainsborough Christian Fellowship 77 Gainsborough Avenue
Manor Park Methodist Romford Rd/Herbert Road - mc
Bible Bookshop 744 Romford Road - mc --- now closed
St Nicholas RC Gladding Road
St Barnabas Browning Road - mc
Sri Muragan Temple 78 Church Road
Mahdekesh Temple 272 High Street North - mc
Anjuman Masjid 266-268 High Street North - mc
Islamic Centre 398 High Street North - mc
Mosque 724 Romford Road - mc
Gurdwara 97a Rosebery Avenue - mc
E7 FOREST GATE
Durning Hall Earlham Grove - mc
Christian Care [now a Community- Woodbridge?] 34 Norwich Road - just a house
St James Church St James Road - mc
Hope Baptist Church 5-7 Stafford Road
Church/Community Centre 66 Sebert Road
St Edmunds 464 Katherine Road - mc
Grangewood Independent School [Christian School] Chester Road
St Marks Lorne Road
St Lazarus & St Andrews [Greek Orthodox] 4 Rutland Road - mc
Shree Kutsch Temple 22-24 Shaftesbury Road
Anjuman Roza Mustapha 198 Shrewsbury Road
Azhar Academy 235 Romford Road - mc
Forest Gate Mosque 449-451 Romford Road - mc
Ida Minhaj Community Centre 292-296 Romford Road - mc
Imamia Mosque 328 Romford Road - mc
Sub Rung Islamic Centre 113 Green Street - mc
Mosque and Community Centre 88 Green Street - mc
St Angelas RC School and Convent Grosvenor Road
St Anthonys 56 St Anthonys Road
Upton Mosque 62-66 Upton Lane
Namdari Gurdwara 96 Upton Lane
St Bonaventure School Boleyn Road
Sikh Gurwara 10-14 Neville Road
E15 STRATFORD
Martyrs Memorial- west of St Johns
West Ham C of E Primary School Portway
Grace Baptist Church Gurney Road - mc
Christ Disciples Faith Ministries 6-7 Park Lane
Stratford Methodist Bryant Stret
Tom Allen Centre Grove Crescent Road
Trinity Chapel/Redeemed Church of God 1 Warton Road
Stratford Seventh Day Adventists 58 Janson Road
Brickfields Welfare Road
Hindu Centre 5-7 Cedars Road
Abbey Gardens,Bakers Row
> Mini-garden opened up on former site of monks gargen of 12thC Stratford Langrthorne Abbey.
Friday, 25 June 2010
Thursday, 13 August 2009
I'm sure some people are still following this...
I'm in Kenya now, livin' it large with an unruly bunch of kids from east London. Well, sort of anyway... painting slum schools and cleaning up the shit from the streets of Nairobi. Ain't we nice?
If you want to follow our progress, as depicted by the aforementioned group of illiterate retards (myself and one or two others excluded), go to http://theswiftinkenya.blogspot.com
Enjoy!
I'll post a few highlights up here once I'm home.
If you want to follow our progress, as depicted by the aforementioned group of illiterate retards (myself and one or two others excluded), go to http://theswiftinkenya.blogspot.com
Enjoy!
I'll post a few highlights up here once I'm home.
Tuesday, 21 July 2009
Photos!
There are loads to catch up on and still a few hundred to upload, but I now have a decent amount on my flickr page and they've all been nicely arranged into sets according to where they were taken. http://www.flickr.com/photos/37333113@N03/
Here's some tasters:
Surin:
Hanoi:
Sapa:
Lao Cai = very nice beer :)
Here's some tasters:
Surin:
Hanoi:
Sapa:
Lao Cai = very nice beer :)
Tuesday, 14 July 2009
I'm home
There's still more blog to come and more photos to show, but I thought I'd let you all know that against my own better judgement, I have returned to London. So for now at least, farewell southeast Asia. *sad face*
Sunday, 5 July 2009
Surin
We were based in a pre-existing 'study-centre' in the Surin Elephant Village, which includes ivory stalls, a circus and elephant rides... hardly the best education you can get. There were 8 volunteers and we were the first ever to go there. We paid 6 mahouts 500B each a day (about 4 or 5 times what they normally earn) to unchain their elephants, put their hooks away and have their elephants follow us around while we went off and planted fields of grass, trees etc... Then each afternoon, we'd head off to the local river or mud bath and bathe the elephants with the mahouts. Basically we were trying to show them that they can make a lot of money without having the elephants work and without them putting in any effort whatsoever. All the mahouts co-operated completely and apparently were surprised at how well things turned out... some promising to continue the routine of a daily bath; something that doesn't happen at the moment. Whether or not they will, I don't know. he morning we left, we saw one of our elephants back in chains, mahout on its neck, hook in hand, so it might take a while to educate them completely.
The place itself is stunning. Completely flat, rice paddies everywhere and thanks to deforestation, not many trees in sight... we're hoping to change that. They currently have 65 elephants at the centre (we saw about 20 in total... it's possible the rest are on Bangkok streets. We thought it best not to ask that sort of question just yet), most involved in the circus. We're hoping that their mahouts will see the money we've spent on our six and be more willing to co-operate with us in future.
Eventually, it'll just be a vast area of land for up to 300 elephants to roam free in, with volunteers and visitors working with small family groups, while the rest are free to roam, undisturbed, and we'll cycle families. As it stands though, the land itself just isn't ready for that number of elephants, so we need to plant loads and loads of grass, trees and fruits for the elephants to eat.
The local river is awesome. It's so much wider and less currenty than the ENP river, and bathing elephants without throngs of day visitors is so much better. We even got in little fishing boats for one of the afternoons, which was insanely good fun! You also get to get an awful lot closer to the elephants themselves here than you do in Chiang Mai. There's a lot less security stuff like barriers for feeding and it makes a big difference... I felt like I really got to know the six elephants we were with.
The volunteer group were, if it's possible, even more awesome than our group was at ENP! We all got on, were all hard workers and everything went excellently. Couldn't have asked for a better week (could have asked for a longer one though) - it was hard to leave.
There are lots and lots of photos to come. Hope you've got unlimited internet, John!
The place itself is stunning. Completely flat, rice paddies everywhere and thanks to deforestation, not many trees in sight... we're hoping to change that. They currently have 65 elephants at the centre (we saw about 20 in total... it's possible the rest are on Bangkok streets. We thought it best not to ask that sort of question just yet), most involved in the circus. We're hoping that their mahouts will see the money we've spent on our six and be more willing to co-operate with us in future.
Eventually, it'll just be a vast area of land for up to 300 elephants to roam free in, with volunteers and visitors working with small family groups, while the rest are free to roam, undisturbed, and we'll cycle families. As it stands though, the land itself just isn't ready for that number of elephants, so we need to plant loads and loads of grass, trees and fruits for the elephants to eat.
The local river is awesome. It's so much wider and less currenty than the ENP river, and bathing elephants without throngs of day visitors is so much better. We even got in little fishing boats for one of the afternoons, which was insanely good fun! You also get to get an awful lot closer to the elephants themselves here than you do in Chiang Mai. There's a lot less security stuff like barriers for feeding and it makes a big difference... I felt like I really got to know the six elephants we were with.
The volunteer group were, if it's possible, even more awesome than our group was at ENP! We all got on, were all hard workers and everything went excellently. Couldn't have asked for a better week (could have asked for a longer one though) - it was hard to leave.
There are lots and lots of photos to come. Hope you've got unlimited internet, John!
I'm back in Bangkok :(
... and i'm still alive. Surin was, by a long way, the best week of my travels to date. Lots of stories to tell.
Right now, I'm off to find some street begging elephants with fellow volunteer Rachel, which should be an experience, if nothing else.
Tomorrow's my last full day in Asia and I'm off on a shopping spree. If anyone wants to get any dirt cheap CDs or DVDs, tell me now. I can absolutely guarantee that they'll be 100% genuine - possibly even working - copies in authentic paper cases. No piracy here!
Right now, I'm off to find some street begging elephants with fellow volunteer Rachel, which should be an experience, if nothing else.
Tomorrow's my last full day in Asia and I'm off on a shopping spree. If anyone wants to get any dirt cheap CDs or DVDs, tell me now. I can absolutely guarantee that they'll be 100% genuine - possibly even working - copies in authentic paper cases. No piracy here!
Sunday, 28 June 2009
Short update
I'm sure I will find time to write about Sapa and Hanoi in a bit more detail than this at some point, but blog writing is boring and I really can't be asked right now. I've got a few more hours to enjoy Bangkok and then it's off to Surin tomorrow morning to play with some more elephants for yet another week. God, time's gone quickly!
After that's done, it's back here for the Sunday night and the following Monday, then I catch a plane to The Big Apple on Tuesday. 23 hours in planes and airports... looking forward to it!
Sapa was superb. Really good people doing it, beautiful place, interesting night spent with a hill tribe family, got an indecent amount of excersize (those hills are steep!), learnt quite a lot of new card games and generally just had a good three days there.
The last night in Hanoi was great... got drunk for about a quid and caught my plane with a killer hangover. My malaria tablets don't help much with this, I've found. I get a hangover after two drinks!
For the rest of today, I'm gonna catch a skytrain (like the DLR, but good) north and find somewhere out of the way to have dinner. Maybe a local market... I've already spotted some interesting looking (and smelling) local delicasies. Let's see just how strong my stomach is, eh?
Once again I'm gonna give you all a break from my blog. I'll be back in Bangkok next Sunday night, so expect something soon after then. And mum, that doesn't mean that if there isn't anything written with an hour of my return, you have to send a text to both of my phone numbers and worry Jerry with an email asking if I'm okay. I'll be fine... it's only Thailand after all, what's the worst that can happen?
So once more, bring on the elephants!
After that's done, it's back here for the Sunday night and the following Monday, then I catch a plane to The Big Apple on Tuesday. 23 hours in planes and airports... looking forward to it!
Sapa was superb. Really good people doing it, beautiful place, interesting night spent with a hill tribe family, got an indecent amount of excersize (those hills are steep!), learnt quite a lot of new card games and generally just had a good three days there.
The last night in Hanoi was great... got drunk for about a quid and caught my plane with a killer hangover. My malaria tablets don't help much with this, I've found. I get a hangover after two drinks!
For the rest of today, I'm gonna catch a skytrain (like the DLR, but good) north and find somewhere out of the way to have dinner. Maybe a local market... I've already spotted some interesting looking (and smelling) local delicasies. Let's see just how strong my stomach is, eh?
Once again I'm gonna give you all a break from my blog. I'll be back in Bangkok next Sunday night, so expect something soon after then. And mum, that doesn't mean that if there isn't anything written with an hour of my return, you have to send a text to both of my phone numbers and worry Jerry with an email asking if I'm okay. I'll be fine... it's only Thailand after all, what's the worst that can happen?
So once more, bring on the elephants!
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