It was a nice sunny session at Thorlands. Angela joined us for her first session, and Demian returned for his second! They, and Jo together cleared the bed of weeds, while I had a go at throwing mulch all over the place.

May's sunshine brought out 12 GoodGymers for Southwark's group run! Like the previous weeks over the past month or so, we've had a newbie for every group run, so Sam was delighted to see not one, but two new faces. Firstly, Alastair was waiting outside Old Spike with Nathan. It happened to be Alastair's second good deed in a week, but the first one with GoodGym Southwark as he attended the group run with Lewisham on Monday night. As the other runners started to come in including Alex, who came for his first group run as he's done a few community sessions, Demian appeared. It was his first ever experience with GoodGym as he wanted to use fitness to do good - you're at the right place, Demian.

As Old Spike became packed, Sam started his GG intro speech and gave a hint to what his ice-breaker question would be. Since it was Cultural Diversity Day last Sunday, he asked: Tell us a fun fact or something you think we didn't know about your culture?

Alastair started us off with his traditions on a Sunday - church, Sunday Roast and a tea and sandwiches in the afternoon, Nathan told us about a water festival in Gibraltar, Daryl informed us on a Chicken Parma from the North East, Nelly kept in the same theme of food and said the French eat everything...all part of an animal, Alex doesn't like tea, but all other Brits do, Demian from Brazil gave us insight that the North hates the South...they have a week long carnival and love BBQs and finally, Sam talked about Mother's Day in Thailand falls on the Queen's birthday (so it changes every few decades or so).

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Cape of Good Deeds

He has been a constant force at the back! Thanks to Daryl for back marking the past few group runs as this 2.5k run took us 18 minutes through the back streets of Peckham and Denmark Hill. We met Emma, Jo, Lindy and Vic at the task as Simon arrived just on time for us to collect the tools and take it to the "Forest Garden". It was here that we split into 3 sub-teams.

Firstly, Sam sent out Emma, Jo, Nelly and Vic to get more woodchip using the wheelbarrow and trolley from the site where the woodchip had been delivered back to the "Kitchen Garden". This woodchip would be used to lay down the path in the future. It would be easier for the Saturday team to collect it from the "Kitchen Garden" rather than doing long trips to the delivery site.

Alastair, Alex, Daryl, Demian, Lindy and Magda (who had just arrived in time for the instructions AND to celebrate her 50th good deed donning the black cape and party hat) concentrated on the terrace to clear the overgrown buddleia and bramble trees. There were some bindweed to discard as the brambles were stoved away in the white tonne bags as the buddleia were chopped down for the compost heap back in the "Walled Garden".

Nathan teamed up with Simon to dig up bindweed as they were joined by Magda after she finished her section on the terrace. Ultimately, they were also digging up holes to plant trees as Simon had saplings to put down.

As the 35 minute session went on, Sam's playlist had the theme of diversity as he put on a world playlist featuring Spanish, Italian and French songs (okay, that's more European...).

The team rushed to finish up what they were doing at 20:00 as they still needed to take back the tools and take a group photo, but this was done within 10 minutes leaving the running team to run back in 20 minutes, which they did.

Well done to everyone who came out tonight!

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out tonight! Firstly, another warm welcome to Demian for coming along to claim his first good deed and to Alastair for coming for his second session and first GG Southwark group run! Simon was impressed that a lot can get down in 35 minutes as we had the numbers. The run both ways was consistent as we ran the 2.5k / 2.7k within 18 to 20 minutes, so well done for keeping up with the pace!

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Thank You Simon

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Simon for giving us plenty to do at Thorlands Gardens and we hope to see great transformations over the next few weeks as we lay down more woodchip for the path and plant trees!