village – Mikes Film Talk

What used to be my favourite place in a village and the hub of activity for village events, the Pub.

In 1990 I came back to England after a four and a half-year stint in Holland. My then wife and I were amazed at how quickly the country had changed in such a short time. She was a “local” girl and we’d moved to a section of country that wasn’t her hometown.

Back then the USAF had a base outside the small village of Woodbridge. The village enjoyed having the “Yanks” here as they funnelled a huge amount of money into the local economy. No one was more upset than local commerce about this loss of revenue when the base closed down in 1993.

I came to the village today on personal business. I’d been yesterday and as I did not know where I was going I took a somewhat scenic tour of the village. It had been quite a while since I’d been here and that was on the not very pleasant business of attending a work colleague’s funeral.

A tragic year, I lost three colleagues in the short span of six months. The small community of Prison Officers were reeling with the shock of losing so many friends way too early.

Today’s business was nowhere near as unpleasant and I noticed how much the village had changed from when I first got here in 1990 and how it looked today.

The village Information sign. You are here. — The village information sign. You are here.

The village is still an odd mixture of old and new; foreign and domestic; timely and faded. I took my iPhone 5 and took a slew of shop sign pictures and shop fronts. These images show much better than I could ever describe the dichotomy that is the High Street (main street) of a typical English village.

Sitting here in the ‘village’ Costa Coffee that would not have been here a few short years ago, I’m savouring my coffee while I savour the irony as I write this post on my iPad.

I’ll finish up with a few images of the village called Woodbridge and hopefully you’ll see the old and the new; and how they mix together.