50 years ago......

BAnanas :D - Gorki, he had a lucky escape then with my friend Romi

Deedaa I had a similar but different problem. My father was in the army and stationed in Germany. Home for the summer vacation in summer '63, I went down to the forces sailing club and had a lovely afternoon crewing for a really dishy guy, things were going swimmingly to the extent that the next step should have been a drink at the bar and a date, but we got ashore, he thanked me politely for crewing for him and was gone.

I later discovered that he was a Warrant Officer but I was an officer's daughter and never the twain could date. It was one of the many reasons that by the time I was 10 I had decided I would never marry anyone in the services. I was fed up with my social life and friends being governed by my father's rank.

I was just about to join the army, best years of my life, within 3 months of joining up I was in Kenya and stayed there till they had their independence in 1964. I went all round the world, good days.

I was at Primary school with Justin Hayward of the Moody Blues. In fact I sat just behind him in a double desk with my friend Jane. He was really good -looking even then and all the girls (we were 11 years old ) adored him.

Flowerofthewest I was down in Brighton last week meeting up with one of my old school friends who I have known since the year dot, we went to a Biba exhibition at the Brighton Pavilion, we were huge Biba fans, but couldn't really afford much of their stuff in those days. Most of the people going around this exhibition were women of a "certain age" it evoked loads of memories of us going to the very big shop they opened in London, more to hang around and gaze longingly at the clothes than actually buy anything.

Another memory, my friend and I were strolling along past the Marquee in London on a day trip to the city. All of a sudden she was squealing 'Quick, I've got a Moody Blue, I've got a Moody Blue!!!' I looked round in horror to see her hanging on to Denny Laine's arm. He looked more terrified than I did I must admit. I bought blue and while flowery shoes from Biba Boutique that day and a red cord skirt with a zip all the way up the front - very daring

It was Beatlemania for me - I used to go on coach trips to see them in London. I remember them being supported by the Stones! I just wanted to see the Beatles. I couldn't hear them for the screaming but looking was enough in those days.

On holiday in St Ives I met Francis Rossi (Status Quo) before he was THE Francis Rossi. Just a lad who used to sing with his friends and play guitar above Porthmere beach. It was only a couple of years later that my sister went to the local dance and came back with a photograph of the band that was playing and sure enough it was the lad from St Ives.

I was 12 and had just done the opposite of "ketty* 's move - I moved from Romford in Essex - then a busy market town with easy access to Central London - to a little village in Suffolk. It was a horrible culture shock.

I was 17 and working as a cadet nurse, met my DH who incidentally was at King's college too Flickety. The summer of 63 I went to Butlins, Filey, with my friend and her parents, my goodness I thought I was so grown up dancing the night away.

I was just about to start Art School - still the best four years of my life
I had the same problem as you anno I'd met a couple of African students at the Natural History Museum (as you do!) and the Ghanaian one wanted to go out with me. He wanted to know why I didn't seem keen, but I couldn't decide whether it would be more hurtful to let him think it was because he was black or to tell him that it was actually his friend the Nigerian that I fancied. In the end I chickened out and didn't see either of them again.

I was 22 and doing my post graduate teacher training in Edinburgh. I think it was at this time of year that the college chaplain asked some indigenous students, of whom I was one, to accompany a group of overseas students from many different countries on a residential course in St Andrews, a town I knew very well from having been a student there. I can't remember all the details but got to know a couple of young men from Malawi who later took me to lunch in Edinburgh. It was striking how a Turkish Cypriot and a Greek Cypriot appeared to be on the best of terms while they were away from home. A Nigerian student had brought his ceremonial robes with him and a very beautiful Goan girl modelled her elegant sari one night. A student from Kenya took a fancy to me and subsequently bombarded me with phone calls. It was difficult to keep telling him I didn't want to date him without appearing racist.

I was 18 and at medical school

I was 12 and had just spent my first term at the local comprehensive having decided to leave my boarding school in the NE. My parents had returned from working overseas and settled in the south. I was getting to know my two brothers, one of 6yrs who I had not seen for almost a year and one of a year who I had only seen for 6 weeks just after he had been born. I had my own bedroom for the first time..a luxury... and a growing wardrobe of non-uniform clothes.

I was nine and every day I ran to school - and every day I dawdled home. I LOVED school; it was my escape.

In the Lower Sixth and really fancied myself as an academic...took another 10 years to get there, thanks to an early pregnancy and marriage.

...Me? A swan? Aw - go on!!

Marelli But what a swan you grew up to be.

16 yrs old and about to move to the Isle of Wight. I had a Dansette record player and pictures of the Beatles all over my bedroom wall. My friends were flicking up their hair to look like Kathy Kirby but mine wouldn't stay put so I adopted the Jane Asher look instead.....Far more successful with the boys

I'd been a teenager for about 3 weeks. My socks were never long enough, and my skirt was always too long....I had feet like barges, and long thin arms. I looked like a spider in dressing-up clothes!

I was just about to become a teenager. I don't think I had a clue what was just ahead but I made the most of it as I got there.

Just starting work in a Hospital Path Lab. What is now an MSc was a qualification gained at college in the evenings. I was still in the same profession in the same group of hospitals when I retired.

I was in my second year at Kings College, Durham, now Newcastle University having a whale of a time, sailing, debating, doing some work and falling in love for the first time.

Oh and I didn't get to go back to school till the next year!

Half way through primary school and just discovered The Beatles!

I was sitting in our driveway in Atlanta,Ga. Where we lived for a year. I was dressed in a new shorts outfit and had my hair in foam curlers with a big hunting dog in my lap. I was going to my dance resital that night. well I didn't get to go cause my mom drove around the corner of the house in a big car and didnt see me or the dog. Luckily I was ok and only spent the night in the hospital with concrete burns and a large chunk of skin taken out of my leg.I was 9.