Mornin’ all! What’s good about it, you may ask? Well, you are still alive and kicking, your loved ones are still around you; and the bills keep coming in. So, no worries there.
Yes, trying times for all of us, but count your blessings. Could be worse, I suppose, but rather be ‘in the pink’ than ‘in the dark’, or, ‘in a box’.
ALSO READ : Rob in the ‘Hood: Ted Morley: ‘A good innings and a life well lived’
On with the show.
And A Small World, Too
Small world, isn’t it? After last week’s tribute to the late Ted Morley, a couple of readers contacted me to comment on the article.
Not so much about Ted, but my reference to’ Salisbury in the ’70s, which now seems a long, long time ago.
Pauline Antrobus of Leisure Bay e-mailed me to ask if I could help confirm where Flanagan’s Restaurant, Salisbury was located.
Husband Derek had disagreed with Pauline as to where exactly it was situated.
I was only too happy to provide the ‘right place’, simply because I had worked in the same building, BP House, Jameson Avenue.
Flanagans was then a firm favourite watering hole at the end of a hard day at the office.
City or United?
In her e-mail to me, Pauline also mentioned the Le Matelot night club, Avondale, along with some old favourite haunts of yesteryear.
In responding I suggested the three of us meet up, and talk of old times.
It turned out to be one of the best chit-chats since putting pen to paper.
The long line of coincidences of our parallel lives was just quite amazing.
The meeting got off to a good start: “Derek, I see you are from Wilmslow, Manchester. I have to ask you a personal question before we go any further: Are you ‘City or United’?”
Derek’s reply was music to my ears: “I’m a Manchester City fan.”
“You’re in!” I replied. You have to get your priorities right.
Reina Del Mar
Our meeting over a cup of coffee was frequently interrupted with gasps and cries of ‘so was I or so did I or I was there then’.
The coincidences just piled up.
The Antrobus’s kicked off with ‘we once went on a cruise to South America on the Reina Del Mar’ which many South Africans will fondly remember.
“Hey, that was the liner I had worked on as a ship’s printer on my first trip to sea to the west coast of South America.”
From working in Zambia in the same years, to living the good life in Salisbury in the ’70s, it was too good to be true. But it was true.
Familiar names we both knew, favourite restaurants, Reps theatre, Avondale stored in our memory sticks of life were brought back.
A case of ‘The Song Is Ended, But The Melody Lingers On’.
Fortunes To Be Made
Derek came out to South Africa in 1965, beating me by a couple of months.
Realising that ‘fortunes were to be made on the copperbelt in Zambia, and not whilst living in the shadow of Table Mountain, Derek moved to Kitwe in 1968, to become managing engineer for a mining company.
I followed Derek’s flight path in the same year, having a ‘very nice time’ in Ndola, although somehow, neither of us quite made that longed-for fortune. Time to move on to Salisbury. Golden years.
In the meantime…a young Pauline Alderson swapped the beautiful Lake District, Westmoreland, to become a Crown Agency ‘sunshine girl’ in Zambia, working as a secretary at Lusaka’s city airport.
After completing her three-year contract, Pauline moved on to Salisbury, Rhodesia, where she met Derek. The rest is history.
The Antrobus’s were married in Morecambe, UK, before returning to Lincoln Green, Belvedere, Salisbury, and married life.
They raised two sons, one presently serving in the Royal Navy.
Derek ran a successful sheet metal business in Harare, Zimbabwe until 2005, when it was time to retire to the Hibiscus Coast, opting for a leisurely life-style in Leisure Bay.
We’re Doomed, I Tell You!
Life has not stood still, the Antrobus’s are active ‘players’ on the Hibiscus Coast, particularly Pauline’s continuous love of dancing.
A former competition-level ballroom dancer, Pauline keeps fit with her own interpretation of a ‘definitely not line-dancing’ group of ladies.
Derek also added that the name of Antrobus is mentioned in the medieval Domesday Book (1086), being of Viking stock.
ALSO READ : Rob in the ‘Hood: ‘You’re getting to be a habit with me!’
No worries, Derek, you are now mentioned in the present-day version of the Doomsday Book, South Coast edition, with its modern spelling!
Point of No Return
We ended with that perennial, age-old question ‘do you ever think of going back (to the UK)?’
“No, not at all. We just could not take the weather,” was the reply. “And who wants to live in Grimsby? We are here till our time is up.”
Many thanks, Derek and Pauline, for a lovely get-together.
See you, Rob.
HAVE YOUR SAY
Like the South Coast Herald’s Facebook page, follow us on Twitter and Instagram
