Category: Community Groups

Enjoy A Sociable Chat And Stroll

Caring relatives provide an extremely valuable service and the responsibility of care giving often falls on one person’s shoulders. The strain that carers are under and their invaluable contribution to care is often not acknowledged. Most carers cope with little or no support and caring can become a socially isolating experience. If you are a carer and would like some social contact and light physical exercise, then join our Carers walk at Barry Island.

On the first walk of 2020, there seemed to be a colourful theme as the walkers wore bright coloured coats, hats, scarfs..and…shorts in one case! Bright colours are not compulsory, just a desire to take a break from caring duties and enjoy a sociable chat and stroll. If you would like to join us, it’s the last Thursday of every month, 10 30am, Barry Island station.

 

 

Spring/Summer Programme

Our Spring/Summer programme began with a social evening when everyone was able to have a chat and enjoy a quiz. This was followed by a trip to the Millenium Centre to see “The King and I” which every-one enjoyed.

Our first talk was given By Peter Cox and was entitled “My Life as a Spy”. Peter had been employed for 32 years at GCHQ and was able to give us a fascinating insight into the world of British Intelligence. Although still bound by the Official Secrets Act everything he told us is now in the public do-main so no rules were broken in the giving of this talk.

Peter began by explaining how British Intelligence is organised and what function the various bodies perform. The intelligence services are responsible for Homeland Security, Foreign policy, Military support, combating organised crime and global security and this is devolved to MI5, MI6 or GCHQ.

GCHQ is known as the 5-eyes community as information is gathered and shared by the UK, Canada, USA, Australia and New Zealand.

Peter was recruited in 1980 primarily because he had studied Russian and joined the Technical Language Service but later worked in other departments.

To help us understand how the security services work we were played a tape concerning the shooting down of Flight MH17 and the various conversations taking place were explained so that the West knew from these recordings that the plane had been shot down by a Russian missile.

Peter then went on to describe some missions to explain how the various agencies cooperate in for example the disruption of drug shipments.

Finally Peter explained the vital importance of Global Communication networks and how GCHQ is able to watch every move as it has the power to intercept internet traffic on fibre optic systems.

This talk was fascinating and it is obviously true that Big Brother is watching you and that we are all being protected by our Secret Services who are working tirelessly to combat all manner of crimes.

In many ways our next talk led on from our previous speaker as this was about scams and how information can be gathered about us without us suspect-ing. The talk entitled “Friends Against Scams” was given by Greg Couch a Nat West Community Banker.

Greg introduced his talk by showing a video when we were introduced to the various scam techniques. The National Trading Standards Initiative has been set up to protect and prevent people from becoming the victim of scams.

After the video Greg showed us some facts and figures relating to scams. It was interesting to note that the 16 – 25 age group are currently being targeted more and that there are different scams for different age groups.

£5 to £10 billion is lost to the British economy through scams and only 5% are reported. Action Fraud is a new initiative set up by the police and this is a dedicated task force to clamp down on scammers.

Telephone scams are the most prolific and a system called Call Guardian which serves to block callers by dialling 1572 was explained.

The importance of having secure passwords to make on-line scams more difficult and a site called “howsecureismypassword.net “ can be used to see how long it would take someone to crack your existing passwords.

The important message that we were able to take home was that any suspected fraud activity should be reported and that any scam e-mails should be deleted after being reported.

 

 

From Cosmeston to Penarth

 

The Thursday Wenvoe Walkers’ Group undertook a walk on New Year’s Day from Cosmeston to Penarth and return. The walk is usually held monthly on a Thursday afternoon and generally covers some 5 miles with a cut-off for those people requiring a shorter route. On this occasion the weather did not deter any-one and 23 people turned up.

 

February Meeting News

 

President Madeleine welcomed everyone to the meeting on 6th February and gave a special welcome to several new members, especially Ann Daniel, who was celebrating her 80th birthday that day.

Our speaker for the evening was our very own Maria Williams. Maria is a professional musician and teacher. She has sung in various parts of the world during an extremely successful career. Music is beneficial to physical and mental wellbeing – this was stressed as we travelled through various breathing exercises. With her amazing voice Maria sang a popular love song, a spiritual song and a third song about peace, war and freedom. We all enjoyed joining in with Maria’s singing and then we all sang HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Ann.

Maria concluded her talk with a story about her recent visit to a church in the centre of London. She has visited this church regularly and has sung there. This church has been involved in the founding of many charitable organisations, such as Shelter and Amnesty International. It has a reputation for compassion gained through many years of engaging with poverty and deprivation. Hence the story we heard was very moving.

During refreshments we all thoroughly enjoyed the delicious cake kindly donated by Ann to celebrate her 80th.

WI business began with the announcement of the Glamorgan Federation events. Members were informed of a quiz to be held on 6th April at Culverhouse Cross and a board will be available next month for signing up.

A letter has been received from the charity “Dogs For Good” confirming that a local speaker will attend our September meeting, when we shall present a cheque – the result of our fundraising efforts this year.

Next month’s meeting will be on Thursday, 5th March at 7pm at Wenvoe Church Hall. Our speaker on this occasion will be Pam Cockerill. She will be talking about “Telling Tales”. Any visitors can always be assured of a warm welcome and there is no charge.

 

 

Join the Craft Club

CRAFT CLUB
Wenvoe Community Centre
9:30-3:30 Mondays & Wednesdays
Bring your project and craft along with a friendly group of crafters who are interested in all kinds of textile work.
Learn new skills in patchwork, quilting, embroidery, feltying, crochet etc. Beginners and more experi-enced crafters welcome.
Just £72 for 12 weeks for either day, or you could sign up to both days.
For futher information, phone Linda: 02920 593679

 

 

The Sealwomans Gift by Sally Magnusson

The Sealwomans Gift by Sally Magnusson

These are some of our comments about this book, the debut novel for Sally Magnusson.

Beautifully written, loved this book, rich in wording, descriptions superb, incredible quality of writing, lots of humour even in dire circumstances, superb language, clear storylines, based on a historical event which makes it particularly interesting, no unrealistic ending.

So what’s it all about:- In 1627 Barbary pirates rounded the coast of Iceland and abducted 400 of its people, including 250 from a tiny island off the mainland.

Among the captives sold into slavery were the island pastor, his wife and their 3 children.

In this re-imagining Sally Magnusson gives a voice to Asta the pastors wife. Enslaved in an alien Arab culture Asta meets the loss of her freedom and her children with the one thing she has brought from home, the stories in her head. Steeped in the sagas and folk tales of her northern homeland she finds herself experiencing not just the separations and agonies of captivity but the reassessments that come in any age when intelligent eyes are opened to other lives, other cultures and other kinds of longing.

This book is about the eternal power of storytelling to help us survive. The novel is full of stories, Icelandic ones to fend off a slave owner’s advances, Arabian ones to help an old man die.

The Sealwoman was captured with Asta and lay next to her on the slave ship. Her gift was the saga she recounted which enabled Asta to find peace when she finally returned to Iceland after many years away.

As well as all our comments we further discussed how advanced the Ottoman Empire was, how hard life sounded in Iceland, the decline and fall of civilisations throughout history

Some quotes from the book: “Forgetting gets easier, thinking gets harder”: “It is important to be known”: “Men’s stories come through history, women’s don’t”.

 

 

Cowbridge to Ystradowen.

Cowbridge to Ystradowen.

In contrast to most other Saturdays this winter the day dawned frosty and clear. What a relief after Storm Brendan and all the rain. We walked from Aberthin towards Prisk and Ystradowen in glorious sunshine. The views in all directions were brilliantly clear and we admired the beautiful country in which we live – a bit of sunshine makes all the difference. We saw several rams separated from ewes, donkeys, a llama and the first sighting of lambs this winter.

At Ystradowen we saw St Owain’s church and headed west passing a motte before turning south for our return journey. We found a relatively dry field where we basked in the sunshine while eating lunch . A caterpillar chose to crawl across one of our boots; it was carefully removed.

After lunch the ground was waterlogged in places even though numerous ditches have been dug to drain the land. On a lane we found one ditch clogged with leaves which two people valiantly cleared with their walking poles and the water gushed away. Fortunately we walked along the road, past Newton towards Newton moor; the fields had reeds growing in them and signs of recent flooding.

Skirting Cowbridge we crossed the Aberthin road to climb a hill, following a footpath. A blocked footpath forced us down a quiet road for the final stretch. (Walk 7.75 miles 650ft Map 151)

 

 

Barry

Barry

The forecast was that Storm Brian was going to blow hard with intermittent heavy showers. Still 13 brave souls set out from Cold Knap and quickly moved down to the lake to seek shelter from the wind. Many seabirds had the same idea and we even saw a black swan on the lake.

We walked over to Barry’s Whitmore Bay via Jackson’s Bay, Clements Colley Walk and Nell’s Point. Returning after a well -earned drink to Cold Knap we agreed that all cobwebs were blown away and we felt refreshed and very glad we had ventured forth. (Walk 5 miles)

 

 

Cowbridge and Sigingstone.

Cowbridge and Sigingstone.

The weather forecast was sunshine and showers but we only saw sunshine in the distance and had more than our fair share of showers. We set out from Llanblethian Church near Cowbridge, along the Valeways Millennium Heritage trail crossing a very full Factory brook.

We crossed a field where the remains of a World War II runway are visible and as we approached Siginstone, found an Air crash memorial slate which marks the 40th anniversary of a tragedy. ‘On Sunday 12th March 1950 a Tudor V Aeroplane returning from Dublin crashed 200 yards from this spot as it approached Llandow Aerodrome. 75 Welsh rugby supporters and 5 crew died. There were just 3 survivors. In Belfast the day before Wales had won the Triple Crown.’ The plane had done many relief trips to Berlin before crashing on its return from Dublin. Fans had a lot of luggage (souvenirs?) and it is thought this caused the crash. As a result airlines introduced baggage weight limits.

 

Next to the air crash memorial stone is Sigingstone Pond. We chatted to a man who lived in the house next to it and he told us that his father had the farm above the pond and cattle used to come down to the pond to drink. His grandfather would fill buckets at a tap in the wall above a spring and carry it up to the farm.

At the Victoria Inn, Sigingstone we turned onto a stretch that was particularly muddy with muck coming over boots; most of us carefully skirted the edge but one person ventured into the worst of it! We were relieved to emerge onto a long path between two hedges glowing golden in their winter coats.

We took the road to Crossways House passing what appeared to be its own sewage processing plant. The boundary wall at the front of the house proved an excellent place to sit and eat our lunch.

Between Penllyn (north of A48) and St Brynach’s Church are a series of coffin stiles, which consist of two stiles side by side with a wall between them on which a coffin could be rested as the stile is climbed. St Brynach’s Church was for centuries the parish church of Penllyn and remains its burial ground even though it is a mile away. It is thought that the stone traces of settlement close to the church are of Romano British origin and the ‘village’ was wiped out by the Black Death (14thC). The church boasts ‘no electricity, lighting or heating’.

Although the stiles on the Millennium Way were well maintained most of the others were pretty poor, sometimes surrounded by mud and there were plenty of double stiles! We stopped at the Bonvilston cafe for tea and they served us even though they had shut the dining room. (Walk 7 miles 650ft Map 151).

 

 

1 … 31 32 33 34 35 … 72