Thanks Note - Jack to his children - 11th Jan.2013

Jack's adventure of his flight back to Canada from London

Hi all,

I thought that I should write back and thank all of you for a wonderful holiday full of activity and surprises. When were planning on coming for Christmas I thought this is a bad idea as the flights should be always full but with guidance from God above we did move and it has all worked out very well. When we were leaving we did not get on the first flight but got comfortable seats together on the second and all was well. On the return journey when I went to check in they could not find the booking. So after going to three different counters they finally managed to retrieve the booking. My U had looked like a 4- moral make sure that booking references are written very clearly and precisely. So that done, I got on the standby list and waited patiently and anxiously as the list became shorter on the display board in the Staff Waiting area. I was finally called as the last standby passenger to go to the Red Desk. Oh Oh I said to myself this does not sound good as the others were all directed to the Blue Desk. When I got there they said I had not said I would take a jump seat so if you want one run to the Blue Desk. I said great I will take it and almost as the boarding pass was printed and my bag was being tagged they receive a call to say HOLD. “I am sorry” she says “they have found 2 broken seats on the plane so they have to move people around your seat is to be allocated to the one before you and you will need to wait for the next flight”.

So back I went to wait for the next flight 4 hours later. I made myself comfortable on the hard airport seats with my feet on the bags and got 2 hours of sleep, had a bit of lunch and then with great hope went back to the Staff Standby area. I was 2^nd on the list. “ACCEPTED GO TO BLUE DESK” flashed up. Thank you lord I said. At the desk they checked the bag and said you will get the seat at the gate. So far so good so I went in and made my way to the boarding gate and waited patiently till the boarding was completed. The wait was rewarded with a Club World seat. Praise the Lord he is so good and wonderful and gives what we need.

As I sipped the Taittinger Champagne I thought about you Maryann the champs connoisseur, the Crayfish butternut squash and cucumber timbale starter and cheese board of Barber’s cheddar and Cropwell Bishop Stilton were dedicated to you John and the Hereford fillet of beef with béarnaise sauce was dedicated to you my love. A wash down with a tot of Otard VSOP Cognac completed the BA offering of all the natural tastes of sweet, salty, bitter, sour and Umami the fifth taste as I savoured every mouthful thinking of you all with no one to say I was making crunching noises as my neighbour slept with headphones over his flat cap right through.

On the whole the experience was great.

Love dad.

Happy New Year - 2013

Christmas in London with our children, Happy New Year 2013 and Mel's Surprised 60th Birthday Party

Dear All

Hope you all have had a good Christmas, a good start to New Year.  For those who did not receive any Greetings from me at all I am sorry. I had every intention but flying to UK for Christmas and New Year and not having easy access to a PC  and phones sort of threw me off balance, but you are remembered  very fondly all through the year and in my prayers.

Well I think this email should actually be all about China but that was one job I gave Jack to do so good justice could be done to our holiday and to the new group of fun loving  people that we met.

I will brief you roughly.  It was a 14 days trip starting from Vancouver, Beijing, Shanghai - just like New York, Wenzhou, Hangzhou where one of my Chinese student drove 5 hrs with his wife and 4year old son to meet us and gave us a wonderful night out.  Then we went Xian - the famous Terracotta Army and this was amazing.  You got to see to believe it.  Here too our two lovely Chinese students Bebe and Tina came to see us with gifts and took us for lunch.  Our last stop was Beijing was Beijing - the Great Wall of China and YES I climbed and walked a fair bit of the wall in temperature of -5C and wind chill of -11C and enjoyed every bit of it.  On the way back in Vancouver we went sightseeing and visited Victoria Island.  I would love to go there in the summer.  We got to see our lovely friends after nearly 20 years and they gave us a wonderful time.

Back in Canada, Advent season was busy in the church and we love our Spiritual life.  We also went as family and friends to see a Nativity play and a Walk to Bethlehem an outdoor experience of the Nativity journey. There were many children.  It pleased me that parents and grand parents were doing a good job of raising the children in letting them know about the story of Jesus birth. The other play was indoors and that was fantastic.  Before we flew on 20 Dec we met our family and then with our Friday Prayer Group we had the end of year prayer and Carols party at our house. Jack and I were so Blessed with so many people plus the Priest and the food - I cannot even describe it.  

In UK, we cannot even describe to you the welcome and warm hospitality we received every single day of our stay from the 21st Dec to the 6th January.  The Parish people who I call my family was great.  On the 23rd we met with Theresa, had lunch with her and then picked Fiammetta to go to London to watch Kiss Me Kate and here John gave us all the attention we ended the day meeting Maryann and John for chat and dinner.  I stayed with the Pereira Family and they even had us over after Christmas Mass for drinks and nibbles.  CHRISTMAS DAY with our God child and family was fun.  John and Maryann and Buom did the cooking and the rest helped in setting the table.  Maryann and John came up with some games.  It was a lovely day.

Our main base was Manjit and Surinder and family in Greenford.  They were just marvellous.  Boxing day was spent with Mike, Karen and family and there were lunches and dinners with Heike/family, Zach/Ozy, during the week. A 2nd Christmas lunch was with Manjit and family so we could all be together.  Maryann, John organised the shopping and the menu and every one helped in peeling, setting and clearing.  It was a real success with 16 of us on the dinner table. Daughters/Holland’s made time to go out with us, New Year was brought in at the Hutch residence watching the brilliant London fireworks. New Years Mass at John Bosco was a golden opportunity to meet many more people. Visited 3 of our senior couples  who are in their 80’s friends of  35 years who are like our family and what a joy it was to have tea and cakes with them. New Years lunch was at Beena's home.  That night we slept at Beena’s.  On the 2nd visited Nkem and it was joy to be with them.  That afternoon Fiammetta took us out for lunch to say Thank you.  It was indeed fantastic. Then before going off to London to be with Manjit and all we visited our dear Italian friends Paola and Luigi.  What a joyful welcome.  By the way some of these visits were impropto meaning visiting without telling them.  Now a days people are so particular about wanting notice etc that they do not realise life is short and events and death waits for no one.  On two occassions we visited people unannouned and they were not in but when they came to know about it we were not told Oh you should have phoned but in fact encouraged us to try again as we could not give them dates or time as we were fully booked up.  Ann-Marie/Nigel/Robert cooked a yummy roast pork with cracklings that John was fortunate to join us for. On the 3rd Jan I visited Margaret from my job at The Abbey School and it was nice to have tea, cakes etc plus meet little Felix and his mom Angelica as we used to work together. Thank you dear and thanks Margaret another one of those sudden visits.  That same evening at 7.30pm My Mother's Prayer Group had a girls party for me , it was all ladies, lovely ladies and got the cake and champagne out for me for my 60th Birthday which was on the 4th Jan.  We had a real blast, and it will keep me going with your love, support and friendship till I meet you all again.

On the 4th my big day 60th which I have been waiting for so long finally arrived and there was no big deal or fuss made.  Well I just prayed for patience and to let me go with the flow.  My friends Manjit, Surender and all the other friends did not really make any effort to wish me, I thought that was odd and said well may be time has changed.  Then in the afternoon things started to happen. We met Maryann and John, they took us to St. Pancreas for High Tea that was yummy and then Jack drove to Norwich to a Spa hotel.  It was a very relaxing night followed by a sumptuous breakfast, back massage and pedicure, while Jack had a massage and sauna. So I am now 60. On the 5th afternoon we drove 3 hours from Norwich to Reading visited Sr Joseph for tea and then to our former Home Prayer Group at John Allinson's home where our fellow prayer partners met to pray and give thanks and praise.  John's wife Isobelle did a high tea with lots of baking and yummy sandwiches.  We are so really Blessed.  We thank John and Isobelle for hosting and giving us a wonderful time and for everyone to give up their Saturday to be with us - it is called true Love andWE THANK AND PRAISE GOD FOR HIS ENDLESS LOVE FOR US.

In the evening we were invited to Jack's nephew Alex/Khusboo's home and they had a lovely spread of Indian home cooking plus we opened the Champagne bottle that the Mother's Prayer Group gave - thanks to them too.  Still I was not fully satisfied – “ if I was living in UK I would have had a big party to bring on my so long waited 60th Birthday” I said many times but was ignored by everyone I met. After dinner we went to Manjit’s for the night and John and Maryann to their places. So now comes the 6th Jan being Sunday and also ‘Holy Family’ day and also our 36^th Wedding anniversary . I was wishing to go for Mass together as a family but they said they had their own plans. So Jack and I went for Mass and next I see John come into the church to take us to another church.  What a joy it was to have our children and also Alex.  I enjoyed the Mass very much.  Then we all separated - John was working and Maryann was studying they said and they would meet us later for lunch with Manjit and Surinder to celebrate.  Beena rings me to say can we meet and I told Jack what a shame they could not organise getting just a few friends together but what did he do.... he told Beena to have their lunch with her family and that we would have our lunch and may be hopefully meet up in the evening.  I told him he was very rude to say that considering we are nearly like family.  Anyway did a bit of shopping, managed to get a watch for me and back to Manjit's home.

We left at 1 noon to go for lunch with Manjit and Surinder and the restaurant front door says closed - I said LUMBINI restaurant is closed so may be there will be another restaurant round the corner opened, what a fiasco for our Wedding Anniversary.  Never mind we went round and this gentleman apologised and took us inside.  As we walked in the lights went on and there in the other room were about 40 people singing Happy Birthday. I started to cry because my good friends managed to keep the secret for me to give me this wonderful surprise.  Thanks to them and a big thank you goes to Maryann and John for getting my friends inspite of her having exams.  There are some that were not invited not because you are not special but because I did not have my home to host it.  Thanks for all the gifts and the money donated for the BETHANY Society children in Meghalaya. It was a great party.

Sadly all good holidays must end. Jack left the next day for Toronto and I for Singapore en-route for Melbourne.

Normally I would ask Manjit to just drop me at the terminal and I would check in. You won't believe this but I went to terminal 5 and I told Surender  just  come with me inside and of course I was asking God to help me.  I punched my booking ref into the self check in and it says that my booking ref is not correct. Surinder then quickly asked one attendant who said you should be at Terminal 3 madam.  Manjit then rushed me to terminal 3.  It  is so different since I was last in there and the counter person helped me to tag along with Surender.  Next you know he gave me my boarding pass and told me to rush to gate 40, no duty free as it is a long  walk.  I walked and walked and I thought I was going to collapse but finally I reached panting and people asked if I was okay.  When I got into the aircraft I  was told to go  up. I had been upgraded to Club Class.  My companion was Nigerian.  I chatted , slept, ate and watched movies and finally as we left  he gave me his card and I looked at him and  he is a  Senator in the Nigerian Parliament .... and has invited us all to Abuja. He also happens to have a house in Ashford Kent.  What do you say to this?

My nephew Floyd and his lovely wife Cheryl is giving me a wonderful time.  Their 9 mth old baby Chloe is a gem and I am enjoying every bit of her.  I am going to miss her when I leave for Melbourne on Sunday the 13th Jan. night.

Keep in touch. 

X

Mel