This is Betty. I met her recently at an old folks club in Tooting, run by a charity that tackles isolation among the elderly. She was singing music hall songs. I told her I live in Kent. “We used to go down to Kent a lot,” she said. “My mother loved it when the apple […]
Monthly Archives: December 2015
“They called me the Maharaja”
On a visit to the Imperial War Museum with another tiny charity, South London Cares, I met Oun. He arrived in London from India in 1962 with £5 in his pocket and a selection of his mum’s jewels around his neck. “They called me the Maharaja,” he said. Walking around the museum and eating a […]
When Bob gets up to sing
They were singing Christmas Carols down at the old folks’ drop-in centre in Tooting on Wednesday afternoon. Quality variable. Then Bob, 81, who’d just been mumbling along until that point, steps up and offers to sing a solo. Oh, gawd. This will be awkward. But he opens his mouth and out comes a beautiful music hall ballad, […]