As children we didn't take much notice of all this talk. It was almots like the stories Dardie has made up for us. But all of a sudeen the stories got very close to home. While in bed one night Sandra and I overheard Dardie telling Marmie that he wanted to go and make a new life in England. He was frustrated by not being able to play jazz, the music he had heard so much about but got such little opportunity to play because the music in Trinidad was calypso, Latin and steel pan. A friend who had settled in England had written and told him he would not only get a chance to play jazz but also to make lots of money. The discussion went on into the night and over the next weeks newspapers advertising jobs and boat journeys to Britain were left around the house. Some nights, in bed, I could hear Marmie crying, saying she would never leave us. I felt so reassured by those words, they were my only comfort during those restless nights. I started to have dreams, bad dreams, nightmares of being left alone, falling with no one to catch me. I told not a soul about my dreams and anxieties -- if I did then perhaps they would come true and I didn't want them to. So I kept silent, pretended I didn't know what was going on. But the talk of going to England never stopped.

Then finally it was decided that all eight of us couldn't go at once, so Dardie would go first and send for us later. I was so relieved that Marmie wasn't going to leave us too. I was sad to see Dardie go, so I cried a little when he left, but was soon back to my old self. Life hadn't changed much as Marmie was still with us, things were almost back to normal, no more constant talk of going to England. But then the unthinkable happened: Marmie started asking family and friends if they would look after us, because she was going to join Dardie in England without us. I was devastated; she was going to break her vow, she had said she would never leave us.

I wished night after night that it wouldn't happen. I though my wish had come true when none of my family would take us -- they all had too many children. Grandparents usually took care of the children when parents left for a new world but that was not to be the case with us, we had none. Marmie began to sell the furniture and all her jewellery as well as the silver we got got out christenings. She started singing in her own special way. The same song she sang before Dardie left -- now she was singing it again and again:

She would start to cry and hug us while she sang. Then we would all start to cry. I couldn't understand why she wanted to leave us. If she loved us why couldn't we all stay together, especially as no one wanted to take care of us?

But she kept telling us that she did love us and that is why she was going to England to try to make a better life for us. We couldn't all go together because she and Dardie didn't have enough money, but one day they would.

Unexpectedly two of our godparents said they would take us. We couldn't stay together though. Lester and Ellington would stay south in San Fernando, Sandra and I would go north to Tunapuna. The lucky two were Cynthia and Junior, the two youngest, who would go with Marmie to England. This was the day when the veil of unhappiness came down on my life. To be separated from Dardie was bad enough, he had now been gone for a year. But to be separated from my beloved Marmie and my younger brothers and sister was like the end of the world to me. My happy little world was beginning to crack and break into pieces, drifting away from me like flower petals scattered on a pond. We were all so very close, we all played together and had no other friends. Life was going to be sad and lonely and that soon proved to be true.

The people who looked after Sandra and me (we called them Auntie and Uncle as a sign of respect even though we weren't related) treated us like servants. Lester and Ellington were treated even worse by the people who looked after them. They had to fight each other for food, winner take all. They worked hard in the day and at night were forced to sleep not in a bed but under it! We were told every day that we were lucky to have someone to give us a home and that we should be grateful to them because we could have ended up in an orphanage. Later Marmie told us that twice a month she had sent us money, clothes and parcels but we never saw any of them.

Instead, we had to work from five o'clock in the morning cleaning the house, preparing meals and washing, all before we left for school. I was so tired I didn't learn much at our new school. But I remember Sandra and me being bullied because we were newcomers. I was a good fighter and fought Sandra's battles for her too.

One of the most embarrassing moments I had there was when the elastic in my home-made knickers snapped as I ran to school to avoid being late. The knickers landed at my feet and all the children started laughing at me, especially one particular boy. I was so angry and humiliated that I lashed out at him. He was bigger than me, but I didn't care. I must have looked and acted crazy because from then on no one teased or bullied Sandra and me again.

After school it was no fun, except when we walked home during the mango season. The mango trees would be laden with ripe juicy fruit. It looked so tempting and irresistable that Sandra and I would risk all to get some of the sweet, mouthwatering fruit. We would climb over the fence and pick as many mangoes from the drooping branches as we dared before the owner chased us off. If the mangoes weren't ripe we would both get tummy ache from eating them.

One day, on our way home, we say the preparations for a funeral. A local man had died and neighbours were encouraged to go in and pay their last respects. Sandra and I presuaded each other to go in and pay ours. I didn't know what to expect or quite understand why I was going in; the truth was that I didn't want to go home and anything to delay us for just a blissful moment was welcome. So we shuffled into the hushed room where the open mahogany casket was laid on the table. I slowly edged forward until it was my turn to say goodbye. I looked down at the old man's face and was so surprised at what I saw. It was the most peaceful and serene face I had ever seen. He didn't look old and wrinkled but contented, almost smiling. I smiled back at him as I whispered goodbye under breath. I wasn't scared, but happy that I had discovered something that, up until then, had been the unknown. The atmosphere at the funeral was quite different. This was when the mourners let their feelings out &mdash they cried and wailed, some even threw themselves across the casket. Later that evening the family had a 'wake' to celebrate his life give him a good send-off. It was like a party.

There was nothing for me to celebrate when I got home, only work: ironing clothes, picking the husks off the rice, sweeping the big dusty yard and collecting the eggs. I remember once hacing cried myself to sleep that night. In fact most nights Sandra and I cried ourselves to sleep. We wrote to Marmie in England but out letters were always vetted and lines cross out if Auntie and Uncle didn't approve of what we wrote. After a few months we moved to a new house with an inside bath and toilet. Auntie bought all the latest gadgets: a fridge, an electric iron -- you name it, she bought it. She was a very superstitious woman and each day at the new house Sandra and I had to go through the bizarra ritual of waking up at four in the morning and sprinkling holy water around the house, especially across the doorway, to ward off evil spirits.