Far Left: Sharon and Steve

Left: a staute joins in the fun - with an oriigami red nose

Below: Sharon takes Richard French's blood

Friday 11^th March was Red Nose Day, an annual event that puts the ‘fun’ into ‘fund raising’.  Four members of the BOS London group volunteered to take part in an organized event by teaching origami to staff etc. at two large London hospitals located on the River Thames.  Steve Brown, Paul Hanson, Pauline Trew and myself, Sharon Turvey, met up at Guys Hospital at 10:30 am.  (FYI, An all zone, one day travel card purchased before 9:30am now costs £12 which is about $23!!!) (I haven’t gotten over that yet)  We gathered in Atrium 1, a large open hall with plants, a piano, and a sculpture of Icarus falling (hanging) overhead.  Steve set up our origami display on one table and on another we had paper, BOS leaflets and several 3page, A4 leaflets made by Paul containing simple models and some of his own models specially designed for the occasion.  One was a hypodermic needle (hospital theme) and another was a red nose with hair (not like ‘nose hair’ - please see the download in previous news letter).  Across from us was a set of chairs and some voluntary masseurs who would make people relax whilst a loud but jolly steel band played near by.  Steve and Pauline bravely sampled the masseurs’ skills.

This proved to be a location with very little human traffic about, so we weren’t very busy........and then it was time to EAT!  Large trays of sandwiches and Danish pastry were provided with tea and coffee.  So just as we were relaxing to the music, eating pastry and admiring Icarus, it was time to leave and take a taxi to the other hospital, St Thomas’, where we met up with the masseurs, the band, and the left-over sandwiches.

Our new location had throngs of people (comparatively speaking).  Paul (naughty boy) stuck red noses on two of the marble busts which lined the hall.  I couldn’t resist trying out our giant, comic, origami hypodermic needle, so I took 3 pints of blood (origami blood) from someone who turned out to be the event organizer.  All day, a very relaxed person with a bucket was collecting monetary donations from the public.  I don’t think the bucket ever got very heavy, but it was an interesting day (and the Danish pastries were lovely!).