Contributors

Jayanta Das retired as a senior executive in the jute industry. He shares his time between Kolkata and Mumbai.

Jean Drage lived in Cambourne.

Jenny lives in Ludlow near the border between England and Wales but has lived for many years in the hills of Wales. Since retirement she has been travelling and fulfilling a few dreams and becoming a practising Buddhist. Before that Jenny worked in administration and project management, latterly in the environmental sector - she is an old environmental campaigner, latterly more into human rights, with a special interest in what has happened to Tibetans.

Joan was the inspiration behind this site and the first author to post a story.

Joseph Tek Choon Yee is a distinguished leader in the palm oil industry with over 30 years of experience.
His career includes corporate roles such as CEO and Managing Director of a publicly listed company
and Chief Executive of the Malaysian Palm Oil Association (MPOA). Joseph holds a First-Class Honours
Bachelor's degree in Botany from the National University of Malaysia, an MPhil in Plant Breeding from
Cambridge University, and has completed the ASEAN Senior Management Development Programme
at Harvard Business School. His educational background, combined with his extensive industry
experience, enables him to blend technical expertise with strategic vision and passion. Guided by his
motto, “Aspire to inspire before expire,” Joseph is dedicated to advancing leadership and innovation in
his field. He opted for an early retirement and now lives in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. He is involved with
youth empowerment through TVET especially for marginalised youths in Borneo.

Joy Ma grew up and was educated in India until she left for graduate school in the US. She enjoys traveling, meeting people and writing. Joy lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her family, She was one of the few children born in the Deoli Internment Camp in Rajasthan. She wrote "The Deoliwallahs" published in January 2020.

By Judy

Born in London in 1924, my upbringing and education by governesses and select schools were probably typical for certain families of that period which followed the end of the First World War. When war broke out again in 1939 I left school without having passed my exams and lived for a while in Narborough helping out in the apple orchards. In 1942 I joined WAAFs (Women's Auxiliary Air Force) as a motor transport driver. After training, I was based first at RAF Marham in Norfolk, and in 1944 was posted to RAF Bourn where I drove aircrew of a Mosquito Squadron to and from their kites when on ops. I was demobbed in 1946, a year after VE Day and I returned to Narborough, taking weekly trips to London for singing lessons. Using the name Rose Ash I had a stint on the stage as a chorus girl in the touring company of the musical comedy Annie Get Your Gun. I became third understudy for the part of Annie Oakley and when the star, Barbara Shotter, suddenly became ill on the opening night at the Liverpool Empire Theatre, played the part as the other understudies were also ill.

I loved my stage days but decided I wanted to see more of the world and joined a group travelling to India on a rickety old bus. From there I intended flying over to Australia. Unfortunately, I picked up some nasty complaint en route and had to return to England to recover. Fit again, I became a Ten Pound Pom and, in 1958, I sailed away from Tilbury Docks on the Orient Liner 'Orontes.' For two years I hitch-hiked in Australia ending up in Darwin from where I intended flying back to England to start off again in another direction. However, as a last fling, I went on a Safari and met one of the crocodile hunters, called Tom, who worked for the camp.

I married him and we set up our own very primitive ventures for travellers to the area. No bitumen anywhere-just rough tracks on which wild buffaloes were likely to hinder one's journey. We progressed over the years until the bitumen and civilisation came to the area and we retired to a now modern Darwin city. Sadly, Tom took ill and died shortly after and, with a sudden hankering for the education I had missed out in my childhood, I applied to the newly opened Northern Territory University(later to become Charles Darwin University) and was accepted on probation. Amazingly I went through all the stages of Bachelor of Arts ending with my doctorate in 2008. After so many adventures in my life, I decided to write my autobiography called An English Rose in Kakadu which was published. At which point I felt a hankering to return to my family in England.

I now live in a beautiful Retirement Home called Cavendish Court in a new town called Cambourne built on the edge of the wartime airfield RAF Bourn, where I had been stationed. My days are always full, going through old papers, playing on my keyboard, writing short stories or poems and enjoying visits from the family or walking(with my stroller) around the garden with its birds singing merrily or through the nearby woods. But suddenly the world has been hit by the corona virus and life for everyone is on the verge of chaos and collapse.

June Rodd is a retired professional who lives in Cambourne.