Well, I remember Jamaica, because I was born there innit, yeah. Back home, it’s fresh, fresh air. The sea, yeah the sea and the rivers, yeah, so, you know. It was fresh there, back home. I was happy. I was happy. But in 1961, my mother-in-law was here, so she sent for him, and then he sent for me.

Well, I thought it would be paradise, but it wasn’t. Laughs. Because when we come here, the English people, they don’t want no Black, no Irish and no dog. You see? And the Irish people, them and the Black people, them get along very well. See? And you couldn’t get a room from an English person. And those days you could leave your front door open, go all over the country and, and come back. But if you leave your bicycle outside, when you come, it gone.

Laughs. Yes, yes, yes. Yeah. So it wasn’t easy for us here and it was very cold. Every Christmas snow falls. Snow not falling now. Snow high up like this and no central heating in the building. Every weekend, the paraffin man come and call and say, ‘Paraffin!’ Everybody go, go get them paraffin to put, like, in the heater.

And it… the toilet, somebody said, ‘Was the toilet was outside?’ Yeah, it was all there. But you know, we still carry on.

When I come here, because I’m the Windrush generation, they come and build this country. Very few other nations was in this country when we come here. You come here and work hard, pay your insurance and pay your tax. And yet, my mother-in-law come here in 1956, three pound fifty a week. My old man come here ’59, seven pound a week. I come here 1961, five pound a week. Remember we have, you have to pay your rent, you have to buy food. You have to pay money for your bus fare if you go to work. That’s it. You see it wasn’t easy those days. If you have a child, you have to wash the baby nappy, light the paraffin heater and put them on a rack to dry. So that wasn’t paradise.

When I come here, it’s mostly factory job them did over here. Yes. I work a sweet factory. Tin factory in Bermondsey. Peek Freans. And my last job was the Old Bailey, cleaning, early morning. Have to leave Dalyell Road, four o’clock in the morning. I made new friends, I did not really have no family. I’ve got my mother-in -law and so on, you know, so we have to make friends, you know. You talk to people, you talk to them. And you meet them early morning, going to work on the same bus, so you get to know people.

I always love music, yeah. I love Bob Marley and all those Bob Marley songs. I love ‘Don’t Worry’ ‘cause I can sing it as well. I sing it, I go out on stage and sing it. Laughs.

[Sings] ‘Don’t worry about a thing
Every little thing gonna be all right
Wake up this morning, in the shining sun
Three little birds
On my doorstep
Singing sweet song
Melodies pure and true
This is a message to you ooh, ooh, ooh.’

It’s good, yeah. I’ll sing anywhere, anywhere I go, I sing. People like it. I go out on stage and sing. I go in Windrush Square there every Wednesday at day centre and this other one, ‘Buffalo Soldier’, we used to it at the day centre.

[Sings] ‘Buffalo soldier, dreadlock Rasta
You should know your history
And where you’re coming from
Oh yo yo, yo yo yo yo
Yo yo yo, Buffalo soldier.’

Laughter and clapping.

Oh, oh dear me, yeah. Anytime I hear music, I have to dance. So. Every weekend, they have party. Yeah, they was good. You go there and you’d dance til daylight.

We used to call it ‘pushing’. And when I say to the young people, them say pushing, they say no shebeen. Me say I pushing. Because that’s the day I was happy. We go and dance and enjoy ourself. Every weekend you know you have somewhere to go.

I like reggae music. All those old-time music. I dance any music, jazz, anything, anything. Yeah, I dance it. I dance the young people, them off the floor. They can’t dance. Laughs. Yeah, they can’t dance. Instead, they wheel themselves and when I look at them out there, that is not dancing. So any time I’m dancing, they always watching my foot. Or want to come and dance with me because they can’t make the move the way I can make. I just dance. Oh, I was in Peckham dancing. This shop playing music. So I started to dance. A big crowd was there, nobody can walk on the pavement. Someone must have put it on TikTok. Yeah, I think TikTok, them put it on. And someone put it up and later on somebody say it’s gone viral. They say I’m TikTok star, so I feel good. Laughs. Oh that’s what I hear, people, I can’t walk on street, people know me. I walk out, every corner I turn, people recognize me. I the dancing granny.