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| Elephant bay |
Anyway, I have decided to write as I feel and today I will write about Aden.
We were stationed in Germany at the time and I can remember Dad coming home and telling mum that we'd been posted again. She asked where, and Dad had replied "Aden". I was 10 years old and had no idea where Aden was but I know mum didn't want to go as she cried.
At school the next day, I told teacher and she took me to the big map which was on the wall at the back of the classroom. She pointed to a tiny place, right down the bottom of the map 'Aden' it said.So far far away from Germany. Teacher looked very grave, but said that she hoped I would be happy in our next posting.
At the time I thought nothing of it, but on reflection, it must have been hard for teachers working for B.F.E.S.(British Forces Education Service) with pupils coming and going, some staying only a few months, favourite pupils leaving as fathers got posted elsewhere. As an army daughter, I was used to making friends, then losing friends, making new ones as we all moved about.
So, M.F.O. (married families overseas) boxes were all packed with our belongings and we left the home I'd known for 6 years. We were sent to Blackpool to stay in a hostel for 2 months, and dad was sent to Aden to prepare for our arrival. I remember going to school in Blackpool for the 2 months and in the playground one day, the pupils were asked to march into class. I was told I was rubbish and, being an army daughter, should know how to march properly.Now, I see that it was a stupid comment. After all, would a plumber's daughter know how to fix a leak, or a doctor's daughter know how to diagnose an illness? My Dad was the soldier, not me. I also remember the vile school dinners there.It was my first taste of 'civvie street' and I didn't like it much.
Then, we went to join dad. I can't remember the flight to Aden, but I remember when we landed at Khormaksar airport and the door opened and it was as though a hot wet blanket hit us as we left the plane. It was night time, and dad drove us to our flat on the top floor of a block on the Khormaksar beach road. He'd turned the air conditioning on. However, there was a ghecko on the wall and us kids were scared (3 of us shared one bedroom). Dad caught it and put it out and we slept. Next morning was the start of the adventure. Dad gave us sweat towels, told mum to make sure we drank lots,and told her to give us salt tablets to replace vital salts in our bodies from sweating in the first months until we adjusted. Then off he went to his work in Normandy lines and left us to settle in and unpack. Mum was stressed and spent the next few days screaming at my brother and I (my sister was the golden child) and we were kicked out of the flat to explore. In the flats, there was an armed guard at the entrance on the ground floor. We met other army kids who showed us around.
We weren't in a compound of any kind and we had local people living behind us. The kind soldier told us not to wander off and that was it. I was overjoyed to discover stray dogs roaming. (Nobody warned me about rabies) and soon made friends with them. There was 'Titch' a little female who was constantly in pup, a large Akita type dog with a broken tail which hung down, who I named 'Bruno' and several more, who discovered in me, a child who gave them affection and was happy to sit pulling off the clumps of ticks around their faces, petting them, and fetching bowls of water for them.
Our flats were right on the beach road with a petrol station immediately next to the flats. At night, Arab lorry drivers would pull in to sleep, play music, chew qat and eat. When the music went on too late into the night, I remember dad chucking a lightbulb down near then. From 4 floors up, when it landed and exploded, it must have sounded like a gunshot and all the lights got turned off and there was silence.
We caught the school bus, across the road, in front of the 'Sea view' hotel (that would be significant later on).
As we waited with the other kids, we would go to one of the little Arab owned shops situated in the lock ups underneath the flats, to buy a 'stim' (fizzy drink, always made by Canada dry), or an ice cream.
The bus arrived. It was a big khaki army bus with strong mesh anti missile mesh across the windows, with an armed soldier inside the bus, and an armoured vehicle with a machine gun mounted on it, with more armed soldiers front and back , to escort us to school , which was inside one of the barrack ares (or 'lines' as they were called over there).
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| in Ma'ala. Note armed soldiers in the street and one of the armed landrovers |
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| inside the school bus. |
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| school buses in Ma'ala with armed land rover front and behind |
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| aftermath of a grenade attack |
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| note anti mortar grille over the windows of the school bus |
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escorting school kids to their waiting parents. Since none of the children are in uniform, I have a feeling this may be from the bus during the holidays which was bringing us home from the mermaid club |
We did the usual thing when starting a new school. The teacher would announce that there was a new pupil and introduce us. Some memories from my school days are having water fountains everywhere.Grenade training in assembly and at odd times during play time. We were taught that when someone shouted "grenade" we had to immediately drop to the ground, lay on our stomachs with our hands clasped over the back of our heads. A craze for playing 'jacks', everyone having a locally made straw bag to carry our school things in, and one day, fainting in assembly and being asked if I'd had any breakfast, then getting into trouble when I went home because my Mother had been told off for not feeding us before we left the house. I don't think my mother liked my brother and I very much and had no sense of responsibility to us.My little sister was a different kettle of fish. She was the golden child. She was just about to start primary school. My mother would boast about how an Arab door to door seller offered 10 camels and a gold watch in exchange for her.
Most of my memories of Aden were spending the day roaming the area alone. Looking back, I can see how dangerous that was.Aden was a troubled area, a civil war was brewing, we heard shots and grenades going off. But still I roamed free. I made friends with a little Arab girl who lived near us. Her name was Nadia. She lived with her parents and brothers and grandparents in a beautiful large house, surrounded by flowers and greenery, which was most unusual in this barren desert area. One day, one of Nadia's brothers kissed me, and to her horror and his embarrassment, I walloped him.
I enjoyed crossing the Khormaksar beach road, to the beach across the road from our flats, to play, paddle in the shallows and fish. Dad was a keen angler and would fish with me. We caught amassive ray type fish one day and dad took it home and he and I enjoyed a meal. Mum didn't like fish so she refused to eat any of it. Another time, Dad caught an even bigger one, and a very skinny litle Arab boy was watching us. Dad felt sorry for him as he looked very hungry, so he quickly killed the fish and offered it to the little lad, who seemed very pleased, and staggered off down the beach dragging this fish which was bigger than he was!
I remember one day, getting off the school bus and climbing the stairs to our flat, when I spotted a little dog, cowering by the front door of the flat 2 floors below us. Normally, my instinct was to pet it. Even back then, I loved animals, however, this day, 'something' told me to hurry past, and so I did. Later that day, I watched as my dad, took the dog across the road to the beach and shot it, and buried it. I wept buckets, and thought my father very cruel, until he explained what rabies was and that this poor little dog was going to die a horrible slow death from it.
One day, dad came home very stressed and told mum to start packing as we were on the move again. From our balcony we could see the beach being blocked with rolls of barbed wire, more armed landrovers about than usual and people generally seemed on edge. Apparently, the U.N was coming to stay in the Sea View hotel (I mentioned it earlier) to try to negotiate peace between the N.L.F. and FLOSY, the 2 warring factions. All the families were being moved away because of the fear of increased attacks in the area. We moved to Ma'alla, to a flat on what was called 'Murder mile'. Frankly, my life in Khormaksar was nothing compared to this. I was no longer allowed to play outside. These locals were not friendly at all. Nightly we heard grenades going off. Our flats at the back, facing the Shamsan mountain range and the shanty town (kutchi huts) had anti mortar wire over the windows because terrorists would fire mortars at us from the kutchi huts. There was an armed guard at the entrance to the flats and on the roof, was a shelter with more armed soldiers.
Occasionally my mother went shopping in the little local shops along the mile. The shopkeepers were always friendly. they made a nice living out of the army wives after all, but sitting about on the pavement, older men would glare at us, and, as we walked past, throw pins, like darts, at our legs.
Of course in that heat, wounds quickly became infected too and I still have scars on my legs from where abscesses formed from the pin pricks.
During the school holidays, an army bus was provided for the children, to take us to the Lido, or 'The mermaid club' as it was called. The ranks had their own places you see. The mermaid club was for the lower ranks. My brother and I went regularly. We were given a few dinar to buy a stim and some chips. We swam like fish in the sea, but always within the shark netting. Only an idiot would swim or paddle outside. One new woman to the place decided to paddle by some rocks outside the netting and was taken by a shark. We also had spotters to make sure no sharks managed to get inside the netting and an alarm would sound if one was spotted. One day at the mermaid club the alarm was sounded . Apparently there was a large 'grey nurse' shark inside the netting.
I can remember my little brother once cutting his foot badly on broken glass and I had to carry him on my back, to the medical centre. It must have only been a few hundred feet away but I was skinny and tiny and it seemed like miles. He got stitches in his foot.
On the weekends, Dad would take us to various other ranks beaches. We went to Elephant bay once, but Little Aden beach seemed a favourite. Across the bay were the forbidding peaks of 'Silent valley' the grave yard for soldiers and families killed in Aden.
We spent Xmas day on the beach one year and I went with the other kids, pestering the squaddies for their empty 'stim' bottles because we got money on each returned bottle, to buy a choc ice with.The sand was so hot on the beach that you could not go barefoot at all. Occasionally, an Arab man would walk past with his camel (camels stank).
We would occasionally go to the swimming pool in Waterloo lines. My hair had,by that time, been bleached blonde, as were most of the fair haired kids. I was happy that we went mostly to beaches. Those children whose parents didn't like the beaches and would only let the kids swim in the pool, ended up with green hair from the chlorine in the pool.
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| taken from google earth. When I lived here, there were no buildings on the beach opposite the flats. It was just a large sandy beach! http://www.britishpathe.com/video/aden-last-troops-withdraw-aka-last-guard-of-honour/query/Aden |
Then we landed in England. It was cold and grey and smelled of coal smoke. We stayed overnight at a forces hostel at R.A.F. Hendon, then got put on a train to Shropshire. When we arrived in Shrewsbury, Mum bought us kids a banana each. What a strange banana though. It was yellow!!! And it tasted odd. Bananas in Aden were green and delicious.
We were met by an army driver and driven to Wem which was to be our home for several months, until Aden was eventually evacuated and everyone came home.In Wem I discovered that I was regarded as a gypsy, bullied and generally made miserable. Only my second ever experience of civvie street and once again, I disliked it and could not understand the clannish xenophobia that civilians seemed to display towards anyone from outside the immediate area. We lived in army quarters in Aston park (now renamed Ash grove.) I was happy there, among other army children. Our playground was the old deserted army camp, complete with Nissen huts to make into dens. There old bedsteads and one even had an old upright piano in it. There were also dangerous steep sided deep water tanks in which we might have drowned.In the photo below which is a modern one from google earth, the house we lived in is the 2nd on the right as you turn into the close.Above is the old camp. You can see where the old Nissen huts used to be. I understand that the whole area is now an industrial park.
Civilians don't seem to understand us forces families. Army kids have a different upbringing. We've experienced things they cannot comprehend and put up with hardships. Civilians don't seem to understand that us kids also served.
There is now even an 'armed forces covenant' which recognises the debt that the country owes to members of the armed forces and their families.
What a pity that Kensington mortgages is happy to put this old soldier's daughter out of her home rather than extend the mortgage which she was missold 19 years ago.
Eventually, just before Xmas, my Dad arrived back from Aden and we travelled to our next posting back in Germany,
