It's early 1972 and Mama, Papa, Sis and I are now living in a town called Brentwood, not far from a big city called London. Two years will have soon elapsed since we bid farewell to our beautiful Island home of Tenerife to begin a new life here in England (see post Toast And Television). One of the lifelines connecting us to this new world opening out before us is The Television. Occupying pride of place in the centre of the living room, we all love our black and white television set and from it learn copious amounts of English. Everyone has their list of favourite shows and for Mama it will be the soap operas; Crossroads, Emmerdale, and Coronation street. She is already beginning to evolve her fascination for predictable story lines along with an inability to separate fact from fiction. Papa's own interests will lie elsewhere. His favourite program will be called The News and when he is not working, he will religiously tune in on the hour to the news; at six o'clock, nine o'clock, ten o'clock, in fact any o'clock. If The News is on the television, then Papa will watch it.
For Sis and I, it is the children's programmes which will captivate us; Jackanory, Blue Peter, and Magpie. As Sis and I grow older, we will include Top of the Pops as another of our must-see television programs, and along with it will come the big names of pop music of the seventies; The Osmonds, Sweet, Slade, Gary Glitter,and Mud are amongst many of the names that will greet us as we sit down together on Thursday evening. But for the moment, this is a faraway dream for we are still aged only eight and three. For now, in the evenings we will all huddle around this wonderful transmitter of Anglo-Saxon culture and watch comedies such as Love Thy Neighbour and Mind Your Language, taking our cue from the taped laughter on the soundtrack and laugh when the audience laugh. Even if we don't always understand what is said we still laugh along with everyone else. The entertainment and English life that emanates along with it from our television is good.
Watching television has also taught Mama what the English feed their offspring. The advertisements are full of jolly children munching away at their cereals in the morning and that's what we now get for breakfast. Mama is at last happy she's getting it right, our days of mistakenly eating raw sausage on toast erroneously thinking it was pate are firmly over (see post Toast And Television). Our absolute favourite advert is one with cartoon cats sat round a table happily pouring cereal into their empty bowls. There they all are chattering away with one another, clearly this is the best cereal in the world and there's the box right in the middle of their cartoon table. It's the same cereal that we have in our cupboard and it's called Shreddies. Sis and I are having breakfast when this cartoon advert comes on and Mama is suddenly transfixed. She takes one look at the advert, another at the cereal box sitting on our table and is appalled, 'Dios mio, Good Lord not again,' Mama says to herself with a weary sigh, 'Now I've given the girls cat food!' And just as with the toast and paté, our cereal unexpectedly disappears never to be seen again.
I am now at Crescent Road Infants School and my teacher is a nice lady called Mrs Jones who is about Mama's age. Mrs Jones is friendly and always smiling, not so the Headmistress. Mrs Chapman is a stricter-looking older lady and we children are slightly in awe of her. Serious looking, she is always immaculately turned out with skirt suits and freshly coiffured silver hair. All this is topped off with reading glasses dangling from her neck around a silver chain. I am already eight and should really be at the nearby Junction Road Junior School with children of my own age, but I have been kept back a year at the Crescent Road Infant School and I guess it is because my English is still not at the level of other eight-year-olds. My new school is just on the other side of the road from our home at 51 Crescent Road, and if Mama looks out of her bedroom window from the upstairs floor she can see me at break time in the school playground. She says that it makes her feel content to see me playing happily with school friends just as I used to do so with my cousins in Tenerife. The playground is simply a large playing field next to the school building and dotted with a clump of trees in the far corner. One them is a majestic oak and especially enticing for climbing; many times I scale this tree and sit on its low gnarled branches, sometimes falling off and gently thudding onto the green carpet of grass below me. After dusting myself off I simply climb back on. Mama often watches my antics from her bedroom window and once I am home from school she tells me to be careful, I am precious to her.
My new English name is now Marie, Maria del Carmen has long ago vanished (see post A Girl Named Marie), and combined with my Spanish surnames I am now known as Marie Garrido Sanz. But this is soon shortened to Marie Sanz; the English do not seem to comprehend that a person can have two surnames instead of one and they simply skip the first one and use the one at the end. Big mistake, the end name is the Mama's surname, but the first one is the Papa's surname and the one that predominates. Sanz is then mis-spelt and I then become known as Marie Sang. Now, I don't really care about not having Papa's surname, nor about the misspelling, all truth be told I am ecstatic that at last I now have a completely English-sounding name. Armed with this fabulous new name and a bit of luck, no one will notice that I am not originally from here. My ecstasy is however short lived, because I soon take a school letter home with the name Marie Sang written on it and when Papa sees it he becomes incensed.
The following morning Papa accompanies me to school, marches straight into the class room alongside me and in his best broken English politely but firmly informs Mrs. Jones that he is Garrido and so are his daughters; change the name back and change it now, he tells her. Now, Papa is an imposing man that you do not want to mess around with and Mrs Jones quickly realises this, so in an instant Papa's surname is restored and I now become Marie Garrido. Oh well, at least I was English for a few days, I think to myself accepting with resignation this newest and final version of my name; Along with Papa's conversation with Mrs. Jones, the little Spanish girl named Maria del Carmen Garrido Sanz finally and irrevocably vanishes. Consigned to a past life that cannot be reconciled with this present one, she is now replaced by Marie Garrido, the name which will identify me for the rest of my time in England.
51 Crescent Road is lovely and cool in the summer, but summer soon gives way to autumn and this in turn gives way to the chill of the English winter. Our new home does not have central heating, and on particularly cold days Sis and I awake to a thin layer of frost covering the inside pane of the bedroom window. On weekend mornings when there is no school, we run to Mama's bed and the three of us snuggle in together. I notice that Mama has a huge unwieldly scar extending from her back and winding its way across to her stomach in a snake-like line. When I ask Mama where it came from she becomes serious and tells me that its nothing, covers herself up and immediately changes the topic of conversation. I am only a young child, but I comprehend that this huge line across Mama's back is no small thing. It will still take another thirty-six years before the cause of this scarring is revealed, and when we are made aware of its origins, the resulting shockwaves will unleash an emotional tsunami of epic proportions.
To be continued.........
Next post published on Sunday, 5th April : Peas And Poverty
Note: All written content is the intellectual property of this Author. Image material is drawn largely from Pixabay with some additions from private family archives.
