The East Kent MNDA Group were excited way back in August to start discussions with The Yarrow Hotel in Broadstairs for our Christmas Lunch. This was the first time since the earliest Lockdown that we’d been able to plan such an event. With everything in place: Saturday 11 December as the date, menus chosen and 40+ people scheduled to come, we were hit by the latest fears from Omicron the day prior to the event. It was early days so we decided to go ahead with the planned event but make a number of safety requirements, e.g. people needed to have had a booster jab, taken a Lateral Flow Test on the morning of the day and observe social distancing wherever possible. The hotel was visited earlier on the Saturday and table positioning and ventilation checked. Also, any idea of holding a raffle was, sadly, abandoned as it would have created too much movement around the room. By lunchtime only one pwMND and his carer cancelled which was a huge relief.
Our new Chairman David Ward, gave a speech at the end of the lunch and long service presentations were made to Chrissie Batts and Judy Keay. Both were for 10 years of service to the MNDA East Kent community and both richly deserved.
The event was a huge success with people happy to see each other after a long time + the hotel did us proud, as always, with excellent food, service and attentiveness by staff. In fact, many people didn’t leave until 3-4!!
Our dearest hope is that next year Covid will be less of a worry.
