I left Sheffield in July 1978 after I finally finished my final teaching practice, and felt that my life was over. Little did I know that it was only just beginning, but I was sad, bereft, and dreading the future. What I really wanted was another gap year, to find myself as they say, but […]Read Post ›
I don’t know who took this photo, but it is one of my favourite ones of my father. He stayed in Italy after the war, and started attending Rome University , but soon realised that there would be more opportunities in England for Poles like him, who had been deported to Siberia, then managed to […]Read Post ›
Have I said I always wanted to be a teacher? Many times, I hear you mutter. So boring, never wavering, always on about education.Et cetera, et cetera. Well, now is the time to admit, that isn’t entirely true. I’ll try and explain. In June 1976 I finally obtained my degree by the skin of my teeth from […]Read Post ›
This is my first time in Dubrovnik, but not my first connection with it. Many years ago, when I had just finished university, I had a boyfriend who was a disaster in many ways. But it took me a long time to see it, but that’s another story. He was an amateur archaeologist and I […]Read Post ›
When I was eighteen I went to Poland for six weeks. It was a great turning point in my life, as up till then I had been very shy, very nervous, lacking in confidence and with very few independent skills. I was clever and well read, but that was about it. I left school after […]Read Post ›
Maja is my one of my oldest and best friends. I have known her since September 1965 when she started going to my school. I knew her father before then, as he worked with my mum, and her brother, Tom, and I knew of her- but had never met her until she started at my […]Read Post ›
I wonder who remembers this face. If any of his family ever come across it then please get in touch. David’s birthday was on 15th March. He used to joke about the portents and then one day his worst fear was realised and he sadly died in May 1990, a very few weeks after being […]Read Post ›
For the Mhinisteir’s wife Today is the sixth of December. For me the real beginning of the Christmas season. This was the day when good children were given a little present and naughty children a birch rod. One year my mother gave me a rod. It was very small and gilded. Very pretty. But a […]Read Post ›
A hard one this, Tony, but one thing comes to mind. When I was at university there were adverts all over the place for scholarships to various places. I would look at them and think nothing more of them – I didn’t consider the possibility of ever getting one. Confidence was never my strongest point […]Read Post ›
Life Through Basia's Eyes 