Just to say the latest newsletter has gone out. If you have not had your copy yet let me know. If you have problems reading or opening the pdf file I can send it to you via snail mail as long as you have provided me with an address.

I now have a contact email for Ken Blachford so if any one would like to contact him let me know. We are now up to around 80 contacts and I have written to Al Warne at an old address and am waiting hopefully for a reply.

Still having problems contacting others but I may consider purchasing the UKInfo list that gives the details of millions of people in the UK from the voting lists. Of course that will only be of help for those that have remained in the UK.

As its the holiday season I supose contacts and correspondance will be a bit slower until about September but maybe on their travels some may meet old Sqn members if you do please point them in our direction.

As usual not a lot to write about because its the Holiday season and

everyone is off doing their own thing.

On the plus side I have had quite a few chats on the phone and keep up

to date with each others ailments etc.

Ken Blachford left a post on the Guest book but never left a contact number

so if you are reading this Ken drop me a line using the email address on page one.

Just click on the icon. Failing that just give me a bell on 02088035824.

Lack of other news means that I have to tell you that my garden shed and

paving are finished and now I am trying to make the garden look a bit more

presentable. So chaps if you are fed up with my garden you will have to start

giving me something more to write about.

I have just checked out Taff Fisher's site. He has changed it around a bit and

its looking quite good. the link is on the Links page.

I understand a few of the lads got together in Leeds last weekend so I am

waiting for a bit of a report on that from John Ashton some time in the

near future.

I am running a bit late with the newsletter but I hope to have it distributed by

the end of next week. As usual I am scratching for things of interest to write

about. I could fill pages with various comment about the world situation, sport

or painting the back door red but I like to keep it to things about 51, Army or

things of interest to ex Squadies.

Thats all for now.

Beef

Well nothing much in the way of news but I will do my best to make it interesting as possible.

The highlight of the month for me has been my trip to see Harvey Andrews at Chatham. a few more details of that are on the news page.

Mick Marshall has now joined the computer set so, if any one would like his email address just drop me a line.

John Clark has now moved up to Brum and should be settling in his new

home by now. If its any consolation John I still haven't fully unpacked from

my last move and that was about 25 years ago. Good luck in your new

home John.

I am still checking out new venues for the next reunion but so far most

places are very expensive when compared to the King Charles Hotel.

There is still one place I want to check out but I will say more about

that when I have checked availability and prices.

Terry Kirby says he is going to OZ next year and hopes to meet up

with George Dempster and Chris Milne so I hope he will be able to

provide a few pics of the occasion.

I have just had a new shed delivered and I thought I would do a few

other things like a bit of paving and concreting while I was at it and

in the mood. I only mention this as a sign of how old I am getting.

It was the sort of work that only a few years ago would have taken

about 3 days working 8 hrs a day. It has taken me three weeks and

every joint in my body is hurting. When did I suddenly become this

creaky old man.?

Well thats all for now folks

When I was last in Germany in the 70s I used to listen to a bloke called Harvey Andrews. I bought his LP “Writer of Songs” and wore it down wafer thin becauseI played it so often.

I later brought 2 other LP,s “Friends of mine” and “Fantasies from a corner seat “.

My Record player broke years ago so I hadn’t heard the songs for a while. 

My son and my Daughter got me CD’s of the first two (“fantasies from a corner seat” is out of print).

I started to listen to them again and became hooked all over again.

Just out of curiosity I typed his name into google and found he was alive and well and still performing.

The upshot was that I brought 5 CD’s that I had not heard. The magic was still there. The songs can make you

laugh, put a tear in your eye and make you think about life in all its vagaries.

You may not have heard of Harvey Andrews because he is not mainstream Pop music but a lot of you will be familiar

with his song “Soldier”.

Harvey’s web site has some samples of his newer stuff as well as the old so if you want to check it out his site is at   modernprojects.com/Harvey/  

It’s well worth a look.

He is playing at Chatham 22 April.

By now every one should have the News letter. Just to say I got two things wron in the letter.

First mistake was the Group photo list of the front row. I missed Terry Kirby off. He is the fouth one from the right on the front row, between Alastair Brownlie and Trev Rilatt. Sorry about that Terry.

Second mistake was that I said the cost of the Room and buffet was £400  well Ron informs me that it was only the cost of the buffet and coffee that cost £400 the room was a further £150 which Ron had paid for. So I have gone halves on that with him. The only reason Ron mentioned that was because we may not be able to do that next year and the cost may all have to come from the contributions.

From the feed back I have had it seems like every one enjoyed the reunion which means it has  been all worthwhile. I have already started to think about next years reunion so any Ideas for entertainment of things of Interest should start contacting me now.

As I said in the news letter the vote on next years venue was close but came down in favour of keeping it at the same place. I will be phoning round/checking out a few places a bit further north just to see if we can get anywhere as cheap while avoiding army camps and the like. There is a fine balance between a few mates getting together and a Regimental style Reunion. I have never been keen on the regimented side of things.

The thing about the Hotel we have been using is that it was reasonably cheap, Clean and they were prepared to discount a few things. Of the places I checked last year some of the accommodation was cheap but the meeting rooms were costly and things like buffets and screens for the projector were a lot more expensive. one place I checked wanted nearly £500 for the meeting room and then we had to be out by 8 pm.

Well its time I got back to trying to find other ex members of the Sqn. Bye for now.

Well it has soon rolled round to what appears to be our annual reunion. We had a total of 32 ex 51 Squadron members turn up and several had partners with them so I think we can count that as a bit of a success. I can,t remember all the partners names so please forgive me for not mentioning everyone.

Every one seemed to enjoy themselves againwith cries of, "you haven't changed a bit" and "sorry who had you used to be ".

I managed to get a bit of a slide show going. and Len Millward and his wife brought a a video of their wedding that had been made from an old 8mm film. No sound of course but, there were the younger versions of people attending the reunion running round on screen to show that we were not always "Wrinklies".

When we took the group photo there were people who were present at the reunion but otherwise occupied at the time. I have manage to stick them on another photo by cutting and pasting from other photos so that the whole group can be seen. Both the group photo and the one with added images can be seen on the Reunion 2010 page.

We had a bit of a ballot about whether we should future reunions at some other venue further North i.e. around the Midlands. I counted the votes and they actually came down in favor of keeping it at the same Hotel. However it was  a close vote so we will still look into finding some other venues and put it to every one when we can get a favorable deal.

The voting went as follows.

For the same location                                 15 Votes

For a more Northern or midlands Venue.   12  Votes

Neuteral Vote                                              5  Votes

As soon as possible I will get a newsletter out to show everyone the pics of the Reunion in a bit more detail and to spread whatever other news comes to my attention. I will also try to fulfil the requests for pics and media that people hve asked for. The news letter should be within the next two weeks and the rest as and when I can do it. I will not keep anyone waiting any longer than is neccessary.

Well thats it for now. I think I will try to catch up on some rest after a very nice but very hectic weekend

Beef

Just a few lines for the begining of the month.

John(Pip) Harris sent me a few pics and I have added them to the same page as the Malcolm(Chalky) White picture page. This way it keeps the number of pages down and is less to trawl through.

I have managed to contact Mick (Geordie)Marsall and had a chat with him. He seems to be keeping well and like many of us he is retired now. He says he will not be able to make the reunion but sends you all his regards. I got Micks number via Mike Scott.

I have also had a contact with Richard Sandy (Lt Sandy) He says he ended up as Col and then became  a British Attache in the middle east. When I spoke to him he had just got back from there. Len Milward had the first contact with him and he passed the number on to me. Mr Sandy sends his regards to anyone who remembers him.

Its only about three weeks to the  Reunion now and I am looking forward to it. See you there .

Well the next Reunion is getting nearer and there should be around 30 of the old Sqn attending if everyone turns up.

This month there have been two new contacts Lt Sandy and Ken (Scouse) Bradshaw. (Nice to hear from you Gentlemen) Mr Sandy retd as a Col and then spent time in the middle east and has in fact just returned from there. Ken Bradshaw lives in the Dover area and says he will be at the reunion.

Len Milward sent me a phone number for Mr Sandy and Ken got in contact via the site.

I can' remember if I wrote this in the last news or not but Clive Lee informed me that Mr Farmbourgh dide in Cyprus just before Christmas. I did exchange emails with Mr Farmbourgh once or twice and he was very helpful in tracking down a few people who he knew had retired to various areas. RIP Mate.

Thats about it for this time.

Beef

Well here I am back in Old Blighty and the winter weather. I had a great 30 days in Singapore and loved every minute of it.

As I reported in the last blog I had a trip round some of our old haunts and things have changed quite a lot. The old camp at Seletar has shrunk to about a 16^th of it old size. Part of the old runway is used as a small airfield but most of the land has been taken over by civilian firms for various enterprises. Around the area of the old C of E Church is a country club with a swimming pool.

The old RAF headquarters is still standing and will be kept as part of the heritage programme as will the old Guard room. The remaining bit of the camp still has a few of the old blocks and a few of the old buildings like the Sgts Mess, the NAFFI with the cookhouse below and the Malcolm Club. The Cookhouse is still used by the Singapore Engineers who are billeted there.

The trip to Serangoon Gardens was a bit of a disappointment in some ways as new development seems to be creeping in at a fast rate but it is still recognisable.

The top part of Jalan Kayu nearest the camp has gone to make way for new Road works. However the bottom part remains and is still more or less the same.

I will be making a page with all the new pictures sometime this week so you will get a better idea of the changes from them.

I met up with Keith Thomas and his wife Anne who was on a three-day stopover on his way to Bali. We took a trip to the Kanji War memorial and the old ford factory where the British signed their surrender in WW2.

I also met up with Gareth (Taff) Davies and his wife in China town. Gareth is on a nine-month posting after coming out of retirement for the third time.

A trip to Changi proved to be a bit of a disappointment as it is now called Changi Village and is used to milk tourists of their hard earned cash. It is quite pleasant to walk round the place and sit down to the kind of meals we used to have after a night on the booze in the old days.

Most of the coastline of Singapore has changed because of land reclamation projects and I reckon there is growth in land area of about 10%. The east coast has changed but it has been made into a long beautiful beach where you can take walks or bike rides and stop at food areas for some wonderful Makan.

There are now a total of three causeways into Malaya and discussions for another some time in the future. Singapore does not have to rely on Malaya for water now as they have built several new reservoirs and are even using desalination plants.

Overall it was a very nice stay in Singapore and at the end of it we were reluctant to come home. In the end though its nice to have your own bed back and the family round you.

Beef

Well here I am in Singapore again. The place has changed a lot since I was here two and a half years ago. One of the changes is a bit of a shock to the system it’s the exchange rate from Pounds to Singapore Dollar. I got just over two dollars to the pound. It is now much cheaper to buy electronic goods in the UK than in Singapore.

The people that only go to the tourist areas are finding that they are well over budget within hours of arriving. There are still bargains to be had if you know where to look and it is well worth chatting up one of the locals to steer you in the right direction.

I have had a trip to the Serangoon Gardens area and although there are extensive changes it is still recognisable if you remember the old days. There has been resistance by the locals to the ubiquitous high rise flats and the only real differences are the normal changes you would expect. The cinema no longer exists and a new building is under construction in its place ( who knows it may be the first high rise building).

John Gabriel is the Camp Commandant of what is left of RAF Seletar. He very kindly escorted my Son and myself round the old places that I remembered so well. Not only did he show us round but he also collected us from our Hotel, brought us a dinner and then returned us back to our Hotel. We managed to get a few nice photos, including one on the balcony next to my old billet.

The RAF treated us Engineer Lads as the poor relative and I have taken it as sort of boost to moral that the final Military occupants Seletar are Engineers of the Singapore forces and it will probably be Engineers who see out its last days.

As for the rest of Singapore, Some of the buildings that I considered new (30 years old) have already started to be knocked down to make way for even larger and newer buildings. I don’t think I have ever seen so many shopping malls in one place before.

It looks like little India is going the same way that Chinatown and Bugis Street went with the old being bulldozed to make way for the Ultra new.

During this trip I have managed to link up with Gareth Davies and also with Keith Thomas both with their wives. Gareth is here working and Keith is passing through on his way to Bali.

Gareth looks quite well although the flowing locks of hair have been replaced with a close cropped hair cut and he looks a lot leaner than I remembered. Keith has not changed a lot from the reunion in February.

Beef