I was born in 1934 in Dorset, England. Our family lived in a lodge at the bottom of the drive of a former mansion situated within a large estate. The lodge had a lovely garden in which there were wild-flowers, song-birds, fruit trees and a sandpit for us children. As a youngster, I wandered freely in the grounds and neighbouring fields. I recall at seven years old being a very happy child.
One day, when we came home from a rare holiday, all the windows had been covered with black cloth. I found it frightening. The entire country was at war, and “blackout” rules forbade showing any lights after dark to reduce visibility to enemy aircraft.
I was never looking for Fame during my 24 year career, I just loved doing what gave my adventuring soul pleasure and satisfaction.
My parents were broad-minded, education-loving, free-thinking people, and they imbued me with their values. The old Manor house was turned into a school, which they founded with others on the principles of Steiner and which I attended from Kindergarten. Here we were taught to appreciate the outdoors, sport, excursions, nature rambles, along with music, art, craft and all the usual educational subjects. My father taught at the school while my mother was taken up with caring for us six children.
When I was four, I performed in a school play about a sleeping butterfly. I played the role of the butterfly. I was told to crouch very still under cover of a rough blanket. When the other children began singing “Awaken Sleeping Butterfly”, I emerged from under the blanket and became the butterfly. I still remember the words of that song and recall my sheer unself-conscious joy at acting the part. My lifelong enthusiasm for performing began then, in kindergarten.
In 1949, when I was fifteen, I travelled to Germany as an exchange student – an event made possible by a British Government incentive to make reparations after the Second World War.
Hamburg was in ruins, twisted metal sticking up, the remains of chimneys still standing amidst the devastation. The War, so recent and devastating, the country, the whole world was trying to recover.
For me, a happy-go-lucky teenager, Germany was a great adventure. Billeted with families, I became fluent in German, and I was granted the privilege of free and comfortable travel. I enjoyed myself immensely and asked my parents for an extension of my time in the country. With their support, I stayed an extra four months, ten months in all.
This trip was a seminal turning point in my life. From here on, travel and languages became lifelong passions. German later became my main study at university.
Back in the 1950s, it was practically unheard of for an English girl to be going out with a dark-skinned man…
In 1952, I attended University College in Cardiff. I studied languages. Besides German, I did Swedish, Modern Italian, Classical Greek – and Welsh for fun!
At one of our formal university balls (full length gowns, gloves), Engineering student Gour Sen asked me to dance, and we danced with each other several times that night. Shortly after, I saw him in the library and made a beeline for him. There was a mutual attraction, and our relationship developed from then.
Back in the 1950s, it was practically unheard of for an English girl to be going out with a dark-skinned man, so Gour and I were in the vanguard of change. The colour of one’s skin was of no significance to me or my parents.
Gour and I married in 1955. In 1958, we moved to Newcastle-on-Tyne for Gour’s PhD studies. This is our fourth child’s birthplace; the first three were born in Cardiff. Our children are Anita, a girl (who is now seventy!), then a boy, Prasanta, followed by two more girls Runa (who, at fourteen and wanting a more ordinary name, became “Jane”) and Shakuntala, known as Shuki.
In 1962, we travelled to India to live in Gour’s family home. My first impressions of Calcutta were immediate and intense – the heat, crowds and poverty, cows wandering freely in the streets, the red splodges on the pavement (spittle from the bitter paan leaf) which I thought was blood from coughing and virulent TB, the never-ending movement and noise which sent me reeling.
This was where I gave birth to my fifth child, a son, Rahul, at a nursing home run by Anglo Indians, as was the norm then, where I had the best of both worlds.
The impact of India was, and still is, enormously important. I wish now I had expressed to Gour how grateful I am for having lived there. At the time, I was taken up with the difficulties of shopping, cooking on a little two-ring cooker, electricity cuts, the children’s health, and just keeping on top of many other challenges.
As the children grew older, I took part-time work. When the youngest was five, I began teaching English to overseas students. I also taught adult evening classes in German at a TAFE level. Later, I taught General Studies to unemployed teenagers. By the 1970s, I was teaching full-time.
In 1981, Gour left for Sydney, Australia, to join the staff at the University of New South Wales as a Lecturer in Mining, while I remained in England to steer our youngest through exams prior to university entrance.
In 1983, I joined Gour in Sydney. Four of our children remained in England, and our second son Prasanta, went to live in Tokyo.
I assumed that living in Australia would be much the same as living in England, but I was mistaken. The language differences were at times hilarious, at times confusing as were some customs I encountered, but it all became a fascinating challenge.
Gour and I were accommodated in student lodgings. Gour was extremely busy preparing his two-hour lectures, so I looked around for friends. The students tended to ignore me. If I said “hello” to someone in the corridor, I might not get even a glance, probably because I represented Authority, as a Tutor, and they’d had enough of Authority at school! I also encountered the Tall Poppy syndrome and found it very odd. But all things change, and over time, I got used to students, and they got used to me.
I also found the language, its idioms and pronunciation both intriguing and confusing. In shops, I would stand waiting to be served, and waiting, and waiting, until finally the assistant would look up and say to me, in a slightly challengingly voice, “You right?” I learn that in Australia, you say what you want, are more direct, “equal”.
At parties in the 80s, men and women separated into two groups; the men spoke of sport and the women of domestic matters. In the presence of men, women did not speak up. I missed the exchange of views, shared jokes between men and women, but if I made a joke, it always fell flat. This was not what I was used to!
Yet another shock on arrival was driving through the suburb of Mascot, at that time rather rundown and shabby – a far cry from the wealthy and exotic Australia I had imagined.
Finding paid work was difficult. I was told I needed new qualifications to teach – all my experience in England was discounted. That annoyed me; I wasn’t prepared to go through the process of re-qualifying.
Next, I offered my services to travel agencies as a tour organiser. It was clear that I did not embody the desired image. All the employer asked was: What were my shorthand and typing speeds? – I had neither.
So, I began volunteer work with UNICEF. Here I finally met people on the same wavelength. And life became better, but it took time.
Mourners at a temple in Tokyo, taken at Prasanta’s funeral.
In 1986, tragedy struck our family. At the age of 29, our son Prasanta, who lived in Japan and, very unusually, had just been offered a permanent position on the staff at Toshiba Medical Engineering, was killed in a motorbike crash.
It came like a bolt out of the blue; I could not grasp it! Gour was entirely lost – He drove aimlessly around our neighbourhood. Not knowing where he was or what he was doing, he drove through a red light.
Gour and I flew to Japan to arrange Prasanta’s funeral. I was fearful of what I would see when I saw him, wondering if it would be just a body with a label tied to it, but his face was peaceful, though damaged, and the Japanese sense of beauty and their reverence in the face of death were calming, perfect. And when I saw him there, his death became a reality.
Prasanta’s friends gathered around us with welcoming graciousness. Together, we arranged a Japanese funeral. The customs, which involve specific rituals such as chanting, were spiritually uplifting; the acceptance of death, moving and cathartic. That experience became part of me. I understood Prasanta was where he wanted to be – in Japan. And I was overcome with enormous gratitude that his life had been a full one.
On our return to Sydney, I began learning Japanese at university. It gave me a feeling of connection to Prasanta. I also took up painting; this, too, was a timely gift, which helped me regain possession of my life.
One afternoon in the late 1990s, I attended a show by the Older Women’s Network Theatre Group. It was alive with energy. It excited me, and I knew this was what I wanted to become part of. Shortly after this, I joined the group and took part in performing. The experience of “becoming another person” was totally immersive – it suited me perfectly. I rediscovered my childhood joy of performing for a live audience.
From the Theatre Group, I joined OWN itself and became involved in activities, including being on committees. It gave me new confidence; I found my voice.
I sat with him while his breathing became slower. And then it stopped. The reality of his death was impossible to encompass until it had happened.
In 2023, Gour was diagnosed with leukemia. He wanted to remain at home, so we set up a hospital bed in the spare room of our Coogee flat. He became increasingly ill, losing strength day by day. One by one, Gour had to give up things – walking from our flat to Coogee beach, attending our small vegetable garden. The last time he went to the garden, he had to be carried. At the end, after three months of decline, I sat with him while his breathing became slower. And then it stopped. The reality of his death was impossible to encompass until it had happened.
Close on the heels of Gour’s death, I moved from our unit in Coogee to Independent Living in Leichhardt. I sold the unit we had shared for over twenty years. It was physically exhausting, let alone emotionally. Looking back, the hardest thing was that I had barely time to mourn my loss; there was just so much to be done.
Here in the retirement village, my apartment is open, spacious and secure. The sun comes in at my big windows, and the views are great. But it is lonely and silent.
Living alone has both pluses and minuses. I am in charge; make my own decisions; eat when I feel like it, and not by the clock. But it’s an isolating business, especially after almost seventy years of married life. There is no one to talk to. I miss the companionship, the chats about this and that, the discussion of the news – usually dreadful on TV bulletins – though in fact Gour had increasing aphasia for the last two years of his life, and any conversation had become difficult. I just miss his physical presence. There are no hugs, no quick smiles in passing; I am just here on my own. It’s a kind of ache.
Surprisingly perhaps, I find the sound of planes flying so close over the building as to be momentarily deafening, something to be thankful for, diminishing sounds, signs of life.
I watch a lot more TV than I used to. I read too, and write, and try not to go to bed too late. Having something to do is important, and I am trying to get familiar with acrylics to begin painting again. The walk to shopping centres with my walker gives me exercise, as does hydrotherapy in the pool here, and I keep in touch with friends and look forward to visits from my daughters, who live overseas. It nevertheless remains a very quiet existence.
In 2024, I travelled to England to celebrate my 90th birthday. Shortly after my arrival, I was woken by a tightness in my chest – a heart attack. I called an ambulance and somehow managed to open the snib on the door for the paramedics. I remained in hospital for 11 days, followed by a four-week recovery in residential care.
Finally, my 90th birthday celebrations! We got together for a magnificent family lunch party, which included my grandson, who flew in from Sydney that morning. It was June, and the roses in the superb garden of our Oxfordshire hotel were in full bloom.
On my return, I flew to the US with my eldest daughter to see my sister in Maryland, and after that, we took the train together to New York. Anita spent a couple of days exploring New York in the heat, while I boarded the cruise ship that would take me back to Sydney, thirty-six days at sea, seeing the Panama Canal, the coast of South America, past Pitcairn to Tahiti, then Auckland and finally we tied up almost alongside the Opera House itself.
Because I now use a walker and my balance is poor, I’m not up to public performance. So I retired from the OWN Theatre Group but remain associated with OWN activities. Most recently, I played a role in a dramatised scene in one of OWN’s training videos.
I also attend a weekly drama workshop at the Summer Hill Community Centre. We practise improvisation and are currently workshopping a new play written by one of our members. I also attend a monthly memoir writing group with others in this retirement building
I’m not particularly interested in domestic matters. Gour and I always shared the cooking, but I do cook myself simple meals.
I’m getting too old to do a lot of things, and that’s annoying. Apart from needing a walker or stick for my deteriorating balance, I have less energy. My hearing is appalling, even with hearing aids! I’m not in pain – though there are a few pains: arthritis in my right knee, and in my middle finger, which really hurts and makes doing up buttons an annoyance. Back to being three years old again!
“Get on with it” is my motto. It doesn’t always work. Sometimes I think, “What’s the point?” But that’s fleeting. Despite my age, I still ask myself, ”What next?”
I’d like to go back to England one more time, but I probably won’t. There are impediments – travel insurance for one thing.
Airports! Time zones and differing seasons. So I sit here, enjoying the sunshine. And the view.
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We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which we work and live, and we pay our respects to Elders past and present.
We acknowledge the sorrow of the Stolen Generations and the impacts of colonisation on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
OWN NSW supports the Uluru Statement from the Heart, the call for a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Australian Constitution and a Makarrata Commission to oversee agreement-making and truth-telling.