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As a volunteer who does some craft work with the Calabash African Caribbean Elders Club, I was invited to attend the celebratory event for the 75th anniversary of the docking in England of the Empire Windrush on the 22nd of June this year. The event sponsored by the National Lottery was put on by Team Inspiration KYV CIC, for the Calabash African Caribbean Elders and other Elders in the community. 

The event was very well attended by members of the club as well as another group who attend the Calabash and members of Kora another Elders club as well as Elders from the community.

From the very start, the event was lively, colourful, and enjoyable with steel pans. Endurance Steel Band, playing in the courtyard, and people dancing along while being provided with tasty drinks, bear in mind that this was a daytime event so fruit juice was featured here. There were several displays around the center showing memorabilia from the era as well as work made by the club members. The work was much admired to the pleasure of those who had contributed to the making of it. 

After a while of mingling, we were all invited to the larger area for introductions and a prayer to start the day.

Our hostess Saleah was excellent, her storytelling and repartee were both amusing and informative. She involved other members of the audience as well as other performers. 

Despite not being from the Caribbean myself I spent my career teaching in Catford with many children from the area as my pupils, and so the patois was largely familiar to me, and I was highly entertained by the informal and inclusive style of Saleah. She spent the day in character telling us stories and anecdotes about when she first came to England with her husband Hubert. 

The stories involved the use of props which were artifacts from the era, and she often engaged with the audience to encourage them to remember, using, or having, such things as the paraffin heater that you could put your kettle or pot on.

As well as the banter there was singing of familiar songs, which everybody really enjoyed including me, and later a professional singer, Audrey Scott, sang for everyone and people again including me joined in by dancing. 

After the first round of entertainment, we moved to the other room for lunch. This was provided by Refil who gave us a wide choice of popular Caribbean foods such as jerk chicken, rice and peas, macaroni cheese, curried goat, and rice, and so on. The food was well prepared, displayed, and most importantly tasty and the staff were outstanding, understanding, and catering to the needs of the elders. I had my favourite jerk chicken with rice and peas and enjoyed it very much. Along with the food, there were of course drinks available for all, no alcohol. 

I had intended to go home at this point but was enjoying the day so much that I stayed on for part of the afternoon.

After lunch, there were a number of presentations to celebrate significant people such as Ms. Veta Louise Hinds who is 105. Her bouquet was presented to her granddaughter Susanne. Additionally, all elders in attendance received goodie bags filled with gifts, sponsored by Grace Food and Team Inspiration KYV CIC. 

We went on to have a singsong which went down especially well. We were invited to guess the songs and we did very well. Personally, I enjoyed it very much since the songs were all familiar and I decided then that I was going to be fine when the time came for me to go into an old person’s home as I really liked the experience of singing along with friends. 

I left after this and went excitedly home to tell my husband what a good day I had experienced. A day full of stories, music, and dance. A huge thank you needs to be given to all the organisers, entertainers, and catering staff for giving us all a great celebratory day, they did the Windrush Generation proud. 

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Eilidh Stewart