It takes a team!

Tonight we cleared an abandoned campsite near Rose Hill which has been unoccupied for a year or more.

It quickly became clear that it had been a family with little children living here. There were toys, baby clothes and nappies amongst the pots, pans adult clothing. Discarded food and drink containers, lots of sodden bedding, the tent and awning, a rubber dinghy which was being used to keep the tent off the hard ground, a hoover; it was a huge haul to get up to the ring road for collection by Oxford Direct Services.

We really hope the occupants abandoned their campsite because they found a solid roof over their heads.

Ovada are a non-profit gallery space with limited funding and a small staff team. Car park hire is a key source of income that enables them to run events, exhibitions of socially engaged work, and an education programme where they offer a number of subsidised and bursary places.

With only a small staff team it is hard to keep on top of maintenance, so they called in our GoodGym flash mob to get their car park area ship shape. Car park hire is a valuable source of income, so getting it tidied up is important to the gallery.

Bundled up against the spring showers we shovelled mud, raked leaves, shifted rubbish out for collection, weeded, pulled up nettles (achieving the first nettle sting of the year) and litter picked. Found tools (the magic stick) proved nearly as effective as proper tools and fitted with the mucking out vibe of the task. In little over an hour we filled 2 large builders' sacks with detritus (and could have filled several more), got an excellent upper-body workout, and we got a mini tour of the gallery space afterwards.

Ovada's website is here.

Good work everyone!
Welcome to GoodGym Charlie.

A final (for this season) evening at Oxford Mutual Aid food bank doing our flash mob cleaning.

Since the autumn we've worked our way around every inch of the food bank cleaning areas which rarely get any attention. We've moved stock, crates, and shelving. Swept, bleached, mopped, and then figured out the giant tetris of how to put it all back. We've cleaned the kitchen monthly, including taking out kilos of food waste and scrubbing the fridges, walls and floors. We've restacked storage, loaded deliveries, packed Christmas gifts, and cleaned dozens of delivery crates (prising them apart when necessary!).

It's taken 5 months, but WE DID IT!