Yesterday session was held at the Brighthelm Centre, a well-known community venue in central Brighton that hosts a wide range of social, cultural, and support services and other community-focused volunteering activities.

The main objective was to help out the centre with practical maintenance tasks to improve the accessibility and appearance of the community spaces, currently disrupted by building works that are in progress since weeks. After a warmup tuned by Zumba moves (courtesy of Zumba with Mon), we engaged in a combined sweeping action of stairwells indoors and of leaves outdoors, accompanied by a festive weeds scraping workout of the garden pavements. The grace of Ewan, the building manager, revealed just how meaningful our contribution was to him and to all who benefit from this vital community centre in Brighton.

Yesterday mild night turned to be a bonus, bringing most joy to our GoodGym-ing and chit-chatting about the coming up Xmas GoodGym social events. We welcomed Pavel at his second GoodGym session on a personal mission to do as many good deeds as possible by 2025.

More to come? Plenty!

A core group of five valuable GoodGym-ers run and cycled to Leach Court – a large Brighton and Hove County Council’s senior residential housing with a communal patio-garden needing some care. New host, known task, great team! The fame of GoodGym Brighton preceded our entrance in the building. Only a few weeks earlier, we were in fact at Lavender House with a “weeding” force of good!

Arrived a Leach Court, we were welcomed by Tony and cheered by the astonishment of other residents lounging in the grand central salotto. “Are you going out there for gardening, REALLYY?? NOW??” – a resident’s question. Our answer: “YEESS! This is GoodGym. We Do Good and Get Fit every Tuesday after our working day and, this evening, we will be shining our torches 🔦 ON 😉 your garden. You are welcome to join us, next spring maybe?!” 😊

We scraped out weeds from the patio pavements, we cleared the pile of green/brown waste from the noticeable non-biodegradable plastic contamination to make it ready for composting, and we swept the autumnal leaves that were invading the most hidden and darkest corners of the Court’s outdoor space. Torch essential to shine on all the Good done all around🔦 😉

The last but not least task of the evening was to make a draw to decide who would represent GoodGym at the Active Sussex Award Ceremony 2025. GoodGym Brighton is a runner-up for the Environmental Sustainability Award! Great achievement all.