Transition to a Sustainable Swaffham: The (short) story so far

We're still pretty new, having formed the core group in December 2010. A few of us were mulling on our own how to get an initiative started, but thanks to "synchronicitous" mechanizations beyond understanding, we were put in contact and things began to happen.

Right away, two of us managed to get in on a Transition Training weekend that was held in Ipswich at the beginning of December, led by Naresh Giangrande from Totness and Marina O'Connell of the Apricot Centre in Suffolk. (Thanks to Steve Marsden of Transition Ipswich for making that possible). Soon after, we held our first core group meeting and set our sights on hosting a January film screening for as many people as we could get  to come.

In the meantime, we've enjoyed a couple of impromptu, fun social get-togethers over food and wine with interested neighbors and friends, who were quite receptive to the Transition message. We've also developed a Web site and blog to promote our presence and keep people up-to-date, and are slowly-but surely building our mailing list. We've fortunately already attracted attention of certain town movers, and have found a seat in at least one of four community partnership groups developing a plan for Swaffham's future. So things look quite promising at this early stage.

Last night (Sunday, Jan. 23rd) we held our first "public" event in the nearby village of Castle Acre, with a very good attendance (16 that could make it, though others that support us were unable to come). We screened the film "In Transition," fielded a few questions afterward, and shared a brief open space session. All-in-all, a fine first outing, and another event is already planned for February 13th.