Chris’s letter home (1) – 26th Feb

Well, here I am – sitting in a cottage at the back of one of the big houses in this neighbourhood of Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham is a steel city; the city itself is only about 300,000, the same size as Leicester. But it is surrounded by towns and villages which make the total conurbation much bigger. (But don’t tell Ruth that – her Birmingham is over a million people, and with the Black Country and all the other surrounding towns, it’s huge.)

My work table - all ready to go!

The flight over took a whole day – and on top of that, my watch had to move back 6 hours, so that day was 22 hours long! The next day I was a bit tired… but I seem to be over it now. Henry and Becky are very kind and hospitable (he’s the Bishop who visited us in 2008). Henry has lent me the laptop I’m using at the moment, and Becky took me down to get a mobile phone (called “cellphone” here) that I can use in the USA. I’ve transferred some photos across, and if this works, you’ll get them with this letter. I’ve been for a couple of walks, mainly down to the shop, but this afternoon we’re going to the Diocesan retreat centre, Camp McDowell, where we’ll be staying overnight and I expect to do more walking. Next week I’m going on retreat for 5 days, so you won’t hear from me now for over a week.

So far I haven’t done much – well, I’m not supposed to be doing much, and it takes a bit of getting used to! But I have been spending time in the early mornings praying, and I’ve found a website on the railways (“railroads”) of Alabama, which will help my research into the railroad my family was involved in. Yesterday afternoon I caught a bus – not something people do much here, and the bus service isn’t nearly as good as in Leicester – and ended up miles outside Birmingham, with not a clue when the next bus would come and take me home! Ah well – put it down to experience…

Best wishes

Chris.