Scooters and Civilised Lunches and Family Dinners

To the hospital today to meet the hospital chaplain, with a nine o'clock start it was an uphill struggle. It was going to be a bit difficult but more difficult because I just wasn't interested n visiting sick people who wouldn't understand who we were and why we were there. How wrong can you be, it proved to be fascinating. Sensibly our host didn't take us visiting baffled swedish people but rather we were able to see how Swedish people organised their public life.

Answer with some style! For a start there's swedish design... Why shouldn't a hospital be full of high quality art (they even had a guide book for the interested? The chaplaincy was designed right through to the art and the chairs. Then there were the scooters. It was a big hospital, so how to get about? Special corridors and an adult three wheel scooter; such fun and practical too. Design needs to be fun, even in serious places like hospitals.
Finally there were the ways in which community was encouraged. Lunch happened for the whole hospital in one place at one time with two choices. They had a library which was open to patients young and old and served as an academic record for all staff who wanted to look further into their work. Patients and staff together, meals served for the whole community. A buildiing with light public areas to bring it all together.

Such a sense of community, such civilisation, such a commitment to good taste, is this something we have thrown away or rather something that we are beginning to rediscover? Quality public spaces, both in the built environment and in the pattern of our day seem essentila if we are to regenerate our communities.

As a post script to this story I visited one of the town centre churches in Boras this afternoon and met a man who had been helped to rebuild his life by the chaplain I met this morning. He had spent time with the troubled man when he had been at a low ebb in his life. Now he repays this by helping others who visit the church. Who knows how many people have been helped because that chaplain took the time to help. Regeneration can happen when we spend the time with just one lost sheep.

A nice end to the day when we spend the evening with a Swedish family who treated us to a lovely swedish meal in a hose that looked like it was designed in the sixties. Turns out it was actually a 1940's house because of course we discovered swedish minimalist design long after they invented it!