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Colin Farquhar: Ferryhill Community Centre is a lifeline in area I love – we must fight to keep it

Public consultations have of course begun, and hopefully people will speak up to defend much loved and valued places at the hearts of their locales, which might otherwise face the axe.

Places like Ferryhill Community Centre deserve to be protected, writes Colin Farquhar.
Places like Ferryhill Community Centre deserve to be protected, writes Colin Farquhar.

I recently started going to yoga classes.

It was less to find inner peace – although I could be doing with a dose of that following a few Facebook comments lately – and more about trying to iron out a few kinks in my bones as I get a wee bit older.

My Mum is soon to have a long overdue hip operation, and given the shared genetics it does occur to one that the same issues might crop up with time. Best to keep everything in as good condition as possible.

It’s a galling thing to realise, as I approach 40, that the aches and pains in a few spots are edging towards permanence, rather than temporary distractions.

Indeed, trying to walk a few twinges off is instead causing them to run on. I try to keep myself in reasonable nick, but my preferred exercise of choice, running, can be a bit hard on the ankles, knees and pelvis.

Ferryhill Community Centre is a great place for getting active

A reasonable stretch for at least one hour a week seemed like a good place to start and I am very lucky that I live close by Ferryhill Community Centre.

Fantastically, the distance is short enough that my joints don’t even get a chance to creak before I get through the door.

I can honestly say that yoga has helped a fair bit in the few short weeks since I’ve been going. A niggly pain on my left side seems to have quelled and I’ve been walking a wee bit more comfortably. So, in for a penny, in for a pound, and I’m hoping to restart classes soon, after a short October break.

What has alarmed me though is learning that the Ferryhill Community Centre is going through financial hardship.

A wee poster on the door caught my eye as I left the last session, asking for help. What a loss that would be, after so directly and effectively contributing to my wellbeing.

The Community Centre is looking to raise £20,ooo in order to keep the doors open and provide what they provide, yoga classes being just a small part of the picture.

People playing Pickleball at Ferryhill Community Centre.
People playing Pickleball at Ferryhill Community Centre. Image: Darrell Benns/DC Thomson

As is always the case, these small spaces in our communities do far more than anyone really realises. Aside from my yoga, there’s a raft of other classes – language learning, kids’ playgroups, step classes and, for the season, Halloween discos. The list goes on too.

These spaces do so much of the heavy lifting in our society

Also, the Community Centre has an affordable cafe to sit and have a baked tattie with a pal, and we know how important these spaces are when so much has become so unaffordable to so many.

These spaces working directly in our city communities do so much of the unseen heavy lifting in society, which happens under the radar of much of our busy lives. They’re as essential as any other public infrastructure, to lift us, and improve our lives.

Every time I walk down the road, the Community Centre is busy, with cars coming and going and activity visible. This is not an unused space – it will be missed if it goes by the many who use it every day.

And my joints and knees won’t stay supple on their own. The squeaky wheel needs the grease, increasingly more frequently.

Ferryhill Library remains closed since the cull of the Council’s 2023/24 budget, with petitions to reopen so far falling on deaf ears. Hopefully, we won’t get to that stage with any of our community centres in Aberdeen, but the council is still in poverty and options will be on the table.

 

Ferryhill Library
Ferryhill Library closed during budget cuts.

Public consultations have of course begun, and hopefully people will speak up to defend much loved and valued places at the hearts of their locales, which might otherwise face the axe.

Perhaps these centres would make good recipients of the recent bus gate windfalls the councils have received. That said, it’s small beer against the £34 million of projected savings that have to be made – what a mess.

As ever, it will of course be people who pull together and help out their local community spaces.

Ferryhill Community Centre has a GoFundMe going to help them reach their target, and thankfully the donations are ticking up.

Hopefully it’ll be a big part of the area, which I’ve loved living in since I moved here a year ago, for a long time to come.

You never know – it might even be around long enough for me to achieve enlightenment through yoga, although I’m sure there’s plenty out there who will doubt that.


Colin Farquhar works as a creative spaces manager and film programmer in the north-east culture sector 

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