The Harmonica

This picture of me was taken on the bridge over the Tsavo river on the road from Mombasa to Nairobi. It was when I was first sent 'home' to England to school in January 1954, when the company's driver took my mother, her friend Bobby Thomas, my brother and I to Nairobi to put me on the 'plane to England,. We spent the night at the Tsavo Hotel.

Throughout the trip I played a mouth organ incessantly, which must have been murder for everyone else as I didn't know how to play it, but it helped with the misery I felt and I don't suppose anyone had the heart to tell me to stop.

Somehow, the mouth organ has stuck with me through the years and is resident in the little brown suitcase. It hasn't been played in years.

At top right, there's a 'G' stamped into the metalwork, so I assume it was tuned to G. I also note that it carries the warning 'Foreign'! There's no indication of where it was made.