“THE BAND OF DIMINISHING BROTHERS” - OTT’S REUNITED NEWSLETTER Spring 2008
“Never apologise, it’s a sign of weakness” or so said one of the regimental police L/Cpls at Queen Elizabeth’s Bks in 1963 – (and whom incidentally had more upside down stripes on his arm than he ever had the right way up.) I had started to prepare this newsletter in the Autumn of 2007 and have not been able to put it together until now because of the delay in finalising the dates for the next reunion. I know how important it is, if we are to keep the momentum built up by Ken Hannah and others going. I know that all of those members who have email receive the “Friday updates” but for those who do not, my apologise for the delay. I would like to begin with a bit of an “Editorial Comment”. The Band of Diminishing Brothers is just that, a band of serving and ex OTT’s who of their own free will desire to come together to meet up with old buddies, meet new people, remember and honour those who have passed on, to enjoy each others company and to lend a supporting hand to those who may need it from time to time. We have no rules, other than those conventions that govern good behaviour, no subscriptions and no committees. Perhaps my role as “Chairman” is a bit misleading; I am not a chairman in the conventional sense but more as a conjoint to bring elements together, if ever required. There has been some criticism that we are becoming an off shoot of the WOs & Joes or the retired Officers’ Club and that perhaps younger potential members has been put off. Let me put their minds at rest, we are a totally democratic group, we do not discriminate against age, sex, colour or religion and certainly not of rank. We are all serving or ex OTTs/ODAs/ODPs regular or TA and that is what joins us together not separate us. Ken Hannah was absolutely right to allow an open debate on our website. It is unfortunate that so far most attendees have been of the middle and old brigade, but that has not been for the want of trying to engage the younger elements. I am delighted that we have the ‘middle brigade’ (no offence intended gentlemen) involved in organising our next reunion.
Reunion 2009
The next reunion will be held at the Royal Court Hotel, Coventry over the weekend of 27 Feb – 1 Mar. The principle organisers will be Andy Foley and Dave Whitfield. Guest of honour will be Gen Jack Coull. An application form is enclosed (for those on the postal list). Reservations can also be made by phone or email - once completed forward to the hotel and inform either Andy, Dave, Ken or myself asap so that we can keep track of who is attending including partners names. For your information there are only three disabled rooms and seven single rooms so book early if you require these. We are seeking sponsorship to off set the cost of pre-dinner drinks, wine with meal, transport to the station if required, a coach for the Sunday activity if necessary and the General & Mrs Coull’s meal/accommodation. One member who does not wish to be named has kindly started the ball rolling with a pledge of £500. If you know anyone who is willing to sponsor the event (named or anonymous) please let Ken or myself know. (Hotel/booking details on the reunion page of the website).
Website OTT Reunion.com
I think that all who has seen it will agree that it has got off to a fantastic start – thanks to the work and dedication of Ken Hannah, Danny Kennedy and Pete Hughes. We are looking at updating the site in the near future due to the limited capacity of the current provider. I would encourage all of you to contribute both on serious and light hearted topics.
We are particularly keen to get more photos on the site, any topic any era. If you have digital photos please contact Pete. If you have prints please contact Ken. Contact details at the end of this newsletter. All photos will be returned if requested.
If you are aware of any job opportunities please let us know any we will circulate. If you are seeking employment have a look at what is on the site. I would like to point out and personally thank Jake Marlee for his tireless efforts to keep the “message pages” informed and entertained. - I will buy you a beer Jake – I promise. Oh! alright and you too Phil.
Database
As we go to print we have 187 members - 166 retired, 17 serving and four associate. Of the 187, 19 are only contactable by post. If you are one of the 19 please let Ken know if you now have an email address - all non respondents will be classed as ‘lost’ until confirmed. If you change contact details please let us know asap. Please have a look at the ‘Where are they now’ page on the website – if you can help locate the ‘missing’ please let Ken know. (copy of database attached for mail users).
I would also like to thank Ken Hudson for his assistance in tracking down ‘lost souls’ and maintaining a duplicate dbase in case of loss.
In memoriam
I never served with John Hemmings and only had the pleasure of meeting him through the Brotherhood. John was instantly likeable and I now know from all of the comments and anecdotes I have been told, he was not only greatly respected as an OTT but as a ‘gentle’ gentleman. John was not only loved by his wife and family but by all who had been fortunate enough to have known him. RIP John.
Geoff (Dix) Dean was very well known to me – I served with Dix at 9 Coy RAMC Colchester – he was an amazing young man, he was very bright indeed, had the most off the wall humour and could have co-written with Spike Milligan – he was a very quiet man in many ways and hid his light under a bushel – as many truly brave men do – I knew he wore “Para Wings” earned whilst serving with the Royal Sigs I think, but it was not until I saw him at home just before he died and after a gap of over 30 years, that I found out he had been mentioned in dispatches. I know that the whole gang from 9 coy will miss him greatly, Marlee, Campbell, Davies, Clerk Henderson, Bossingham, Henry and Ma Pringle to name a few. RIP in room 6a Dix mate.
George Henderson past away in April after a long illness. Geordie Fairlamb wrote ‘He was only a young lad in his late 30s he left the army around 2004 - a great bloke who represented everything that Military OTT's stood for....loved a drink...cracking sense of humour and a conscientious and hard worker. I for one am going to miss his irascible Scottish wit and sense of fun. RIP George’.
Condolence cards have been sent to the families on behalf of the group. Those who have passed away have been recorded on the website. Please let us know of any colleague who has passed away so that we can record there names.
Humour in Uniform
Do any of you remember when for the first time ID bands for patients came in? I was in Cyprus at the time. It came about to prevent a spate of wrong operations on the wrong patient. Anaesthetist was told to check the band, the notes and confer with a 3rd person. The pretty young QA was holding a young child in her arms in the gas room – the child was due to have a myringotomy – Lt.Col Ollivere remembered he had a new process, so checked the notes, checked the ID band and turned to Paddy Mooney (OTT) and said in his thick Irish brogue. “What ear is it Mooney”? “1967 Sur” – “Get out you stupid idiot!”
Letter form our man Mik in China – unedited edition.
Here in Dalian the sun is shining and the sky is blue. Towards the city across the harbour is a wee bit murky, due to the smoke from the industrial area between us and the harbour. These are due to be demolished in the near future, as new complexes have been built in an area which does not cover the city centre in smog when the steel mills discharge their pollutants.
Yesterday here was Tomb Sweeping Day. A strange term and the first Public Holiday of the Chinese Year. It is the day that families go and clean up the graves of their ancestors, plant flowers and burn paper 'funny' money to honour those ancestors. What a change from the UK, where most have no idea who or where their ancestors are, or for that matter care. A scathing comment perhaps, but roundly earned by our present day society. Confucius said 2,500 years ago "The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home" Now it was then and nothing has changed, it is true today. The west seems hell bent on introducing "Human Rights and Democracy" to China. I can assure you that the vast majority of sane thinking Chinese (and there are more than you think) don't want a bar of what the west calls democracy. A British judge has today railed against the "Meltdown of Society and the Family". A vain bleat in the UK's bland, grey and mediocre PC climate of today. Here in China, I see with my own eyes and make my own judgements. I see smartly clad school children being escorted to school by parents or grandparents, aunts or uncles. Smartly attired in their natty blue and white tracksuit school uniforms (note, not red, blue and white!). Education is the religion of the China of today. Schools are immaculate and well kept. Every morning 15 minutes PT for students, to wake them up prior to classes commencing. Those who believe the majority of the dross that passes as journalistic truth in UK, probably still believe in the tooth fairy! They are not teaching communist dogma and haven't for decades. They are teaching skills necessary for the future of China, Sciences, multi-Languages, International Tourism, International Finance....etc.
In this 'repressive' society under the CCP 'oppressive' oligarchy, Chinese people can walk the streets in a safe environment unknown in UK. Criminals receive sentences commensurate with their crimes. All Chinese people want to do, is get on with their lives and their quest to 'better themselves'. To the Chinese, Tibet is an integral part of China and always will be. The totally repressive theocratic serfdom which was Buddhist Tibet will remain a part of China. The Dalai Lama has stated categorically that he wants more autonomy for Tibet within China, not separation from it! Now the Chinese have a neat saying "If the Emperor is not worried about it, why should the Eunuchs worry?"
56 different nationalities comprise the nation you call China. Most live in complete harmony with one another. That all don't is perhaps understandable, how many family members in a family of, say six, agree with one another? The Muslim Uighur in the western province of Xinjiang are beginning to sense that they can claim to be East Turkistan, in a part of the country which has never been anything but Chinese, ever. Perhaps they see the dithering over Palestine as a role model for them to push a claim which has no foundation. The term Turkistan, by the way was used as a convenience by a Russian in the 20th Century. There never was or has been a Turkistan, never. There will be many in the west with Sino-phobia (as opposed to the rampant US phobia practiced by many in UK) will support such a push. Never mind the legality of such a claim; "never did like those Chinese" will carry the day no doubt.
Here the buses and trains are clean, inexpensive and run on time! On Thursday Heather and I took a trip to the far end of the LRT (Light rail line) to Golden Pebble Beach to conduct a recce prior to my daughter Rachel visiting here in the near future. We are trying to work out a flexible itinerary for her visit. In the rush hour the (about 50kilometres)trip took about 42 minutes (including 11 stops).We had to stand for about the first 15minutes, then had seats there and back. Even when sardine packed, without the sauce or oil, it is not odious at all. Air-conditioned and clean, cleaned at the end of each single journey. On the way back some Australian women got on. Probably working at one of the International firms operating here or one of the International schools, of which there are several. The most notable being the Maple Leaf Canadian schools complexes, which have been here for the passed 6 years at least (That I can vouch for)....and they are teaching what?
Anyway the trip was uneventful. Arriving at Golden Pebble Beach we passed through a huge complex called "Yosemite" (after the US Nature Park presumably).The area is a huge sea-side resort, with modern looking fun-fair entertainment. There are other attractions too. The Tourist Centre was modern, airy and spotless .We were greeted by two uniformed (like cabin crew on a good airline) ladies. As it was 'out of season' the place was almost empty. We were given an overview of the area. One of the charming almost childish ladies talked to me in broken English, and reverted to Chinese after finding out I could speak 'yidianr' Chinese. We jumped on a small No1 Bus and for the princely sum of 1yuan (about a 14th of 1GBP) each we were driven around the area. We got out at the Rock Garden, a fascinating geological plethora of unusual natural rock formations. That will be on the itinerary. Then we walked to the sea. The views were lovely and the bracing sea air was arriving in 'big lumps', i.e., the onshore breeze was strong and chilly. Digression being the better part of valour we caught the bus (which runs around the whole circuit on a regular and during the season frequent basis) back to the LRT. We didn't explore further, to do so would spoil for me anyway the novelty of seeing it operating at full bore! Still to look forward to for me, is the two (one world class according to a magazine comment by an American golfer who visited and played here) Golf Courses and driving ranges. The myth of China being a khaki clad/blue Chairman Mao suited beige country of oppression is just that, a myth. Like any country there are the rich and the poor. There is also opportunity to become rich. It all doesn't just depend on 'the party’; it depends on education, drive and the will to succeed. Beggars on the streets here? Sure, but most of them are richer by far than you or I. The authorities give them tickets to go back to their villages, but they don't want them. Everyone here has an aim, a direction, and it has nothing to do with communism (other than that being the career path they choose to succeed). It has to do with the will to better the lot of them and their families. Heather's Grandfather was a truck driver; he lives in a house on its own grounds, with two small one roomed 'gate-house' flats at the front. The house itself is HUGE! With enough large rooms to accommodate a very large family. The area is called Mian Hua Dao, Cotton Island (actually a peninsula) where many 'millionaires' live. He is not a rich man or anything like it. He has a small van (which he drives like Michael Schumacher) which he 'hires with himself' to pick up and deliver, i.e. like a mini cab. A retired truck driver who has prospered through something, many in the UK have forgotten ever existed, hard work. Not party affiliations, graft etc, just plain, honest hard work.
Well the lovely Heather has just arrived back so it is time to call a halt to this diatribe. Suffice it to say UK or China? No contest. Believe the mind numbing garbage you call news, view the gag-producing programmes they call Television, (would think that John Logie Baird is spinning in his grave) be subjected to feral binge drinking youths, drug soaked single parent producers of the next generation, criminals who openly give the finger to the law, Councils who 'rape' the taxpayers, Police who chase motorists instead of real criminals, introduced ethnic communities who change things to suit everyone but the original inhabitants, PC gagging by left wing, Liberal, hanky-wringers, who have succeeded where Phillip of Spain, Napoleon, the Kaiser and Hitler failed. The joys of being British? Proud to be British? Embarrassed would be more accurate. Put your own houses in order before you pontificate on that of others. Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, a living testimony to the fall of values in the UK. A real role model for the inhabitants, and the UK Government led by a control freak countryman of mine, makes the Chinese Government look GOOD by comparison. Mik the Lao shu bao, Dalian China. Lunch today: Chicken wings, rice, and beautiful kumara.
Contact details:
Les: lesjanviner@toucansurf.com
Tel 01507 605632
Ken: ken.hannah@peterborough.gov.uk
Tel: 01354 660636
Pete: dodgerhughes@hotmail.com
0151 4248187
Andy: andy.foley@finsbury.org.uk
01372 360830
Dave: Dwhitfield@wmt-emea.com
Tel: 07973210817