When I left school.
I went into
a big factory called Siemens,
used to do the underwater cables
And the telephones
and I served my apprenticeship there
and I ended up at the millwright.
And of course, I was exempt
from going into the forces until I was 21.
And at 21,
almost immediately, I was called up
and I learned all about armaments.
I became an armament fitter.
I was called up to go abroad.
Seletar Singapore.
We got to Singapore.
By boat, it took us a month
to get there,
and we went on the SS Halladale
and we came
all the way down
Gibraltar through the Med.
We had a day's leave in Malta.
In Valetta.
Which we made the most of,
I mean, we got off whenever we could. And.
From there,
we went through the Suez Canal to Colombo.
We had a day off there
and you see things.
I used to live in London.
Never went out of London at all.
In fact, we didn't even go up to the city.
You know, I lived in Greenwich
and then all of a sudden
And when we went to Colombo,
were beggars
Men with no legs on pushing themselves
around on the pavement, you know, begging,
which would never, never encountered.
Your education,
you know, when I think about it now,
education is exploded.
You can't do more
than join the service to see life,
to experience life.
I'm very privileged.
You saw things
when you go in the Mediterranean,
and you see the land
You don't see any land.
It's too far away.
It's a horizon of water
and you see dolphins come up either
You can't see them both at the same time
But dolphins, flying fish.
We saw them.
A boy from London.
