“I’m a war baby. I was born in 1943 and we lived on the outer western suburbs of Sydney. At the time its was very rural. It was a hard life because it was during war times. It definitely shapes your perspective on life. My father was a primary producer so didn’t go to war but I can remember having bomb shelters. The school bus cost tuppence and my Mum was widowed. I recently found out there was no widows pension and she had a new born baby at the time so people were judging her as having a bastard child. She was severely affected by that which impacted on mine and my younger brothers raising. My mother married again to Stan who is my father. Mum was artistic and active and she was stuck out in whoop whoop with no license and no experience. It was a huge challenge for her.
I had a half hour walk to the steam train, then half hour train trip to school. I went to a domestic science school where I was basically being groomed for motherhood. That’s what they did for girls back then. We didn’t have money so there were no books at home. I did the leaving certificate but didn’t matriculate. The two occupations girls did when leaving that school were either teaching or nursing. The other group who were more academically focussed did shorthand and typing. I did cooking and sewing which I was expert at. Being a war baby people had no money so the sense of community was extremely strong. Everything was recycled. You had one good dress which was your Sunday best. People cared for each other. These are the things that impacted my values I guess.
I finished school and was too young to start my nursing so I got a job as a 16 year old looking after 5 children in Pymble. It was crazy. Those people really only saw their children for Sunday breakfast. The rest of the time was just me. My father was concerned for me because it was a huge responsibility. He used to put in a lot of miles in an old car to take me out for dinner one night a week and also insisted I came home to sleep in my own bed on Saturday nights.
I went on to do nursing. I trained at Prince Alfred Hospital and stayed in an 11 story Nurses home with one TV set. One family in our neighbourhood had a TV so we’d all go to that house or go to town and watch the TV through a shop window. My nursing training went for 4 years. We wore Victorian style clothes, black stockings, white aprons, stiff collars and cuffs which we weren’t allowed to work in but if anybody of any authority came on to the ward we’d have to pull our sleeves down and put the cuffs on and stand. Here we were nursing but if your apron got dirty you had to change. It was amazing. I can still remember my first patients names because hospitalisations were very long. You got to know them. The wards were huge and at night the men would snore and blow the curtains back and forth. Your peers became your colleagues. I still have those friendships.
I did Midwifery across the road at King George. It was challenging at the time but I started work in a small private hospital on the North Shore and got a flat with a close girlfriend. I loved working there but I was often left by myself and I was fairly new.
I had a large social group with male and female friends from University NSW. That group of friends was a real awakening for me. I’d certainly seen life’s good and bad in my work but beyond that my life experience was zilch. That group was instigated by a Viennese immigrant who brought all that European culture into my life. It was fabulous. Through that I met my husband Doug.
I was teaching at the children hospital as an unqualified teacher but as a qualified nurse and it was suggested I get my teaching qualifications so at the age of 27 I did just that. I married soon after and my husband got a job in Papua New Guinea. He went up there before Christmas. I was carrying our first child. He phoned me and said he loved it there and would I come? I thought, why not. I loved him dearly. I completed my pregnancy in Australia as a nurse at Balmain Hospital. After my eldest son was born, within 6 weeks we were up in PNG.
PNG ended up a 10 year excursion with 4 children. I worked at the hospital teaching. When I first arrived and only had one child I was getting bored so I went to see if I could volunteer as a teacher. They employed me immediately. You just had to roll with the punches because it was rough and ready. It was eye opening for me. The challenges were phenomenal. There was no running water in the wards so no hand washing. Malaria was rife and they wouldn’t admit anyone to hospital unless they had almost no haemoglobin. Often they were criticised for being lazy but they were just very weak.
We started our own little playgroups and I initiated ceramics and art. We dug our own clay and made our own glazes. At the time we went through Independence so Australia was pulling out. I was there when they were choosing their national anthem, the name of their currency, their flag which was designed by a 12 year old girl. I had more affinity with Papua New Guinea as a nation than I had for Australia. I had no involvement with any of those things in Australia. PNG had 5 national anthems which they played every morning so people could choose the one they wanted. My heart bleeds now because I hear the vulnerability of the people up there. I feel a great affection for the people in PNG.
I made friends with a PNG woman who probably left school very young but she was a woman of the world. We bonded through our children who played together. She told me she wanted to take me to her village but I couldn’t take the children because it was on an island. The long and the short of it was, it was a 10 hour trip in an open rigger from the mainland to the island. They have a fire on the out rigger to cook their lunch. It took 3 days before the Skipper would even leave due to the weather. Finally we get out past the reef and my goodness, the boat actually cuts through the waves, 2 people bailing water out the whole trip. No wonder I couldn’t take my children. It was the stormy wet season. There were many stories from those 10 days on that island.”