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Young Olney to Australia! And back?

Ben Thompson at MuchAdo
Ben Thompson at MuchAdo

Brits leaving for downunder

Ben is leaving us today for a year long working holiday in Australia.  Sad for us.  Happy for him!

I’m sure many young people in UK are checking out jobs in Australia.   This is an inevitable upshot of the recession.  Actually, I think it would be a good thing to upgrade the agreement with Australia that allows young people from Britain to work temporarily there and young Aussies to work temporarily here.

Swap young people during the recession

I think we should go further and set quotas to swap young people.  We should even provide an year return ticket!

Build a resilient young generation

Experience abroad broadens the mind, expands our skills, deepens our resilience, and rekindles hope.  We will be stronger country for it.  Our future at the end of recession may depend upon a better reservoir not just of skill but of character (selfish, aren’t I?).

MuchaAdo Cafe

I’ll miss Ben.  He’s been with MuchAdo Cafe in Olney since it opened a year ago.  I understand he began his career as a schoolyard at the Courtyard Brasserie tucked away in Rose Court off Market Place.  He went off to Australia, came back, and is now associated with a very successful start-up with the most delectable food and friendly adaptable stylish service.   MuchAdo have a daily blackboard menu with food from the delicatessen next door and they happily adjust the dishes to your taste.  They’ll also send you home with delicacies too and the recipes to prepare something special.

Bon Voyage, Ben! Enjoy the sun and sand.  And be back soon!  We’ll be waiting for you.

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Life on Market Day in Olney!

Life on Market Day in Olney

I had another delightful day in the village of Olney in Buckinghamshire or Bucks in England, UK.  That’s a long address, isn’t it?

Social Media

Hero of the hour, GarethLRoberts, tweeted well before morning tea that he was back from the markets in London.  A quick look at the blog of MuchAdo deli persuaded me that I was not going to eat noodles this week.  I am going to eat a fresh green salad with tropical fruit and to accompany this extravaganza, I am going to grill mackerel (for the first time in my life).  UPDATE: Catch MuchAdo on Facebook and see the ceiling mural by Lee Farmer unfold.

Market Day

Thursday is market day in Olney.  Market Place thronged with the regular array of butchers and greengrocers, haberdashers, cobblers, and gardeners.  The Coffee Cavern joined Olney100 today bringing their range of exotic teas and coffee.  The Happy Carrot, who are the most-glass-half-full people I know, were the ONLY stall to appear during our heavy snow.  I wish they would blog.  They have a philosophical turn of mind, a ready camera, and extensive knowledge of the whole Bucks area.  This is when I regret using Ning.  People can’t comment without logging in.

Housing Market

After the market, I headed for the eastern corner of Market Place and went to congratulate Taylor’s, the estate agent, for selling a house around the corner from me.  Did you hear that folks?  The market for housing in sought-after Olney ain’t dead.  Poke it with a stick!

Coffee Shops and Youthful Enterprise

A lively young man reminded me of how much fun it is to work with Gen Y – on-the-ball, optimisitic and conecting-connecting-connecting.  Next door at the coffee shop, Beans, young Charlie Ray (17) seized the opportunity to raise the profile of his business Mute . . . Anything but Quiet! – an online store for tie-and-dye shirts.  Charlie and his team will teach us a thing or two about websites and social media with connections to Facebook and Myspace.  He intends to go up to university in a few months to read broadcast journalism – mental note to myself – ask Euan Semple at Amplified09 if he knows any mentors around here.

Hair Salons

Energy levels continued to throb in the next store.  Well, it is a store within a store.  Olney is an old lace-making town and shops are tucked away romantically down alleys and warrens.  To reach Olney’s newest of five hair salons, we weave our way through a baby clothes store.  Secluded, airy, fresh, At the Salon is run by engaging proprietor, Rebecca Green, who also teaches hairdressing in Milton Keynes.

Phonebox

My rounds ended with a visit to the Phonebox – an extraordinary institution.  Ron, or Gandalf, got to the social media business model long before Google.  Funded entirely by advertisements, Phonebox prints and distributes around 50 000 copies of the must thumbed and read periodical in the Bedford – Milton Leynes – Northampton triangle.  Quick remarkable!

And amazingly, we aren’t tourists! We live here!

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