Friends of the TRNC Emergency Services
Afternoon Tea Talk – June 2013
By Margaret Sheard
The months are flying by and we found ourselves at another of the monthly Afternoon Tea Talks organised by the Friends of the TRNC 
Emergency Services at the Mountain View Hotel in Karaoğlanoğlu. There was a change to the original talk planned as unfortunately the scheduled speaker had to postpone due to family illness and luckily Edward Barrett stepped into the breach.
The turnout for the event was a little disappointing with around 30 people attending and some people being unable to attend at the last minute but it was nice to see some of the usual friendly faces of the supporters of this very worthy cause.
Mike Plant welcomed everyone and brought them up to date with forthcoming events which includes the 60’s night on the 21st June at The Mountain View Hotel, when there
will be a Blues Brothers tribute band and a disco with Werner’s Steam Machine. Tickets are selling fast but there are still some available. On Monday evening the 24th June, there is the monthly quiz at The Ravine in Alsancak which is 15TL and includes a delicious supper of Fish and Chips or Shish.
The guests started tucking into the sandwiches and cakes with tea or coffee and before long Mike was introducing the speaker for the afternoon, Edward Barrett.
Edward had previously spoken about “Mayors he has known” and he 
made a slight correction to the advertised topic which should have been shown as “More Mayors and more Madams”.
We had a very interesting and entertaining talk accompanied by a slide show and Edward recollected some of his experiences in dealing with Mayors and Madam Mayors during his time as Clerk to the Charter Trustees of the Bath City Council in England. There were a multitude of duties which Edward had to arrange and he told the audience about some of the vast variety of events he was involved in organising. We were treated to many amusing stories too numerous to mention here so I am noting just a 
few of the topics Edward covered during his talk.
The first Madam Mayor he had dealings with was an elderly spinster and there was an occasion when during a visit to Provence in France she was taken ill and had to go to hospital, the rest of the group “legged” it back to England and Edward, with his limited amount of French, was left to deal with the situation. As he was in charge of Madam Mayor’s passport he discovered that she was in fact 10 years older than she claimed! It was quite a harrowing experience as he was left there with very little money and no accommodation but he managed to sort things out and eventually Madam Mayor was discharged from hospital and they made their way back to Bath.
There were occasions when Edward accompanied the Mayor or 
Madam Mayor in office to various countries for reciprocal functions, football matches and in some cases for the purpose of the twinning of a town or city with Bath which was always a very enjoyable experience. There was the job of looking after VIP’s and this was when some of the ceremonial trappings saw the light of day. Edward got to wear the Master of Ceremonies badge which he said was a great honour and he also showed slides of other civic items, some of which were extremely old.
Another occasion, although a sad one, was on the death of Princess Diana which was a Sunday and the Charter Trustees were due to attend a church service that day so it was necessary to produce a huge amount of black ribbon which needed to be cut for various uses, including hats for dignitaries, the mace and the robes. It was a very rainy day so everyone got soaked during the parade and as Edward had the job of dealing with all of this he got extremely wet throughout the day.
All in all Edward enjoyed the time he spent with the Mayors and Madam Mayors of Bath and can look back 
on some very memorable experiences.
After the talk, Mike started the raffle and then the famous “goodie bag” so there was a lot of laughter at Mike’s usual humorous comments. The total raised for the charity from this event was 250TL.
