It was a very difficult afternoon but after many twists, turns, and near fatal almost accidents, Sarah and I managed to find our way from the hotel to the University of Kent, passing through Canterbury on the way. The University is quite large and sprawling, about the size of larger state university in the United States. Given the driving hazards, the signage, and the general difficulty of getting anywhere without wrecking, the British press will likely run rings around the Americans at least for the first week or so.
The press situation is rather bleak all around. The press officer at Lambeth HQ (I suppose that is where we were) was very close to shutting us out. Due to the "extensive media interest" he said, bloggers were no longer being credentialed. After some delicate diplomacy and providing proof that we'd applied and been accepted in advance, we managed to swing the famous blue lanyards. Rejection wouldn't have been disastrous, there's lots to cover beyond, above and below the newsroom, but from my experience at General Convention and the House of Bishops meetings, its always a good idea to know where the press gaggle is going and what they're excited about.
In any case, as we were in the process of wresting media passes from the cold steel grip of the press officer, a tired looking man in rumpled black clericals emerged from a back room, crossed the floor and exited the building. I'm so familiar with Canterbury's photograph, his appearance five feet away from where I was sitting seemed natural. routine. It took a moment for my mind to register who it was and that I ought to take note. As soon as I did he was gone.
But there were other bishops in the HQ.
I reintroduced myself to an orthodox bishop from the Episcopal Church I met in Jerusalem. I asked how things were going. He shook his head and said that the Americans were being "obnoxious" and unbearable, trying to run the show. I asked whether there'd been any resistance. "Oh yes" he said, "people are not taking it lying down". There is a lot going on "behind the scenes" he said. I don't know whether he meant that there is resistance from within the group of American bishops or resistance from without. Looking back on it, I think he mean eternal resistance because he went on to speak admiringly of the Sudanese statement released yesterday.
Having received our media passes and the famous blue lanyards along with a free parking ticket, which we are told is essential if you don't want to have your tires locked, we left the HQ and headed toward the campus sports center, which is close by, to see if we could manage some passes to the university gym. If we don't manage to get a few workouts in we'll both go crazy. Turned out to be a bust. Lots of severely out of shape western bishops were trundling in and out of the place (apparently they get a free gym pass) but they said we couldn't work out for any less than five pounds each a day.
The sports center is very close by the facilities where the indaba groups and self-select sessions are being held. On the way back we saw what I thought was an indaba group but now that I look at the schedule (it was the afternoon) must have been a self-select session sitting on the grass in a circle listening to a young woman who was standing in the center speak about her personal experience of something (I couldn't hear all that well). After she was finished the bishops applauded and the group moved inside. It was a weird image, all those bishops sitting cross-legged in the sun at the Lambeth Conference. The feel of it was not what you'd expect of assembled bishops contemplating the weighty matters of the Church, but, as Sarah said, more like a flashback to a 1970's freshman college philosophy class but with old people instead of freshmen. Next we passed a group of middle aged and senior women (bishops' wives?) doing what seemed to be a sort of outdoor very low impact aerobics to hip hop music (I think that's what it was). They looked somewhat embarrassed but it was a beautiful day and I don't blame them for wanting to be outside.
We hoped to go to the press room and take a look before heading to the hotel to sleep off the jetlag but the press room is, and I think Ruth Gledhill mentioned this, far and away from any of the actual Lambeth events. If you hang out there it would take you a good fifteen minute jog to get to any major center of activity. At this point in the day, we were just hoping to find our way back to the hotel without crashing or winding up in France so we skipped the press room.
Tomorrow is another day. Things are, I see by the news, heating up. We'll be back on campus early to try to get our heads around it all.
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Comments:
That’s nothing compared to what I feel when I visit the States and see all these straight and incredibly dull 20 meter wide two lane roads, with the ridiculously large number of traffic lights. It just doesn’t have any character. And it’s a huge waste of land.
Although it sounds as though you could have picked a better route. Surely its motorway and A roads all the way from Heathrow to Canterbury?