Tempting Fate
Published: Tue, 01/13/15
Between about 1985 and 2000 I didn’t have a current passport. I did go to Germany a couple of times during that period but I was with the military so I didn’t need my own documentation. Then in 2000 Ivar, Shaun and I were invited to go to Texas so I had to apply for a passport. Since then I have flown to the USA more than a dozen times or more times as well as Germany on a few occasions and France once. During that time I got held up once on the way back from Germany when fog delayed the flight and we got back about 3am instead of about 10am. Oh, and there was one occasion when I was dropped off at the wrong bus stop for catching the airport bus from Oxford to Heathrow and I missed my flight to Berlin and had to get the next one instead, which was quite an expensive mistake. Apart from that I think I can say that my international travel has been pretty much trouble free.
Lets hope that I am not tempting fate by telling you how lucky I have been up until now because May this year looks like being a jet set month for me. At the beginning of the month I will be in Minneapolis teaching on the 8th to 10th and for a couple of weeks later I have been invited to Sweden to teach a Seminar on the 23rd and 24th with a few days intense sight seeing either side. I will be giving as much as I can as a teacher but both these trips are likely to be as much an eduction for me as for anyone I teach. In Minneapolis I am hoping to meet various people who are deeply immersed in Norse culture but from a very different background to mine. I am also very much looking forward to seeing Miki and Therissa again.
In Sweden I have been promised the opportunity to see the remains of cult places and rune carvings. I will also have the chance to discuss how mythology and culture persist to this day in modern Scandinavia. Thanks to Roland for the invitation, I am looking forward to coming.
I also had a phone call last night from from an old friend who was involved in Stav a few years back. Life got in the way as it often does but she is now living in Dawlish in Devon and we are discussing me doing some teaching locally to her. Apparently the local pagan group would be interested in some teaching on runes and stances. We shall see, but at least I don’t have to go through airport security to get to Devon!
Locally I have been developing the programme of training at Somerset Stav Martial Arts Centre. There will be Stav for Self-defence seminars on at least a monthly basis and foundation courses over a whole day or even longer. First full day foundation training course will be at the end of this month on the 31st and I will have some announcements regarding Stav Camp tomorrow.
So check out these links and put some dates in your diary.
Stav Foundation Training Course, Somerset 31st January http://www.iceandfire.org.uk/train.html
Stav training in Minneapolis 6th to 11th of May http://www.iceandfire.us/events/index.html
Stav training in Sweden 23rd and 24th May http://stav.angerboda.se/
regards
Graham