Community Barbecue

Coronation Street

Saturday 8 September: 12 - 3 p.m.

There's a green-eyed yellow idol to the north of Kathmandu. And between Hanover and Princess Courts on Coronation Street there's an open space with grass shrubs and a launderette. The latter rather than the former was the setting on Saturday 8 September for  a community barbecue organised by the residents' association in conjunction with the Centre at St Paul's and Cambridge City Council . The idea was to bring local residents together in a trial run for next summer's celebrations when Hanover and Princess Courts will be 40 years old and the residents association will be 20. Celebratory events are planned for 2008 including a small history project.

The event was made possible by a generouse donation of £300. Cambridge City Council's Children and Young Persons team ran games and activities for children, the
Centre at St Pauls organised salsa, bellydancing and breakdancing demonstrations and the Hanover and Princess Court residents' association provided a bouncy castle. Above right: Hanover and Princess Court Residents' Association vice-chair and chief organiser of the BBQ, Caroline Fernandez pictured with City Council ranger John McAspurn. 

Residents' Association Sarah Deniz pictured above and below left, collected standard charge of £1 for refreshments. As income amounted to £92 - which will be put towards this year's annual community Christmas shindig - it was safe to conclude that the event had been attended by 92 paying guests. Centre: Michael Beckett, vicar of St Paul's concentrating on the burger in hand.  In the background and pictured in the photographs below, Richard Beckett and John Thompson flipping burgers on equipment kindly loaned by Adrian Reith.

Left: Martin Evans, chair of the Centre at St Paul's Management Group pictured with Sheila Stuart, LibDem councillor for the Trumpington ward. Centre: Rafaella Ray, a Friday Lunch Club regular. RIght: LibDem Councillor Philippa Slatter who supervised the bouncy castle. Councillors' surgery is held at the Centre at St Paul's on the last Saturday of every month.

 Left: Philippa Slatter with local resident Angela Haynes who personally distributed 250 flyers publicising the event to local households. Philippa and Angela supervised the bouncy castle.

Introducing .... Theodore Menelik-Mfuni, known to one and all as Theo, Cambridge's salsa king, promoter behind the recent World Community Music Festival held at the Centre in late August and organiser of live music at the Centre every 6 weeks. Friday evenings arranged by Theo consist of a live band playing Congolese or Latin American music and lashings of African food prepared by a talented team of  chefs and helpers. The music is fabulous and so is the food. For details of the programme from Septembert to December go to www.menelikmusic.com.  For the community barbecue, Theo provided the sound system and taught an impormptu salsa class (see below).

 Left: Councillor Sheila Stuart, Martin Evans, Michael Beckett and Debbie Beckett. Centre: Karen Dickinson of Music for Little People (every Tuesday and Saturday at the Centre - go  to www.musicforlittlepeople.co.uk for more information) with Debbie Beckett. Right: barbecue co-organiser Caroline Biggs of Community Development (Cambridge City Council) and manager of Ross Street Community Centre

Left: Theodore Menelik of MenelikMusic. Centre: David and Bruce, Thursday coffee morning stalwarts. Right: Debbie Beckett, Martin "It's a fair cop" Evans and Trumpington police officer John Sutton. As this was a summer event, Father Christmas failed to make a premature entrance, much to everyone's relief.

Left: Kathleen King a regular at the Centre's Thursday  Seated Exercise class in conversation with Michael "Doc" Watson - in the appalling Everton shirt - who attends Thursday lunch at the Centre and cooks for the group every few weeks. Centre: Virginia comes to Friday Lunch for Older People with husband Ken.

Street credibility was provided by a couple of Junior Sinstars supervised and filmed by Ben Swift  who is responsible for SinCru's legendary artwork. For more information about breakdancing at the Centre go to SINCru's website at www.sincru.co.uk.

"We are not allowed to keep pets" they said, by way of explaining the presence of the large white cat shown above.

Salsa anyone? Theodore's demonstration towards the end of the proceedings was enjoyed by those who took part and spectators alike. The large bottle of Liebfraumilch  which some of them had helped to consume may have contributed to the general merriment, but really it was salsa and those fabulous Latin American rhythms wot done it.