Remembering Aberfan
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(Photo: The Aberfan memorial at Bryntaf Cemetery by Stephen McKay courtesy of wikipedia).
1966 was not a good year for me, despite England winning the World Cup, it saw the Aberfan disaster happen and about two weeks later my father died, both were total surprises to the thirteen year old child that I was.
I can remember coming home from school and seeing the black and white images on the television as my mother watched the news. Seeing the despair on the faces of the rescuers will remain etched in my memory for as long as I live.
Aberfan was a small mining village a few miles from Merthyr Tydfil in the South Wales valleys, through which flowed the River Taff. Though born in Cardiff, it was very near this same river and at the time, I was living even closer to it, a mere 250 yards away. As a Welsh woman I feel a connection to every one of the 144 lives lost the day the coal tip collapsed and 40,000 cubic metres of rock and shale slurry buried Pant Glas school. Tomorrow, 21st October is the fiftieth anniversary of that dreadful day.
Today, I received a CD of Cantata Memoria by Karl Jenkins a tribute in music to the lost souls of the disaster. Tomorrow, I shall make some time to listen to it as my own tribute to the children and their teachers who perished. I shall also probably remember my dad who although we knew was unwell, we didn't realise he had so few days left to live. I wonder what my relationship would have been with him as an adult, especially an adult female - I shall never know, anymore than we shall know if any of those children would have become world famous in the arts or sciences.