Sue Pye

Story

My parents were married in 1940, a typical war time romance. My father saw service in North Africa and Italy. After he was demobbed, they tried various businesses, with not much success. My father was a painter and decorator, and my mother eventually did office work.

Their names are Bill and Marie Owen. I have a sister, Jane and a brother, Rhys. We moved around Wales and England, never staying very long in one place, until we stayed in Llandudno, North Wales for about three years. As I (the eldest in the family) started grammar school, my parents decided to move away from the coast where there were not many opportunities for work, and settled in Flixton, near Manchester. They stayed there for six years.

I completed ‘O’ levels in 1958 and went to a Commercial College in Manchester, where I did shorthand and typing, and business studies. My first job was with the Daily Express in Manchester where I was a junior secretary. About that time I met the man whom I later married.

We were married in Aden in 1961. Quite an usual event. (My parents visited the church when they emigrated to Australia as they came through the Suez Canal, and the boat stopped in Aden en route to Australia.) We spent 19 months in Aden. It was a wonderful experience for a girl from a big city. Gave me many insights into world events and how the British Empire fitted in! I worked for the government on the talks which resulted in the Colony of Aden becoming a state.

In the years between 1963 and 1966 I had three boys. We did postings in Biggin Hill, Kent, and Stafford. In 1968 we were posted to Germany and spent three years there on two bases, Rheindahlen, and Wildenrath.

My parents and sister and brother came to Australia in 1965. It was always a wish to join them as soon as possible. But first we had to complete a period of service with the RAF. The main reason to coming to Australia was the weather! The time spent abroad as a result of my husband’s service with the RAF spoiled me, and I got used to the sunny weather, particularly in Aden. I never settled back into the cool climate in UK.

At the end of the posting in Germany, I packed up the family belongings. This was November 1970. We returned to UK briefly, then on 10 December 1970, my husband and three boys, Steve, Richard and Brian boarded the Fairsea in Southampton.

Note: The Fairsea had seen service previously as a troop ship, I think the Oxfordshire. Co-incidentally my husband was taken to Aden for a posting with the RAF on board the Oxfordshire. The Fairsea later went on to be a ‘fun ship’ along with the Fairsky in the waters around Australia.

Conditions on board were OK, although the women were expected to have all the children in their cabin while the men shared, and got out of bedtime duties. Not in my family though!

We called in at Tenneriffe, Canary Islands, then on to Cape Town where we arrived on either Christmas Day or Boxing Day. The next port was Fremantle in WA, and finally disembarked in Melbourne. The boys went to ‘school’ on board, while my husband played chess, and I learned to play bridge.

Because I had family in Australia already there was someone to meet us in Melbourne. My brother, Rhys, then 20 years old was at the docks to meet us. We all piled into a car and were driven to my brother’s friend’s place. First impressions were the single story houses, the drawn curtains, and the bright light.

We dropped my husband at the railway station to travel to Adelaide where he had to undergo rookie training for the RAAF. Meanwhile the rest of the family flew to Brisbane to join my parents. We had not seen each other for six years, and they had not met two of my children.

Impressions of Brisbane – the wooden houses, usually on stilts, the lack of guttering on the roads and plumbing in the houses. The first evening, I sat down to watch the TV with the family, and suddenly realised that we were in Australia when I saw the weather map! After nearly three months ‘on the road’ we finally had stopped.

We were posted to Sale in Victoria and then Canberra in 1972.

Canberra was booming in those days, the population was c. 120,000, and there was building going on everywhere. We lived in a married quarter in Red Hill for about three years, before buying a house in Fraser, a brand new suburb. We were one of the first to move into the area. I still live here, 33 years on.

I worked in the public service for nearly 30 years. I started as a typist, then moved into the clerical stream. I eventually worked on implementing the computer systems in the department. Then continued in the computing stream in various guises until I retired in 2001. My husband and I divorced in 1983.

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