Snapshot: Finding our lovely Cousin Nellie
I always knew that my great-uncle Cecil Daniel had lived most of his life in east Asia, and had settled at Kobe in Japan in the 1890s, where he married a Japanese woman. But that was all my family knew.
However, in 1965 I was serving in HMS Victorious, an aircraft carrier, when she visited Kobe. Visiting navy ships always throw a drinks party on arrival at a foreign port, for expats and local dignitaries, and on this occasion I sought out the consul general, one of our guests, wondering if he knew anyone by the name of Daniel. "Oh yes," he replied, "come and meet Miss Daniel. She's my No 2 at the Consulate General." He took me to meet an elderly lady of somewhat Japanese appearance. I asked her if she knew of a Cecil Daniel and she said, "Of course. He was my father."
There was a stunned silence on both sides, though not for long. It was an amazing moment: both were as surprised as the other. I didn't know she existed; she didn't know I existed. She was of course my mother's first cousin, and my cousin too.
She told me that she and her mother had been interned by the Japanese during the war, due to their relationship to Cecil, who had remained a British citizen until he died.
Nellie and I spent much time together before the ship sailed, and she was fun and strong willed, and made me swallow a live prawn in a sushi bar lest she might lose face. She also took me to the European cemetery, and poured a whole bottle of Gordon's gin over the grave of a retired, but thirsty, Royal Navy commander whom she had befriended.
Following our meeting, Cousin Nellie retired from the consular service with an MBE and came to live in England, where she travelled extensively meeting members of her long lost family. She lived with us for a while, then bought a flat in Bognor Regis and eventually, in her 80s, moved to a retirement home nearby.
She seemed fit and well, but one day after lunch she went around the other residents to say goodbye. They assumed she was leaving the home to live elsewhere, but following those farewells, Cousin Nellie went to her room, closed the door, lay down on her bed and died.
Charles Giles
Playlist: Young dreams played out in Africa
Oh Very Young by Cat Stevens
"And though your dreams may toss and turn you now / They will vanish away like your dad's best jeans / Denim blue fading up to the sky"
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It was my leftie friend Teresa who introduced me to Cat Stevens. We were student nurses in the mid-80s living in a Victorian nurses home – all sash windows, high ceilings and cockroaches scuttling across the kitchens. We'd spend many a Saturday at Portobello market buying up long ethnic skirts and then evenings, with joss sticks and vegetable curry singing along to Cat Stevens.
This song reminds me of how young we were – only 19 and both dreaming of how we could change the world, and yet acting like world-weary grownups in the thick of reality on the wards.
During our time in London we watched newborn Prince Harry in his mum's arms on the steps of our maternity unit. I was a royalist, only three years before having waved the wedding flags for Charles and Di. I naively thought then that happy endings would last forever, but Teresa, like Cat Stevens, knew they didn't. One of the student nurses in our group was tragically killed in a road accident, which stunned us – saying farewell to Louise at the hospital chapel memorial service shocked us in its finality.
But some dreams came true – a few of us had joined the anti-apartheid movement and demonstrated outside the South African embassy for Nelson Mandela's release. After decades of waiting, it finally happened – we thought his imprisonment would last for ever, but it didn't.
I now live and work in Tanzania, East Africa, with my husband Tony and when he (not a fan) is out of earshot, I dig out my CD and ramp up the volume. Even now, when I hear Oh Very Young, it conjures up the smell of sandalwood incense and Teresa's epic friendship, making me feel our youthful dreams are still very much alive.
Cath Swanson
We love to eat: Nana's Full-up (Flop) cake
Ingredients
100g chocolate, plain or milk (melted)
100g butter
125g digestive biscuits (broken into raisin-size pieces)
1 medium egg
10g cherries, chopped
40g raisins or sultanas
10g chopped nuts (optional)
Grease a sponge tin well – an 18x4cm tin is fine. Melt chocolate in a Pyrex dish over some hot water on the hob. Melt butter in a pan or in microwave (full power for 30 seconds). Whisk egg in a bowl then slowly add butter and mix, then slowly add chocolate and mix. Add broken biscuits, fruit, nuts and cherries and mix well.
Spoon into tin (it should be fairly solid and need scraping off the spoon; if too runny, add biscuit). Put in fridge for at least three hours – ideally overnight. Slice into small pieces or it will go in seconds.
This is our three-generational family birthday cake – see my photograph above. Mum has made it every year for my sisters and me (yes, even at 46 I still get a cake) and her grandchildren. It is a variation on her mum's Belgium fridge cake recipe from 1957, which her mother made for her birthday.
It got the name Full-up cake – pronounced Flop cake – when Mum misread the recipe instructions to break the biscuit into raisin-size pieces and put both biscuit and raisins into the mix instead. It was wonderful but very filling. Each of us has a slightly different variation. I like it made with plain chocolate; my sister prefers it without nuts.
Dear Mum manages to remember each of our preferences. It is like a hug from her on our special day.
Vikki Robins
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