Editor’s Note: This post was created from the recording of an interview which was part of the community consultation, the CHI’26 Storyfest 22-24 Sept 2026 in the Moray Art Centre (MAC).

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For me, the Community Centre (CC) was always about meeting people. I worked from home a lot, and I’d come to the CC for a break, just to see people. There were always a few tables where you could sit down and meet someone, and I think that was the most important thing it gave us: a place to meet.

Over time the Phoenix Café took on that role more and more, but even so we still had all our celebrations at the CC — birthdays, weddings, Friday night dinners, Sunday brunch and Christmas, of course.

Birthday celebration

I did a lot of the cooking myself — I was on the kitchen team for quite a while, and being in that kitchen, cooking all that food, was just a wonderful thing to do. I loved it.

Blessing the food

I remember the craft fairs too — I sold things there myself — and on Sundays there’d always be people selling their old clothes or books at the brunch sales.

There were open mic nights, and evenings when people ran workshops; I remember someone teaching us WordPress one evening. And always those couches where you could sit and read the papers and just bump into people. That was the thing about the CC, although you could go to the Café, the Café wasn’t only ours but the CC was.

I think there’s a lot of synchronicity in this place. You’d go in and you’d just meet the person you wanted to see — or you wouldn’t, and that was fine too — but either way you’d end up having an important conversation. Sometimes I went up to the Upper CC for Taizé.

I loved the outside eating too — the picnic benches, being outside and the kids playing round us. I remember people sitting out there with bowls and aprons, peeling potatoes, shelling beans and getting everything ready for whatever was coming next.

Eating outside

Some of my proudest CC memories are really about the cooking. I made cinnamon rolls for brunch once — big batches — I remember having to find a recipe and then multiply it up for some huge number of people. I brought in some of my family’s Dutch recipes too, and did the same thing: scaled them right up for a crowd.

We cooked a wedding meal in that kitchen once, for Kasia and Karl, in the extension. I think we could seat about 150 people in there, though 180 was our real max. And when there were conferences, we’d sometimes cook for 300, with people eating out in tents.

Conference meal

It was a great kitchen. Honestly — that’s what we need again now.

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Photo credits: all photographs by Hugo Klip

Eveline Rodenburg

I live in East Whins with my husband Hugo. I’m self-employed and have a practice as a functional nutrition practitioner. I’m very involved in the community, love growing food and compost food waste