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Another Twist in The Tale

My Granddad's book about his life

My Granddad's book about his life

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We settled <strong>in</strong> and Peter and John went to a local school named International School and Paul <br />

had a Ayah , Martha, who took care of Paul when we weren't there, visit<strong>in</strong>g friends etc <br />

We moved <strong>in</strong> ,slowly settled <strong>in</strong> and we just had loads of parties for the kids, who made friends <br />

with the boys who knew we lived on the beach and they were probably <strong>in</strong> a flat somewhere <br />

and were always call<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong> to have a swim and through this we met many children's parents. <br />

Some people th<strong>in</strong>k it's go<strong>in</strong>g to be difficult liv<strong>in</strong>g abroad to make new friends, we found it so <br />

easy. <br />

Valerie and I, whilst <strong>in</strong> England, always had a male German Shepherd dog from puppy stage. <br />

But here we decided to take <strong>in</strong> a stray as we had observed there were strays everywhere, <br />

some look<strong>in</strong>g well fed and others poor devils, half starved. We were also given a dachshund <br />

puppy, Susie, who loved me so much she peed on my safari boots every time I came home! <br />

Before I forget, we had 5 staff to assist us with our lives! <strong>The</strong> cook;, the Ayah;, the Ascari (an <br />

Ascari which is a guard) I named him Hapana Lala – which means don’t go to sleep. I will tell <br />

you the story for that later; the Shamba boy (gardener who used to clean the car every <br />

morn<strong>in</strong>g)). <br />

One day we heard the moo<strong>in</strong>g of lots of animals very early <strong>in</strong> the morn<strong>in</strong>g, we went straight <br />

to the sandy beach and there was a column of cows etc. all plodd<strong>in</strong>g very slowly past our <br />

property and I wondered where they were all go<strong>in</strong>g and we soon found out dur<strong>in</strong>g the day, <br />

these cattle were be<strong>in</strong>g taken and you could see they weren't <strong>in</strong> a happy mood all sullen, well <br />

fed, some of them, but unhappy, and I soon found out why. In this column there must have <br />

been 200 to 300 cattle who were on their way to the Fray Bentos abattoirs, poor th<strong>in</strong>gs. This <br />

procession occurred at least once a month, all the time we lived there. <br />

<strong>Another</strong> strange th<strong>in</strong>g I noticed, we hardly saw any strangers walk<strong>in</strong>g along the beach <br />

although the scenery was so beautiful. However the few we did see we took to be fishermen <br />

but we later found out most of them were not, they were President Nyere's bodyguards on <br />

the lookout for potential strangers or assass<strong>in</strong>s. <br />

One day I arrived home with Valerie and the kids from work and couldn't believe it somebody <br />

had moved <strong>in</strong> to the other empty property not far from us, which was now rented Geoff and <br />

his wife, Ann, and their 2 children, so once aga<strong>in</strong> we found a great family who we got on so <br />

well with. <strong>The</strong>y were English but after we left the emigrated to Australia. Strangely, <br />

approximately 15 years after they left we had an old farm house at Shottaton, just up the <br />

road from Ruyton X1 Towns and what a shock after all those years meet<strong>in</strong>g the parents once <br />

aga<strong>in</strong>. We are still <strong>in</strong> touch after nearly 50 years. <br />

<strong>Another</strong> favourite past time of ours, not far from our bungalow about 10 miles away, there <br />

was an open air c<strong>in</strong>ema, which I had never seen before, and as you drove <strong>in</strong> you looked for a <br />

space on one of the humps, you then parked the car and plugged <strong>in</strong> the loudspeaker to watch <br />

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