Gloucester Road WI

Julie McCalden came to talk to us about her mouth-popping, restaurant-style, Texmex-inspired salsas. Julie used to visit her Dad in the States every summer and ate in a Tex Mex restaurant with an unforgettable salsa, that she’s never found over here. Fast forward to the restaurant closing down, her Dad dying and lockdown hitting and you’ll find the start of her Salsa Story. We heard more about herself and got to sample her excellent salsas for ourselves. In keeping with the Tex Mex theme, we also discovered a bit about tequila and tantalized our taste-buds further, with a couple of tequila tasters.

In July Kari Thomas, a qualified shiatsu practitioner and mum of 3 teens came to talk to us about Shiatsu. Shiatsu is a physical therapy which uses a combination of pressure points, gentle manipulation and stretching to re-energise weak areas and reduce tension in the body. Kari told us about the history of shiatsu and how it can support our physical and mental well-being. She also shared her personal discovery of shiatsu and helped us explore how to listen to our bodies more effectively, to get the maximum benefits from the link between mental and physical health. There was also a live demonstration of shiatsu techniques on a lucky member!

In August, Katie Mack, one of our committee led a walk in the neighbourhood around the WI venue showing us lots of secret ‘greenways’ (footpaths and walkways that take us through green spaces, rather than sticking to roads and pavements) This continued the theme of supporting our mental health – by spending time in nature, and socialising as a community. It was also a real eye-opener to many about how much green space there is all around us – if we simply take the time to look. Or have a super-informative guide, like we did! Thank you, Katie.

In June we were out and about in central Bristol, with a tour from Haunted & Hidden Bristol. We met on Tuesday 13th June, at an earlier time of 7.15pm for a walking tour starting at 7.30pm. We met outside the cathedral on College Green and ended up at Kings Street, for a quick drink and discussion of the evening’s events, such as learning about a door at The Hatchett pub made from human skin!

Bristol’s Haunted and Hidden tour won the 2022 Trip Advisor ‘Certificate of Excellence’ and was voted No.1 on GWR FM’S ‘Top 20 Things to do in Bristol’. John was full of local knowledge, and a good story teller – with quite a few names drops including Paul McCartney who apparently came up with the song Elinor Rigby, while in Bristol. John says Sir Paul, has verified this personally for him!

In May we tried out some new dance moves at a new venue – St Bonaventure’s Parish Hall.   The venue gave us more space to move around and may become our new home.   Lots of us dressed up in our neon leg-warmers and got to test out our Fame dance moves at Mum Dance – a low impact, high sweat, dance fitness class set to school disco smash hits from late 70’s to early 90’s, where nobody cares if you go the wrong way! 

Mum Dance was founded by Hebe, right here in Bristol, and now has classes all over the country, as well as being featured on BBC News and as one of the top 4 dance classes in the in Ok magazine!

On Tuesday 21st March, Imogen Douglas, a Project Officer in the Plastics and Sustainability team at the Environment Agency gave us a talk on plastic pollution. We learnt about the impacts of plastic pollution and the action that is being taken to prevent it. We got to ask questions on how to make a difference and tackle plastic pollution on a personal level and learnt that you can put your jeans in the freezer, rather than washing them!

Rather than just preventing pollution, the WI likes to take action, so we all made seed bombs out of clay and wildflower seeds to be scattered around the neighbourhood. The clay helps protect the seeds and aids germination, meaning they can be dropped on any vacant piece of land with the hope that they will flower in the summer, helping drainage, wildlife and the absorption of CO2.

On Tuesday 18th April, Ruth Wiles from Clifton Wine School came to talk to us about wine, quiz our knowledge and got us to sample a few glasses also!  Ruth has been teaching about wine for over 20 years, having held approved educator status since 2003.  In 2020 she achieved Highest Honours in the French Wine Scholar.   In short she knows a lot about wine!  She believes life is too short to drink bad wine, so come along and learn what you love about wine and how to find more of it.  https://www.localwineschool.com/bristol/

On Tuesday 21st February, Chris Yeo from the Antiques Roadshow gave us an amusing and information talk about his life in antiques, as well as giving valuations to some objects brought in by our members. Chris was curator of the Ken Stradling Collection in Bristol, an eclectic array of British and European design from the 20th century, and is currently a valuer at Clevedon Salerooms. His specialism is 20th Century art and design and he has appeared regularly on The Antiques Roadshow since 2015. He told us about how fashions change and can affect the price of antiques so you should always buy what you love, rather than what you think might make you money (as it very often won’t!)