Boxing Day.

Eleven awesome athletes. Showed up, showed out and shined bright on a chilly Wednesday in Southwark. Shifting, lifting, packing and stacking for the awesome charity Change Please

It was a more than fabulous second week of November for GG Southwark this week! Celebrating not one, but two, team birthdays - Myself and errr heemmmm 10 years my junior marvellous Matt!

After warm welcomes and housekeeping complete, this glorious group of grafters, needed only to step outside the front doors of our home base, to meet with Jonnie, Cemel and Carlos who were explaining the task at hand for Change Please. An amazing charity, who empower the homeless community by training them to be coffee baristas. Providing full barista training, jobs paying London Living Wage and supporting with housing, bank accounts and mental wellbeing. A pretty awesome cause to support.... we think so anyway!!

So to support our coffee comrades the task at hand was simple.... Move a gazzzziilliooonnn boxes of coffee from their home at Old Spike, into the van up front, then race that van to site two - Spike and Earl, 1.5miles away in Camberwell.

In swift formation the team spread out and like a team of Christmas eve elves, packing santa's sleigh, they passed boxes from hand to hand and loaded into the van. Even though the stack of boxes was absolutely huge, in what seemed like no time at all the team had managed to shift and lift all the loads and the van was ready to rock!

Next up, we began our mission, to pound pavements as quickly as we could, through Peckham and up to Camberwell, intent on beating the van to site two...... and...... We did it!!! About 5 minutes before Cemel's arrival as well! The team had so swiftly achieved the journey in fact, that we had some spare minutes to knock out pavement toe taps to keep warm. After Cemel's arrival the line of box shifters began again, this time out the van, up the stairs and up into their new home Spike and Earl bar and coffee house.

The team genuinely worked so fast that the boxes were unloaded and repacked in under ten minutes, leaving us enough time to take a minute to relax in the cafe. With Cemel so delighted at our efforts, which he said would have taken him over a week to do alone, we were rewarded with free jugs of.... BEER HURRAAHHHHHHH!

With the yeasty brew warming our cockles, we cruised back to base, not feeling the cold at all. Aghhhhhh the glorious wonder that is a jacket of beer! Back at base, we had time for a quick stretch, before the team said their farewells and all dispersed home.

What an awesome evening, to give back to our hosts. Volunteering and running were great, but I think it was beer they loved most!

See you next time!

DO GOOD. FEEL GOOD. INSPIRE