Early Years in Birmingham
EARLY YEARS IN BIRMINGHAM
My father went to work in Birmingham as a motor mechanic shortly after the end of the war and my mother and I followed about nine months later, early in 1946. My parents rented a room in a large house owned by a very pleasant Indian couple and they were the only married tenants. The other people living there were all young single women, war refugees from various parts of Europe, who all took a liking to me. Well, I was only three years old - and cute at the time. Unfortunately, I have never been so successful with women again! Living in such a multilingual society, I was soon able to speak and recite nursery rhymes in French, German, Polish and Hungarian as well as English. However, my language skills quickly vanished when we left that house towards the end of 1946.
Our house was quite large but had only two rooms downstairs with a kitchen down three steps in the back extension and three bedrooms upstairs. It had no insulation or draught-proofing and the ceilings were high, so it was very hard to keep warm. The only heating was from a fireplace in each of the two downstairs rooms and a small basket fireplace in my bedroom.
One of the joys of childhood was when it was cold enough (that is well below freezing), or I was ill, to have the fire lit in my bedroom and I remember lying in bed in the dark looking at the flames and shadows flickering into magical shapes which always seemed so much better than the shapes you could see around you in the daylight world. Shapes like pirate ships, doors opening on to enchanted lands, even monsters. You could always get rid of these last by hiding under the bedclothes for a while but you would still check under the bed, just in case one was lurking there, maybe behind the chamber pot or “guzunder”, (so called because it “goes under” the bed), to grab the legs of an unwary six or seven year old. However, you had a good chance of escaping if you took a long stride or jump on to the floor when you got out of bed so that the monster(s) could not grip your ankles, since they did not move very quickly or far from the darkness under the bed.
