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Snowdrop flowering in Stromovka Park © Ricky Yates

Today my blog is exactly three years old. My first ever blogpost was published here on 4^th February 2009. So today is both a time for a little celebration as well as an occasion for some reflection on what I’ve written in the past as well as what might appear here in the coming year.

For any of my readers who are statistically minded, this is post number 163. In my first year, I published 73 posts, in my second year it was 48. In the past twelve months, I’ve published a further 41 as I will deem this post to be the first of my fourth blogging year.

The reason for the disparity in numbers stems mainly from my prolific period of writing and posting in November and December 2009 when I wrote in detail about our long distance trip to Turkey. That apart, it has normally been just under one blogpost a week. In the coming year my goal is to publish at least 52 posts – an average of one a week.

The aim will still be that as outlined in ‘About me – including a photo’. That is, to reflect on ministering here in Prague, to English-speakers from a variety of backgrounds and countries, and living as an expat myself in this fascinating city, as well as the wider Czech Republic. However, I do probably need to update the photograph that currently appears on that page. My hair is now far greyer, there is slightly less of it, and the shirt has long since disintegrated!

I shall try to continue to keep a balance between writing about everyday experiences seen from an expat perspective, recording my travels around, and occasionally beyond, the Czech Republic, together with addressing theological and ecclesiological issues. I’m aware that sometimes there is an imbalance between these things which I hope, corrects itself over a longer period of time.

According to Google analytics, this blog receives on average, between 60 and 70 visitors a day. Yet I get increasingly frustrated that so few of those visitors ever bother to leave me a coherent and relevant comment. My thanks to the two most faithful ones who do – Perpetua and Karen.

This issue was so clearly illustrated to me when I was standing at the Church door and shaking hands with members of the congregation after our Midnight Eucharist last Christmas Eve. A former member of the regular congregation, who still has a flat in Prague but is now based in London, shook my hand and warmly thanked me for the service. But he then said, “Whatever you do Ricky, don’t stop writing your blog”. I was most grateful for his words of encouragement. But that was the first I ever knew that he read and enjoyed this blog as he has never left a single comment!

Therefore as my blog enters its fourth year, if you visit here and regularly to read my musings, please tell me! Leave a comment – tell me if you agree or disagree with what I’ve written. Tell me if you would like me to focus more on a particular area or concern. Likewise, comments on Facebook, when I post a link, are also welcome. But I really would like to also have them here too.

My glass of wine is alongside my computer. I’m raising it and saying, “Here’s to year four of Ricky Yates – An Anglican in Prague!”

Prague Rooftops — View across Prague © Ricky Yates

This week, my blog celebrates its first birthday! I published my first blog post on 4^th February 2009. Entitled ‘Episcopal Taxi Service’, it described the events that had taken place in the previous week at the end of January 2009. So now seems a good time to look back over my first year of being a blogger.

In one respect, the blog is more than two years old as my wife Sybille kindly bought my domain rickyyates.com more than a year earlier in December 2007. She did so at the same time as purchasing a domain for my son Phillip to help him promote his skills as a caricaturist. Not only was phillyates.com available but rickyyates.com was too. So she purchased them both as very unusual but highly useful Christmas presents to us both.

When I started the blog, I had two groups of people in mind. One was my family and friends back in the UK who wanted to know how I was getting on in my new home, new job and different circumstances in the Czech Republic. Rather than write individual emails or letters I could say instead, “Just look at my blog”.

My other initial intended audience were my former parishioners in the Shelswell Group of Parishes in North Oxfordshire whom I had served as Rector from January 1993 until September 2008. The Benefice of Shelswell (to give the group of parishes their correct legal name) produces an extremely good monthly magazine entitled ‘Shelswell News’ which is delivered to around two thirds of households in the parishes who in turn, pay £7.00 a year for the privilege of receiving it. In the first few months after my arrival in Prague, I wrote a couple of newsy pieces about my new life in the Czech Republic. However, I was very aware that I could not always continue doing so.

One unwritten, but very important rule for Anglican clergy is that, once you have ceased to be Rector/Vicar of a parish or group of parishes and have moved on to a new post or have retired, you do not interfere or remain involved in any way, in the life of your former parish(es). This is order that your successor can begin their ministry without any outside interference. So in the March 2009 edition of ‘Shelswell News’ I wrote saying, “In future, if you want to know the latest news from Ricky & Sybille in Prague, visit www.rickyyates.com”.

However, I was always conscious that, sooner or later, my new parishioners at St. Clement’s Anglican Episcopal Church, Prague would also find my blog and start reading it. Therefore, after a couple of months, rather than trying to hide it, I decided to add details of it to my ‘email signature’. Now, although hardly any of the congregation ever leaves a comment, I do know that it is quite widely read by congregational members. And yes – I am extremely careful not to say anything rude about any of them!!!!

Over the past twelve months I’ve managed to write 72 posts. On average, that is one every five and a half days – quite an achievement I reckon! Initially I relied on photographs or artwork legitimately downloaded from the internet, to illustrate my posts. Or I asked Sybille to photograph something for me so I could use it on my blog. Or I scanned the relevant item. But in June 2009, I bit the bullet and bought myself a relatively simple point and shoot digital camera and since then, the blog has almost exclusively been illustrated with my own photos. The exception is when I’m in the photo when I have to rely on my wife’s expertise.

I still get frustrated at my inability to quickly turn my thoughts and ideas into blog posts. I’m a stickler both for factual accuracy and correct spelling and getting both right takes time. And, as I’ve commented previously, I also try to spell Czech words, personal names and place names correctly, using the appropriate diacritics only to discover most web browsers turn some of them into ?????. Aagh!!!

My other frustration is the number of people who read my blog but never leave a comment. I do get comments, usually far too many of them. But most are spammers trying to promote online pharmacies, or sites offering pictures of so called ‘celebrities’ in various stages of undress, or comments that bear no relation to my post, trying to build back links to their own dubious websites. When someone clearly has read my post, then even if I don’t necessarily agree with what they say, I approve their comment. But sadly, such comments are few and far between.

Therefore as my blog enters its second year, if you enjoy reading it, don’t be afraid to say so. If you disagree with me or want to amplify what I’ve written, leave a comment. It will help me as I seek to articulate more of my experiences as an expat Anglican clergyman living in Central Europe during 2010.

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