I Am Who I Am Because.... 2

....in 1934 a young woman who had a secretarial job with the Asiatic Petroleum Company in London went to some lengths to comfort a good friend who had had her heart broken, as they described it in those days, by a young man.  In the time they spent together the first young woman described her ambition to find a job in an interesting part of the world, something she had already been actively pursuing, for example by asking whether APCo would post her abroad - they said she was too young - and by visiting both the Canadian and South African High Commissions, also without success.

The young woman with ambitions to travel was my mother, Helen Wilson - pictured above while on holiday in the Lake District - and her kindness brought an unexpected reward, because her friend, Ruth McElderry, was the daughter of the Chief Secretary in the British administration in Zanzibar and Mr McElderry was looking for a confidential secretary.

Ruth told her father about Helen, and wrote to Helen advising her to contact her father directly, which she did, with the result that she set sail for Zanzibar in 1935.

At about the same time a young ships' agent, who had worked in Port Sudan and was currently in a frustrating job in Beira, in Portuguese East Arica, was recruited to the African Mercantile, which operated as a ships' agency in ports in British East Africa. That young man was my father, Cecil Haylett, and he was posted to Zanzibar, where he met Helen Wilson.

Read the first of the "I am who I am...." posts here.