Matt’s new blog

As we are back in the UK and settling down we will probably be posting on this blog less regularly than before. We will continue to post our news but not so often.

However, Matt is starting a new blog which he plans to use more regularly – and, just like this one, you can sign up to get updates by email or subscribe to the feed.

Matt’s new blog is at: mattfreer.wordpress.com.

Everyone’s online

Last week we launched Jubilee Centre’s new website – www.jubileecentre.org – which I have been working on over the past year. We’ve developed the new site so that it easily provides the latest news and Monday Issue from JC – you can subscribe to receive both of these by email, just click here.

During last week I also trained all the staff at JC on how to maintain the site – yet again it uses WordPress – which was interesting during the week when we had the worst internet connection ever! We got there in the end though – and are now even changing internet provider as well.

As a result there are personal blog sites springing up from JC staff and associates… so far we have the following:

Bread of Life Church Mapalo – this is the new website from the church we have worked with the most in Mapalo, including home of the HBC women’s group Polly has worked with.

Dan Daka’s blog – Dan is a volunteer at JC

Pukuta Mwanza’s blog – Pukuta, a good friend of ours from before we came to Zambia, just last week joined the JC staff to spearhead the Church Mobilisation Programme.

Micah Challenge Zambia – this is the home of Micah Challenge in Zambia, which is housed at JC.

* Update *  The past year has seen JC have major internet connection problems – despite much complaining and telephone calls we’ve never had the problems resolved. Last week’s problems forced JC to look into getting a new provider… and by Monday night this week the new provider had connected us up and all the problems of old are now left to yesterday… what can I say… a week before we leave Zambia JC not only gets a reliable fast internet connection but also a wireless connection!

How to get your own website

I’ve been thinking of writing a post about how to set-up your own WordPress.com website for a while (that is the software and hosting we use for this site) – it is so easy, free and whilst being simple also has some fairly advanced stuff too. It is also Opensource which makes it even better in my view. However, I no longer need to write a post about it as Dave Walker has – more specifically he explains how to set up a church website, but it’d work for a personal blog, family website or any website! Here is the guide and here is the example ‘church website’. 

Sea kayaking in Devon

This time 3 years ago Matt and I spent an amazing few days on Lundy Island off the North Devon Coast. It is a wonderful place to go and seek real solitude, and see a bit of the raw beauty of the British Isles. It feels like you are in another world – with seals, basking sharks and puffins to watch.

Rob and Anita, friends of ours who live in North Devon, have set up Sea Kayaking Southwest, and are running wildlife safaris by sea kayak to Lundy Island and elsewhere around the South West. So this is a shameless plug! If you fancy having an adventure and get away from it all this summer check out their website at www.seakayakingsouthwest.co.uk.

Making the web work for you

Our lives are often enslaved by time – busyness rules… so how do we find the time to keep up-to-date with everything. The internet for one can capture you and swallow hours without you even noticing it, or the thought of wasting time surfing puts you off looking in the first place.

You may already be aware, but just in case you are not, help is at hand… it is basically this little orange button , also known as RSS or Atom feeds. This is a ’site feed’ that you can subscribe to. For example, our blog offers you the chance to subscribe to the site feed by email (but most sites don’t) or through using a News Reader or Aggregator. Once you subscribe to the feed, when the site gets updated it automatically sends the update to you – releasing you from having to go to each website that interests you for the latest update.

Micah Challenge Zambia website

We launched a website for Micah Challenge in Zambia yesterday – you can see it at: www.micahchallenge.org/zambia

It is a simple site that we’ve set up using WordPress.com, the same system that this website uses, and it hasn’t cost a penny so far – another example of what you can do for free on the web! There is not much content on it on at the moment but that will change as things develop.