The Adventure of the D of E Award

Prince Philip died last week and the news has been full of stories from people that met him. It's estimated that about 22% of the UK's population either saw or met Prince Philip at some point and this has resulted in some excellent tales. A woman named Cat saw the Queen and Philip one Christmas at Sandringham and Philip said to her "You look like you've had a heavy Christmas". Unfortunately I don't have an amusing anecdote to tell but Prince Philip did have an influence on my life in a way- he launched the Duke of Edinburgh Awards. 

I did the bronze D of E award when I was about fifteen. There were four sections to the award: skill, service, physical and the expedition. 

For the skill section I learned Japanese, admittedly to a very basic level. For some reason our school had some arrangement with a school in Japan and for one academic year a Japanese teacher was based at our school. Each week I went to Japanese club and over four or five years I learned a fair bit about the culture of the country, had a go at origami and picked up the basic of the language. Japanese is far harder to learn than the likes of French and Spanish which I was studying for, mainly because there is no similarity with English to draw off. At one point though I knew all the sounds in one of the three alphabets, knew animals names, could introduce myself in Japanese and could say any number up to a thousand. Much of this has left my brain through lack of use but learning it was still a beneficial experience. 

My service section didn't really require any effort as I just claimed my activities at "young rangers" that I attended every month. Based at the local country park but occasionally visiting sites around the district, once a month I'd spend the day doing conversation jobs alongside other teenagers and a couple of proper rangers. We cut down trees, we planted trees, we cleared out ponds and lakes, ripped out invasive species, built a boardwalk and generally improved natural spaces. I loved it and for a long time this area was what I wanted to work in. Only this week I walked past a row of trees that I helped plant when they were saplings which are now around ten feet tall. 

My physical section was playing badminton. I think the section exists as an encouragement for teenagers to be fitter which is obviously a good thing but it was certainly the section I was least interested in. I had lessons from a proper badminton coach and reached a reasonable level but I stopped playing when I went to uni and have barely played since. 

The highlight and by far the most memorable section of the award was the expedition. We spent two days walking around the New Forest, navigating by map and camping in the middle. We also spent a weekend training for this including everything from first aid to cooking on a tiny stove and had a practice expedition too. My group was a bit of a mismatch. Most of my friends were doing the award with the scouts but I wasn't a member so did it with school. Our expedition group was kind of thrown together with one friend and four other people I knew fairly well. 

The expedition was great and I have so many ridiculous memories. On our training weekend a teacher directed us to a footpath that went around the edge of a field but we hadn't realised that it went round the edge and plodded straight through the middle amongst the horses. As we reached the far side the owner came marching across to us and said in a sinister tone "Don't you know you're trespassing". The answer was obviously 'no' but there was an awkward silence as the six of us wondered what to do. In films this was the point where the farmer shoots you. In the end she muttered something about us being from that "bloody campsite" and allowed us to leave through the main gate. 

Walking through the New Forest was quite a challenge. Though we had smartphones at this point we were asked not to use them unless it was an emergency and we generally accepted that guidance. Besides, in most of the New Forest you can't get a good enough signal to navigate by anyway. So there we were, a group of millennials forced to use maps for the first time in our lives and inevitably it led to some long detours including one moment where we got stuck at a dead end but managed to find a man in his garden to give us directions. There were also times that the weather was dreadful and though it's technically a forest, there are large swathes of the area that are open heathland. I remember stopping for a break and we attempted to have some soup to warm ourselves up but it was raining so heavily that the soup seemed to be refilling faster than we could drink it. 

Each group had to to a presentation after the expedition with a focus and we chose to do "Colours of the New Forest" which meant that very occasionally we'd take a photo of some flowers but generally we didn't have to think about it. I haven't had any contact with anyone from that group for a long while and indeed properly didn't speak to most of them much again but on those few weekends there was a bond that being out in the wild forms. We laughed and joked around, we jumped in puddles as we were soaking wet anyway and inexplicably sang "Build Me Up Buttercup" by The Foundations. 

I would have liked to do the higher awards but our school only ran bronze and I couldn't find another centre locally to do it with. The award was a fantastic adventure which gave me all sorts of new experiences. If I hadn't done it I don't think I'd have the confidence to go wandering out in the countryside in the way I do now, it taught me how to navigate and how to be safe. 

Whatever your views on Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh awards that he founded have influenced the lives of thousands of people including myself.