now totally devoid of any of the excitement and camaraderie among the passengers and crew who were all firm friends by the end of the trip.
After a good bacon and egg breakfast we boarded a coach bound for London and I could take my first view of England. It was a brilliantly sunny day and as we drove over the rolling Wiltshire countryside my first impressions were the studied neatness of it all. The elm and oak trees were just bursting into golden buds, and I was amazed at their roundness and evenness when compared with the gangling tropical trees, with their odd shaped branches that I had been used to.   In the towns and villages neat brick houses nestled against one another with a quiet air of  firm  solidity and timelessness. The hedgerows, dairy cattle and the early flush of spring corn bursting forth gave me the impression that I was being driven through a gigantic living garden , again in contrast with tropical palms or the stark rough  Australian bush.
A few hours later we were in London in a small hotel in Inverness Terrace, Bayswater. Mother was in absolute raptures to be back at long last in London, her beloved city from her happy  childhood. Once we had our rooms, we were in a taxi to get theatre seats for the next day and we just went for a drive around the city.  It had an all pervading blackish and grey look from 7 years of smog, war, and soot. Bomb damage was everywhere with some areas such as Oxford Street being particularly hard hit. Also isolated buildings were completely blown out from Flying Bomb attacks (V1 and V2s). The following day we went by tube, which was a new experience for me, travelling down the Central line to see St Pauls and the devastation in the City. Great as the destruction was, after having seen Yokohama  and Tokyo absolutely flattened for mile upon mile, there really was no comparison.  We had received serious punishment, but in return the retribution the other side received in return for starting the war, was gigantic and awesome by comparison.
Then we had to obtain ration books, and Emergency Clothing coupons to enable me to be suitably dressed and attired for Bradfield. I was introduced to Daniel Neals, fitted up with a sports coat and dark grey suit, had chilprufe vests purchased for the winter and was soon ready to start my public school  life. Before going, I was taken to Pinner Hill to meet John Simpson and his wife Gwen Yarrow with whom Mother had been at school at Tudor Hall. They were going to be my guardians once I had been put to school, once Mother had returned back to Ceylon. One of the things that we did before I went off to Bradfield was to make a large parcel of food and clothing, cigarettes  and some other goodies to be posted to Capt Jaeger of the “Dresden”, whose family was living in starving squalor among the bombed out ruins of Hamburg. She had been in correspondence with him after she had returned to Ceylon, and had been sorrowful of the terrible hardships that they were undergoing after the firebombing by the RAF of that city which in one night 60,000 people died in the firestorm, many from sheer lack of oxygen as the fire consumed everything.
In the post office in Queensway where she took the parcel, there was a terrible scene and commotion by other customers who soundly scolded and abused her in the harshest tones for even thinking of sending any comforts to a German. When she retorted how good he had been to her and her child when she had been a prisoner, they were still deaf to her pleas with the force of German bombing and V 1 and V2 rockets  still bitterly fresh in their minds.
At the beginning of May  she took me down to Bradfield College, near Reading to Army House where we met my Housemaster Mr Bellamy and his large plump homely wife. I was given £3.10.0  pocket money for the term to buy odds and ends from the school shop and also my train fare back to Pinner. This was more than enough!

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