Old Hall

I just left Old Hall early (I was meant to stay for two weeks) because I wasn’t enjoying it there. When I arrived last Friday the residents were all really busy getting ready for a ‘friends and family’ summer party. They were so busy in fact they didn’t have time to introduce them selves to the new ‘wwoofer’ or show me around the place. It was not a great welcome and as a result I felt completely ungrounded, it made me miss the friends I made at Gaunts even more than I was already. Kate and Wolf also arrived on the same day to volunteer so I did have someone to talk to, we decided to give the community residents the benefit of the doubt and put their lack of effort with the newbies down to the fact they were busy with their party. As the weekend progressed I began wishing they had told me about their plan as I would have chosen to come on the Sunday, if you’ve ever been invited to a party where you don’t know anyone you’ll know how awkward it feels. I did meet one lovely woman who was a friend of a resident and we had a chat about her edible garden in Wales and energy healing. She was the one person in the whole week I felt a connection with unfortunately she was only staying for the weekend. She sent me the Celestine Prophecy to read which my ex-boyfriend had leant me some years before but I hadn’t been drawn to read it at that time. It’s a book that describes a process for spiritual evolution interwoven with a standard adventure story. I’m only half way through but I really like the way it describes our connection with nature on an energetic level and reflects some of the experiences I’ve been having.

Anyway back to Old Hall, I could spend time describing the history of the house and how it used to be a monastery that one of the nuns escaped from many years ago etc but I don’t want to focus on that. It is basically a farming community so if you want to see the geese, pigs, chickens and cows, the vegetable patches and orchards and learn how to make butter and cheese it is a great place for that. The food as you would expect is lovely, really excellent organic food that again I was reminded has sadly become something that only the privileged few have access to. They are nearly self sufficient in vegetables and meat and have 8 cows to milk twice a day and this requires a lot of work so many of the residents work part time to pay their way. It is also very expensive to buy into Old Hall as it’s run as a housing association and each of the units are priced in relation to the local housing market and Colchester is a desirable commuter belt so only those with capital need apply. Starting with the positive aspects of my experience I did get to try out some new things like throwing heavy bales of hay around to make a hay stack, churning cream to make butter and making cheese so that was good and as previously mentioned the food was great but the people I found with a few exceptions (Thank you to those who did make the effort) to be a very unfriendly bunch who didn’t seem to have even basic manners with people they invited into their community as volunteers and not surprisingly this really put me off. The person I had been emailing to arrange my visit who apparently was the ‘wwoof co-ordinator’ didn’t bother speaking to me until day 4 of my stay. I heard various excuses that they were so busy, that they didn’t know who was who because of the party weekend etc but for me there was something deeper going on here and unfortunately I think it was just a bad attitude towards wwoofers. For some reason at Old Hall volunteering your time to support people who are privileged to be able to have land in living self-sufficiently means you are seen as some kind of serf, an extra pair of hands to be squabbled over to help them do what they need to do. There didn’t seem to be any recognition that people wwoofing might be wanting to learn more about community living like the structure, group decision processes, finances and other aspects of running one or be scouting for potential places to join or even that they may have skills and experience to bring that the community might find useful. I was left with the feeling that they saw so many ‘wwoofers’ come through their door they couldn’t be bothered making the effort to get to know them as they were only staying for a short time. Although understandable this attitude is poor, volunteering is after all an energy exchange and it doesn’t work if the energy is given out and not received. The memory of a feeling of goodwill, a friendly smile and a heartfelt thank you last a lot longer than basic needs of bed and food being met. If we are to successfully move towards a self-sustaining society that is not completely reliant on people working purely for financial reward then these subtle qualities of human communication will become increasingly important. If you are lucky enough to have people choosing to offer their time to support your project then expressing gratitude is really important, however many people pass through your door. Right I’ve got that out my system and now I’m off to Norfolk to visit a friend for a week before I travel to my next place.

Making butter pats in the dairy

Kate up to her arms in curds and whey