greenbelt goodtimes[click ere too]

greenbelt04: highlights:

1. eating from a KFC barrel at Rowan Williams' seminar.
2. Monday night at Tiny Tea Tent: a CD player and dozens of party people. on tea.
3. disco dancing on Sunday night in Winged Ox bar. DJ + trumpeter. lush.
4. I think Lambchop were good but I don't quite remember.
5. Jamelia: half an hour of pop euphoria. shimmmy-shimmy.
6. the Centaur venue: huge, brand new and sumptuous. Terry Callier: small, old, and humble. and creator of some exquisite music. soul? jazz? heart-felt.
7. meeting one of the festival's founding fathers who was lost.
8. helping at an art gallery Thursday till Monday.
9. meeting good people we'd got to know from Greenbelts way back...
10. so many women, so little time: going speed-dating for sixty seconds.
11. six days of takeaways. Nuts Cafe's falafel deluxes.
12. Sunday morning communion: it's 'fixin to rain'. several thousand people in a field. a talk that gave me goose bumps. no, it was much more than that. much more. some spirited yet tough-minded songs. dub playin and hundreds of children marching across the field from their service to join us.
13. little lost giraffe on bench.
14. quiet neighbours.
15. seeing this bloke leading Saturday 9am Taize service knowing he'd also ran a club event only hours earlier. realizing that one chant was all in German: 'Bleibet hier und wachet mit mir. Wachet und betet, wachet und betet.'
16. stumbling, beercan in hand (and just round corner from a massive crowd revving up for Jamelia's show due on any minute) across a Medieval Compline: beautiful Latin chanting (and a bongo drum somewhere), led by a dozen young women dressed in white hooded robes. truly, truly out there.
17. ikon: one of the most thought-provoking contemplative services I've ever had the (dis)pleasure to be at. an uncompromising look at feelin God-forsaken. buzzing background sounds, chiseled testimonies, a smoky ritual, and layer upon layer of stark honest truth-searchin that never let up for a moment. and yet, still faith. deep and very dark. Belfasters ikon they describe themselves as 'iconic, apocalyptic, heretical, emerging, failing'. no tambourines here.
18. vistas: dramatic racecourse buildings and green hills far away.
19. the sky.
20. Swedish rockers - all truckers' caps, beards and long hair - wild at their gig but silent at communion. also seen dancing to house music. true.
21. regular tears. probably down to a lack of sleep, chilies, women, love songs, sad stories and beauty.
22. my greenbelt 04 : imagination fuel, humour, mistakes, friendship, religion turned good, nature getting a look-in, litterless, making me feel more of a man, needing more sleep, needing a bigger heart, emotional roller-coasting, sleepy and forgetful... all celebrating this thing called life

[mike barnett]