Christmas parties

Brian here again: It's been a good week. Everyone's been in the Christmas spirit, and we've gone to a couple Christmas parties. The first was on Thursday night; the Christian Union had Christmas dinner out at a very nice and inexpensive restaurant called Pablo's down in the heart of Brighton. About forty people attended, and everyone had a great time. The Christian Union really has been one of our biggest blessings here. Here are a couple photos of our group of CU friends:


Iain loves people; he's a rather sociable little guy. He got to sit in a high chair for the first time while we were at the party. As you can see, he liked the idea. He got passed around the crowd quite a bit and enjoyed every minute of it.

'Christmas crackers' are quite the tradition here. I thought that meant something like crackers and cheese, but this is a Christmas cracker:

You pull both ends of it, it makes a loud pop like a cap gun, and there is a paper Christmas crown and a small toy inside, the kind you'd get in a crackerjack box.

As you can see, my toy was a lovely (but tiny) plastic ring. Iain got a fake moustache!

Jordan got a paperclip--how lame is that?! It did come in useful, though, for resizing Iain's crown.

A truly wonderful time was had by all--God has really blessed us with some good friends here at Sussex, and many of them are members of the Christian Union.

This afternoon we went to a smaller Christmas party at the home of my doctoral supervisor, Knud Haakonssen. He has a lovely home in Eastbourne, which is quite appropriately up the coast to the east of us. We took the train to Eastbourne with our very good friend Lizzie, who is Knud's only other full-time doctoral student. His wife prepared a whole host of Scandinavian goodies (Knud is Danish and his wife, Åsa, is Swedish) that were absolutely delectable! And the mulled wine was incredible--the best we've tried of this traditional English (and apparently Scandinavian) holiday drink.

This is Lizzie, Iain, Knud, Åsa, and me.

Iain was passed around at Knud's house as well. He's a pretty popular guy--much more so than me.


We had a delightful time at Knud's, and it's always a joy to spend time with Lizzie. She is one of the most personable and thoughtful people I've ever met.

The campus is ready for Christmas, too. Several of the buildings have decorations and even a tree inside, but the best one is out on the quad between Falmer House, the Library, Arts A, and the Meeting House. It looks truly wonderful at night, especially at dawn or dusk.


We really are blessed to be here, and we really are blessed to have such good friends on both sides of the Atlantic. We miss you all so much that it sometimes brings tears to our eyes, but we won't be over here forever, and we thank God for the blessings he's given us here.

And now tonight--which is an especially cold one--I am going to settle into our nice warm flat, enjoy the company of my wife & son, and partake of a massive doner kebab prepared by my friend Massoud, an Afghani who works at a local kebab shop. Merry Christmas to you all!