2022 begins but the party isn't over, Elliot says "shopping no", my father Courtenay Lloyd's obituary in The Telegraph, "Putin's People", Djokovic detained in Australia, Kings' Day, 1921 census in England and other stories.

 Sunday, 9th January, 2022

With not so little Juliet in my arms on Kings' Day

Good morning all.

Let me start this week's post by sharing  some good news which is a bit rare at the moment.   Last week'st I reported that Eladio's 99 year old mother was very ill. We really thought it was the end but it wasn't. The good news is that by 2nd January she had completely recovered, enough to join in a family whatsapp call. Thank goodness for that I say and cheers to her. I can't wait to see her reach 100, the first member of her family to do so.

That cheered us up enormously last Sunday. It was a quiet day for us spent alone with Pippa. We needed some quiet time to recover  from the excesses of our New Year's celebrations.  I always find the beginning of a new year difficult. It takes time to adjust I think. Thus 2022 began quietly.  But my friends, the party, at least in Spain, was not over as we had Kings' Day to come. More about that later.

On Sunday I dared go out for a walk despite the pain in my knee. I reckoned it could not do much damage as it will be operated on on 13th of this month. Yes, that's next week. As I will be out of action for a while afterwards I thought the walk would do me good. It did and I came back feeling energised. Lunch and dinner were leftovers, so no news there. There was news though when I had a very long Facetime video call with our friends Kathy and Phil who live in my beloved Yorkshire. Kathy was still getting over Covid - poor thing. Most of the symptoms had gone except for a wretched cough. Surprisingly Phil continued to test negative which may prove some people are immune. Who knows? My other friends, Jacky and her husband John, are not in this category as they too got Covid on Christmas Day. I was sorry to hear that and hope they are better soon. Thankfully the Omicron variant is less harsh than the previous Alpha and Delta ones. As the virus has taken hold and spread like wildfire we know more and more people who have got it whereas we did not know anyone in our circle or family with Covid before.  In my opinion this proves Omicron is the most contagious of all the variants. On the other hand, this and the vaccine programme are achieving what many governments want and that is "herd immunity". Remember that term when Covid began? It was unthinkable then - Boris Johnson didn't agree - but now it looks it might be achievable but not through the way he had planned.  I hope  this proves the prediction of the WHO that this year we will see the end of Covid as we know it today. Time will tell of course.

On a different note, that day the Facebook reminded me of a photo of Eladio and I taken on New Year's Eve in 2010 - 12 years ago; no, 11 years ago. Does it matter? We looked so much younger. Wow so much has happened since then. I got lots of compliments but I know that we look older. However, the good news here is that as a couple we remain united and in love. What would I do without my wonderful husband by my side? If you haven't seen it, this is it. Today Eladio's hair is greyer - at least he has hair - and I have loads more wrinkles especially around my neck. I enviously see that my eyelids didn't droop in 2010 as they do now. 

Eladio and I on NYE 2010 - looking a lot younger but just as happy as a couple

We discussed age in our video call as Kathy and I often do these days. I predicted that my bones  -arthritis will probably be my downfall. But who knows? We also discussed having very old parents and caring for them and that one day it will be our own children facing the same situation with us. Not a nice thought. Wouldn't it be nice to age without all the aches and pains and diseases such as dementia and Parkinsons? Hopefully science can help some time in the future. Again, who knows?

Apart from our walk and my Facetime call I didn't do much that day of any interest so let me move on to Monday 3rd January. I was up at 7 am and had quite a long and quiet day in parts. The morning was quiet and we went on our walk - slowly in my case. I made "cocido" for lunch, that Madrilenian winter dish based on chickpeas and various meats and vegetables. We needed a siesta afterwards. I was up and about shortly afterwards thinking just how quiet our life was when I heard noise downstairs.

It was Oli and family who had come on a surprise visit. It seems they were at Lidl when Elliot said "shopping, no. Booboos' house" (Booboo is his name for his grandfather). He clearly does not like shopping as Eladio doesn't either. They certainly livened up the house and it was wonderful to have their company in the library lounge with the fire on.

Enjoying the surprise visit of our grandchildren on Monday

I thought they would stay for dinner but they didn't. I did though give them some "cocido" for Elliot which I was told later he gobbled down in great delight. I'm glad he likes my cooking.

Tuesday came and it was another quiet day. We were out on errands in the morning and in the afternoon I went to the dentist to have my final crown put in. It was a quick procedure but my mouth feels strange. I haven't yet got used to the new bite so to speak. My mouth is rubbish. I have a 4 piece bridge, 2 implants and now a double crown. On the outside they appear good - if a little stained - as they are straight but underneath tells a different story. Possibly this is due to all the sweets I ate as a kid. 

The news about Covid and the Omicron variant was more than dire that day. In Spain it is nowhere near the peak yet and we have around 2.500 cases per million. That day the country reported over 100.000 new infections. The US reported over a million! France, the UK, Italy and Spain are the countries worse affected in Europe.  Spain has now reached just under 90.000 deaths and the UK 150.000. So far, we are free of it but who knows for how long.

That night we continued watching Stay Close but we were not convinced. When Eladio falls asleep I have been turning to Downton Abbey. But I have now finished the series which I last watched for the last 5 years ago and there is nothing good enough to take its place. Any suggestions?

Wednesday came and I was happy. I was happy because the journalist Jake Kerridge, a book critic who loved my book btw, and who had written my father's obituary for The Telegraph, a big national right wing UK paper (with a paywall) had told me the obituary would would come out that day. And it did. 

What an honour - my father's obituary in The Telegraph this week

This is the text if you are interested. I think it's quite a good summary: 

"Courtenay Lloyd, well-loved schoolmaster who taught Russian to spies and married an exiled princess – obituary

The polyglot Lloyd taught at the Cambridge Joint Services language school, then at Bradford Grammar, where he let his showman side emerge

Courtenay Lloyd, who has died aged 102, hunted Nazis in post-War Germany, taught a generation of future diplomats – and spies – at the Joint Services School for Linguists in Cambridge, became an inspirational teacher at Bradford Grammar School, and married a Russian princess.

Charles Courtenay Lloyd was born in Amington, then in Warwickshire, on May 1 1919, the son of the Reverend John Collins Lloyd and his wife Dorothy (née Scull). His father later became vicar of St Mary’s Church, Henbury, near Bristol, and Courtenay was educated at Clifton College, where he excelled at languages.

When he was 16, however, his father, fearful of the effects of the Great Depression, removed him mid-term and secured him a job at the Imperial Tobacco Company, where one of his parishioners was general manager. Lloyd’s longevity can be partly attributed to his rarely touching the free carton of cigarettes he received every week.

The job – collating coverage of the company’s activities in foreign newspapers – was ideal for a linguist, but he longed to continue his studies, and after taking night classes won a place at Selwyn College, Cambridge, to read French and German.

In 1940 he joined the RNVR, where in the cruiser Norfolk, he caused great amusement among his shipmates by kneeling to say his prayers, and wearing pyjamas; he also recalled that one of his duties was to hand out French letters to the seamen whenever they reached port, despite having no idea what they were for.

In April 1941 he served as liaison officer in several destroyers on loan to the Norwegian Navy, based in Liverpool and employed on Atlantic convoy duties. Briefly he served in the British destroyer Wells as signals officer, before in late 1944 he was appointed to the Admiralty to work for the Director of Naval Intelligence. 

VE-Day saw him in Orkney, where, he recalled, the habitual quiet was shattered by drunken servicemen taking service cars for joyrides and pranging them.

Requesting an appointment which would make use of his rapidly acquired Norwegian, he was sent to Oslo in October 1945 to serve with the Allied forces overseeing the dismantling of the German occupation. In 1943 he was awarded the Norwegian War Medal and in 1946 King Haakon VII presented him with the Liberty Medal.

Lloyd was then offered a job by the Allied Control Commission in Germany, heading a team of six who were tasked with tracking down Nazi war criminals in hiding. Three of the team were German Jews who had fled before the War and become British citizens. Lloyd recalled the work as not being too difficult, since most Germans, including the police, were eager to co-operate.

In 1948 he finally resumed his interrupted studies at Cambridge, switching to German and Norwegian. He then studied Russian under Professor (later Dame) Elizabeth Hill. She became a lifelong friend, a formidable character who would rearrange his furniture to her liking whenever she visited him.

In 1951 she invited him to become her “right-hand man” at the Cambridge branch of the Joint Services School for Linguists (JSSL), where National Servicemen were put through intensive training in Russian so that they could become translators and interpreters – or in some cases, operatives – for the Intelligence Services. The Russians regarded it as a “spy school” and tasked Guy Burgess with collecting information on it.

Courtenay Lloyd during his time in HMS Wells, 1942

Lloyd protested that his Russian was insufficient, but Elizabeth Hill insisted that he merely needed to be a lesson ahead of his pupils. He proved to be a natural teacher and administrator, remembered by Philip Hanson, later Professor of Soviet Economics at Birmingham University, for his “amazing ability to recall from one week to the next who had got exactly which grammatical construction wrong the last time round”.

He was described by Geoffrey Elliott and Harold Shukman in Secret Classrooms (2002), their history of the JSSL, as “a shy and gentle man prone to blushing, [who] figures improbably in the archives as the official in charge of discipline and of reprimanding absentees and other miscreants, though doing so must have hurt him more than it hurt them.”

One of his colleagues was Her Serene Highness Princess Elena von Lieven, a Russian aristocrat whose family had fled to Bulgaria after the Revolution, then into Western Europe after the Russian invasion; she was the god-daughter of Princess Zinaida Yusupova, mother of Rasputin’s murderer. Penniless, she was working as an announcer for the BBC Russian Service when Elizabeth Hill recruited her to the JSSL. She and Lloyd married in 1953.

Lloyd subsequently taught Russian at RAF College Cranwell and published a First Russian Reader in 1965. In 1964, with the Cold War thawing, he took up a post teaching modern languages at Bradford Grammar School.

The Lloyds purchased a 20-room mansion which they crammed with lodgers; a Czech family who had fled following the suppression of the Prague Spring were housed for free. As his wife took up a teaching job some distance away at Leeds University, Lloyd took on the cleaning and, often more pluckily than successfully, the cooking.

In contrast to his quiet demeanour at home, where he was content to let his voluble wife do most of the talking, Lloyd proved to be something of a showman as a teacher, and was much-loved.

He was particularly cherished for the school trips he organised to the USSR, where pupils could expect to be entertained at the flat of the British Cultural Attaché – one of Lloyd’s former JSSL students. One downside, the boys recalled, was that their party sometimes received inferior service on trains or in shops, because Lloyd spoke Russian so well that he was assumed to be a native rather than a tourist.

Lloyd was a traditionalist who once threatened his wife with divorce if she bought a dishwasher; if prevailed on to accompany his family to a beach, he would sit fully dressed reading The Times. When his son asked him to explain the facts of life, Lloyd retorted: “Get on with your German verbs!” He liked to holiday alone, and walked everywhere, having never driven a car except in postwar Germany.

Lloyd endured a good deal of tragedy in his life: his brother died of polio, aged 16, in 1938; his sister died in an aeroplane crash along with her husband and three children in 1971; his wife died in 1999, their son George in 2001, and George’s wife in 2008. Lloyd remained stoical, recalling the words printed on a picture of a fawn that hung above his bed as a child: “Be a good beast, suffer in silence.”

He retired to Madrid to live with his surviving daughter Masha and her family, and latterly gave English lessons to his carers. On his 100th birthday his daughter published a biography of him, and he received a personal message of congratulation from the King of Norway.

Courtenay Lloyd, born May 1 1919, died November 8 2021"

That was my breakfast reading. I loved reading the comments too and was surprised at the interest in my father by The Telegraph's readers but then of course his life was quite extraordinary. These are just two of them: "What an interesting and productive life this chap lived. Wonderful that his skills in languages were picked up when he was so young, and then polished up to the betterment of our country. The few little differences he had to the common man just add exactly the right amount of spice to the obituary. Job very well done. RIP." "Another light from a lost world extinguished. Fab obit full of touches befitting a man who obviously touched many.RIP and God bless you Sir."

Later friends sent me the newspaper clipping. It is far more impressive to see the written print although as a PR professional I do know that far more people read the news online than they do in print. 

My father's "obit" in The Telegraph this week

That perked me up for the day. So did the  other comments from unknown readers who were wowed by the story of my father, a man they had never heard of. Some of them were spurred on to buy my book which made me very happy.  

Wednesday 5th turned out to be an important day for many reasons. At home life was quiet. The highlights were our walk in the sun and good old fish and chips for lunch. 5th December in Spain is known as "Noche de Reyes" - the Eve of the 3 Kings - and children around the country get as excited as children in the rest of the world when Father Christmas comes. Spanish kids actually get both but traditionally "Reyes" is always more important. Parents take their children to see the many many 3 Kings' processions held all around the country. It was to be Elliot's first time. I think he didn't grasp much as he was asleep part of the time and it was raining. I remember when we used to take his mother and her sister to the procession in Boadilla many years ago. Far grander is the one held in Madrid but who wants the bother of traffic, parking and trying to find a spot to see their majesties, Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar? It's much easier to watch it on TV.

I watched a lot of TV that day including the beautiful film "August Rush" a sort of modern day Oliver Twist but where the orphan is a musical prodigy. A bit sickly sweet but I adored it. That night Eladio and I watched a film we also loved. "100 year journey" tells the story of an Indian family setting up a restaurant in rural France with competition from a traditional Michelin star restaurant (Helen Mirren) across the road. This really took our mind off all our current worries which, if you have been following my story in the past few months, will know it is about our squatter. Damn the man. 

It was that day I came across the book "Putin's People" written by the ex FT correspondent in Russia, the British journalist Catherine Belton. A friend sent me the pdf but I would probably have bought the book anyway. It has been named book of the year for 2020 by none less than The Economist, The Telegraph, The Times and The Financial Times. I have only read the first 30 pages but am very alarmed at Putin's tentacles in London - a frightening portrait of Russia's influence in the western world. In the book she tells of interviewing our squatter in Boadilla at a cafeteria where he describes  the part he played in bringing Putin to power. She refers to him as a "KGB operative". Do you now understand why we are so worried?  Here is an interview with her where she describes meeting "he who shall not be mentioned". 

The book where our squatter is described as a KGB operative and one  of those who was instumental in bringing Putin to power. 

Being one of "Putin's People", no doubt he thinks he is above the law. This week I found out too that he has duped his latest car renting company who he hadn't paid. He gave them false a BBVA bank transfer receipt just as he did us. They have now taken his car away. 

In France meanwhile, President Macron was damning those unvaccinated as numbers of  those infected sore. He used the words "Je vais emmerder les non vaccinés". His words very not very presidential and this could cause him problems with elections coming up. Frankly I think he is right. This week Italy has made it compulsory for those over 50 to be vaccinated. In Austria it is compulsory for all those eligible and the unvaccinated in most parts of the world are those who are causing  most admissions to hospitals.

This week we learned that the tennis star Novak Djokovic is probably one of them. He has certainly showed his doubts about being vaccinated on occasion and now he is stuck in Australia where he had traveled to compete in the Australian Open which he has won many times. You all know by now that he has been detained and that the Australian population are up in arms. 

This story is front page news worldwide and has probably damaged Novak's reputation forever. So while he was in quarantine and detained in some seedy hotel on the outskirts of Melbourne, life continued for us mortals.

We woke up on Kings' Day looking forward to enjoying it with our grandchildren. They were here for breakfast and Oli brought the "roscones" - a "roscón" is a special cake with or without cream in it and is a sort of enriched sponge cake with angelica on the top and is delicious. I laid the table so it all looked festive. I caught Elliot in the photo sitting in my father's place. He is of course the future. 

Elliot at the breakfast table on Kings' Day

Elliot was going to enjoy his presents afterwards, the ones under the tree.

Our tree with the presents ready for opening

He was excited and kept saying "oto" ("otro" - another one) and "open". His first present was a Fireman Sam train set which I suspect his father enjoyed more than him hahaha. I had bought his some really cheapo looking Paw Patrol figures which were most disappointing but he loves them. Here he is with his mother and Juliet opening a present.

Elliot enjoying opening presents

Meanwhile I looked on contentedly while little or not so little Juliet was in my arms. She is just so lovely but far too young at 4 months to know what was going on. I have chosen it as this week's feature photo.

While the kids enjoy presents on Kings' Day mothers, mostly, have to make a lunch fit for kings. That was my job of course. I made roast lamb with all the trimmings and we didn't sit down until about 3 pm. Our table looked festive again, the last time this Christmas as now the party is definitely over.

Our Kings' Day lunch table

Missing of course to make the day complete were my father and Suzy. The next day, 7th January, Facebook reminded me of our Kings' Day 10 years ago on 6th January 2012. There we were all together. Again my father's absence was felt, as it is every day. 

Our Kings' Day family photo with my father 10 years ago. 

My father loved the celebrations and we loved him partaking in them.

The rest of the day was spent lazily. I had eaten so much all I could do was sleep. Of course I didn't want any dinner. I just drank copious amounts of water. 

Friday 7th January came, the day of Russian Christmas which we used to celebrate at home when I was a child. I doubt my "KGB operative" squatter even bothered. At least we didn't see him that day.

For the record that day I wore one of my Kings' Day presents. I got two lovely dresses, chosen by me hahaha but officially from my husband. This is the H&M one - a long jumper dress, my favourite comfort clothing.

Wearing my new dress

What I did see that day and which amazed me was the entry for my father's family in the 1921 census which opened to the public on 6th January 2022, 101 years after. My second cousin, Katriona, who lives in Glasgow sent me the information pertaining to my father. It was quite a unique moment; a flash back to 100 years ago. Katriona has an account with www.findmypast.com and so do I but you have to pay for the information - about 3.5 pounds but maybe it's worth it. I cannot fathom why it takes so long for a census to become public. Let me share with you the family entry. P.D. Katriona is my father's great niece - daughter of William Fox Lloyd, his father, John Collins Lloyd's brother.

The entry for my father and his family in the 1921 Census

The census is a snapshot of society 101 years ago - for England and Wales - some 38 million people. In my family's entry I can see the ages of my grandparents 33 and 29 - and my father 2 of course. They were quite old to be parents in those days. Of interest is that living with them also were my grandmother's sister and mother. Even more interesting, the inclusion of a "servant" - Annie Davies - who is described as single. I suppose in those days it was normal to have a servant. My father did mention that his family had servants and a cook at times. He remembers one  who had such a stutter she could often only communicate by singing. I wonder if that was Anne Davies who has a Welsh surname as the Welsh are well known for singing? I shall never know. I shall never know either what the comment "both alive" next to my father's entry means. The census is handwritten so I can only surmise a clerk made a mistake and should have put maybe "born alive". But even that doesn't make much sense. No, we shall never know. But by golly I was gobsmacked to see the entry from 1921 of my father and his family. 

Friday 7th was the day we should have taken down the Christmas decorations but I procrastinated - a behaviour my father always abhorred. But I'm sure he would have loved that we did the food shopping and had a coffee out. When he first came to live with us he always did the food shopping with Eladio and loved those outings.

The rest of the day was spent quietly with not much to report so let me move on to Saturday 8th January. That was the day our squatter's car was probably taken away as "he who should not be mentioned" went out with his accumulated rubbish (we no longer clean his room or give him new linen), came back in and then never left the house and we haven't seen the car. Thus we were home alone with him which was a frightening prospect. We realised we could not leave the house together. Therefore we got down to the unpleasant task of removing the Christmas decorations, a task I always hate. This year we did it in record time.

Elliot playing with his toys

We decided then that we could go on our walks but separately.  While Eladio was out I sat on one of the sofas in the lounge where you can see the staircase and control his movements. He came into the kitchen twice and I told him I would prefer him not to come in again and NOT to touch Pippa (after all two of our dogs died last year during his stay). He looked in dire straits. Oli was worried and we both came up with a solution - to put a camera in the kitchen. The other solution was to put on the alarm while we had our siesta. 

Oli and family came in the afternoon to install the camera but they also brought us company and comfort. With them in the house he didn't dare come down from what is not his room. I can only surmise too that he has run out of food. To get to the nearest supermarket it is at least a 1.5km walk. He probably had a few biscuits but not much else.  The camera was installed also to make sure he doesn't steal our food. This all sounds completely demented doesn't it? That in your own house a squatter is protected by law to stay there and that he has rights is something from a horror story. Well, that's what we are living, our own horror story. 

While Oli and family were here though we were able to focus on other things - apart from Miguel who had to set up the camera and connect it to my phone. We talked about my father and our house in Heaton Grove, Bradford - number 6, never to be forgotten and where we moved in in 1965. 

6 Heaton Grove, Bradford. Our family home from 1965 to 2005

Our house, like others on the street, was built by rich German wool merchants in the middle of the 19th century. In fact my parents bought it from a German Jewish couple, The "Groppers". It still had the original bathroom fixtures which were Victorian and beautiful. We should have kept them. Oli remembered the house well and wanted to find pictures from our old family albums to remember it better. That got us looking at other albums and we found some treasures. Perhaps the one I love best is the one below. It is of my father on Christmas Day with me and the girls in about 1990. He was 71 then. As Oli remarked he still had another 30 years to live. 

With my father at our old house on Christmas Day 1990 (circa)

Always a traditionalist, as the journalist pointed out in the obituary, he was wearing a tie that day and his suit. He looked so happy. We all looked happy.

We miss his presence but have our memories. He would have loved to have been with us yesterday by the fire with our tea and Oli's panettone. It's an Italian cake eaten at Christmas usually which has made it's way around the world into people's houses at Christmas. Being a traditionalist like my father I always rejected the idea. Also I thought I didn't really like panettone. Oli insisted I try hers and I had to admit it was delicious. 

The grandchildren took our minds off our horrible squatter situation and Elliot retired to his toy corner in the library lounge where he loves to play with his little figures and the girls' Fisher Price doll house. I caught him on camera.

Elliot playing yestereday at our house

It was soon dinner time. None of was hungry and we toyed with the idea of a take away. In the end I rustled up a meal including some of the last "perushki". Oli and family left late and we went to bed late, worried about the situation of course.

Today is Sunday and I haven't seen him yet but will tell him today that he cannot use our kitchen or our things anymore. A tense situation which is about to get tenser I'm afraid.

On the bright side - I always like to look on the bright side - today is a sunny day and we shall take our walks but separately. Hopefully we will be joined by our grandchildren again this afternoon.

So my friends, these are the tales of this week. Happy reading and cheers till next Sunday,

Masha