The London Thing Experience

Jan 4, 2012 by Fidler    6 Comments    Posted under: Chair of DF Committee, London

“London Thing has been the most insane weekend of my life, in a good way. When I said there is “No thing like London Thing” I didn’t realise just how true that would be.”

You may have heard that this years London Thing didn’t go quite to plan. Quite how the plan went so far awry is still being investigated. It seems like communication was lacking from our end, or the site owners’ end, or most likely, both ends and everything else in between. We’re working really hard to make sure this doesn’t happen again. Support for our event coordinators is going to be increased 100 fold. For a start, an updated version of the events pack will be out really soon.

But the experience wasn’t all bad. It stands as proof that DFs can manage well in a crisis. No small thing like a lack of venue can come between us and getting business done. Here is, finally,

The Tale of London Thing

Chapter one – Getting to the Venue 

So we all set off from our relevant cities, we left lots of time and made sure we had packed enough pairs of socks. We arrived in London at various times and followed the instructions to get to the site. But, little did we know, there were two places in that part of London with exactly the same name. The place all the taxi’s took us to was not where we wanted to go, it was a farm, and full of horses. 

“I was so excited when we saw the Sign for Mote Mount, I couldn’t believe it when we found out we were actually just more lost.”

But we got to the site in the end, relieved at finally being able to nurse out wounds and rest our aching bones. We were welcomed by a warming camp-fire and fellow woodies singing beautiful and obscene songs. Everyone felt assured that the keys to the venue would be found and we’d all have a warm bed and some dinner…

Chapter Two – Leaving Again

It’s a mark of just how brilliant we are that even with the prospect of spending a night outside, in November, looming before us we managed to have a fair discussion and find a solution. We all piled onto the last bus, and then squeezed onto the last train and made it to Bloomsbury where the wonderful people from the Occupy Movement gave us a warm place to sleep and a a kitchen to use.

Everyone from London Thing would like to thank the people of the Occupy Movement, you really saved us.

Chapter Three – Never Giving Up on Business

ARRRRRQQQQWRAAAAAAAAGWWWWWW. It’s 6:00 in the morning. A couple of us thought it would be a good idea to wake up early so we could try and sort out a way of getting into the venue. But, sadly, after several hours and a billion phone calls to everyone we could thing of it became clear that this was impossible. But we are DFs and we never give up on business. A plan formed and we set off for a long and difficult journey to Folk House, the Woodcraft offices where there was a conference room we could use.

Despite a closed station and some very poor directional skills from myself (Chair of Committee, sorry guys) we made it and on to business. To find out what happened there look no further than this post.

“We had everything from surviving round a campfire to singing very loudly on the tube. On the movements first moving thing, tube for change.”

Chapter 4 – When all else fails, have a Party

We still needed somewhere to stay for the final night. Thankfully the wonderful Rosie Pearce let us use her house for the night. Finally we all had the chance to let our hair down and release all the stress of the event with friends and fun. Films were watched, pasta was made, baths were had and much a wonderful evening commenced. We gave one of the weirdest events ever one of the best send offs ever.

“I believe that any other group of young people would have really struggled to cope in the situation that we found ourselves in. Through consensus and team work we were able to keep ourself warm and dry with no time to prepare. The overflow of community spirit  combined with our ability to adapt to the situation made this one of the best events I’ve ever been on”

-Joe Bowler

We’re still investigating quite what happened to send this event so far off course but for now we’re making these improvements:

Better communication with Thing Organisers

More information for Thing organisers in the Events Pack