Typical – you wait months for a way to leave a comment in Dock Cafe, and then two turn up at once…

Today saw the arrival both of our beautiful leather-bound Dock visitor’s book, and our funky little comment cards – so that we can find out a little bit more about all the people passing through the doors of Dock Cafe.

A great start: in their first few hours on display, we’ve already got some real lump-in-the-throat comments telling us just how much The Dock is loved and appreciated.  Good news stories that give all the volunteers who run the cafe fresh energy for each new day.

And speaking of the volunteers – this Saturday we’re having a Volunteer Training Day, bringing together the wonderful people who have tirelessly, enthusiastically, sacrificially given time and talent over these past few months to make Dock Cafe a reality.  They’ll be enjoying some training, some treats and some top-class info on all things Dock.

So please note that the cafe will be closed this Saturday (3rd November) as we lavish some love on the people who make it all happen – and (hopefully) emerge at the end with and even more amazing team!

I had one of those days recently when, if I was honest, I was feeling pretty lonely – but my virtual self kept getting lots of Facebook Likes and Twitter retweets.  Online social life is never a substitute for the real thing. One of the things I adore about Dock Cafe is the opportunity it gives for people to meet and chat and connect in the real 3D actual world – people who might otherwise be in the apartments, offices, workplaces and classrooms of the TQ, stuck behind a computer screen.

So I LOVE the message behind this little Tetleys advert – give it a watch!

(And then, y’know, retweet it and Like it)

Tomorrow’s Dock Walk ends with a bang… We’ll arrive back for our customary steaming mugs of coffee, tea and hot chocolate just in time to watch the fireworks display at the Odyssey through the window.  If you’ve been thinking of joining us at 3:33 on Sunday afternoons to walk, talk, laugh, pray and enjoy God’s fabulous creation – maybe this is the week!

A really special day in Dock Cafe today – one of those days when everything is just right.

Great atmosphere, great people, visitors from all over the world, lots of different chats with interesting people, new faces, old faces…  We were even visited by both my parents and my parents-in-law, but even that couldn’t spoil the day.  (only joking!)

The good news wall – which is filling up fast with all sorts of different stories, messages and anecdotes – received its first foreign-language piece of good news today from two really friendly visitors from China.  Another one of the thousands of connections between people which happen every week in this wonderful space.

Pleasant chaos reigned in Dock Cafe over the last few days as normal business continued amidst the ladders, scaffolding, drilling and hammering of the team who arrived to fit our shiny new heaters.

We’ve been looking at several different options to keep Dockers warm over the winter months, and eventually we’ve gone for the kind of heaters usually seen warming open-air diners in Parisian pavement cafes!  If it’s good enough for Paris…

(and looking out at the weather, I think they have arrived just in the nick of time – apparently Winter officially starts today!)

As we prepare to enter a whole new era of toasty-warmness in the cafe, maybe it’s time that I introduced you to the two heaters who have been struggling manfully to keep us warm through the ever-balmy Northern Irish Spring and Summer.

Our longest-serving soldier is this faithful old Super Ser (remember them?).  I found out from some of the students this week that the Super Ser has a name – they know it (her?) as ‘Malin’s Girlfriend’, in honour of one of the student gang who used to snuggle up especially close to the heater as they gathered on the comfy sofas!

(Which may be a very little thing, but it makes me just so happy when I hear stories like that.  How many cafes do you know where the heaters have been given a nickname?  I LOVE it that the students feel so at-home and comfortable in the Dock… long may it continue.)

The second heater is a more recent acquisition, but as soon as I saw it lurking in B&Q I knew we HAD to have one for The Dock!

In essence it’s a glorified Super Ser, but designed to resemble an old furnace – exactly the sort of thing I can imagine everyone gathering around at lunchtimes in the shipyards.

I’ve always been inspired by the stories of the revivals, Bible studies and faith discussions that happened around the furnaces in the heyday of the shipyards.  So nothing makes me happier than when The Dock’s very own shipyard furnace is used to continue that tradition.  Yesterday I had the huge privilege of taking part in the Metropolitan College Scripture Union discussion, sharing ideas and reactions and challenges from a passage in Luke’s Gospel as we gathered around the furnace.  Faith being “fanned into flame”, as Paul encouraged Timothy.

So I’m looking forward to basking in the glow of the Parisian pavement cafe heaters for the rest of the Winter – but as the most beloved heaters in The Dock, they’ve got some catching up to do!

There’s a new face in town these days… I’ll let him introduce himself!

Hello, I’m Andrew. I’ve chosen to do a placement at the Dock as part of my training course at The Church of Ireland Theological Institute, which means I’ll be hanging around the Dock on Fridays until Christmas. I’ll be working alongside Chris, making trouble for him and asking difficult questions and , no doubt, he’ll want to return the favour by asking me to get stuck in making tea, meeting the regulars and brainstorming the way forward for the Dock Café.

My first day was huge. I was swept along by a wave of challenges and surprises. Who know that a steady stream of my dear friends from Albany, New York would flow through the door of the café? It was a blessed day indeed. I’m already excited about what my next day by the sea might have in store…

(PS from Chris – the idea that fresh young (?!) trainees like Andrew can be sent to me for training and direction is humbling, hilarious and slightly worrying all at the same time… I’ll try my best not to break him!)

And while we’re talking about new faces, a familiar face from Dock-World reappeared in our lives this morning: the incomparable, unconquerable Eamonn Holmes sat down for a chat while I was meeting Chris Hollies, the Dock Co-ordinator, for an early-morning breakfast (in a secret location that was Not Dock Cafe – ssshh, don’t tell Tegan).

If you don’t yet know the incredibly pivotal role that Eamonn played in the life of The Dock, click here…