When she came up to visit, my mum watched 'The Mighty Boosh' (British comedy show) for the first time. She particularly enjoyed watching the green hiker - a crooked cockney character of a bygone era - sing about eels:
"Eels up inside ya
findin an entrance where they can
eels up inside ya
finding an entrance where they can
Boring through your mind, through your tummy, through your anus, eels!"
Mum was so impressed that she went out and bought herself an 'eels' badge (yes, it's a badge that says 'eels') and now wears it proudly around her neighbourhood, taking impish delight in thrusting her chest into the faces of the WI women and shouting 'eels!' in their faces in her loud, brash cockney best.
As a little girl, mum would love nothing more than to play with eels in the bath. "We was poor, we had no toys, we took 'em from the cook pot when mum weren't looking". This, and the fact that mum was born and bred on Walworth Road in South London, was recently revealed to me after years of questions. Mum's guarded about her childhood. When I asked if she'd ever go back to where she was born - Elephant-and-Castle (now famous for the garish pink elephant-topped shopping centre) she replied "What's to go back to? I'd rather leave it all behind" Too many memories, better to forget.
Her chipper cockney accent could not be erased so easily. Looking for work at 14 she soon learnt that if she wanted a job in the City then she must speak proper - lose the sing-song slang of her youth and flatten the vowels. She learnt to be ashamed of being cockney. Years later and she's baffled: "All the REAL cockneys don't sound it and all posh kids want it". When speaking with strangers, mum puts on her best telephone voice. But she can't always control it - it slips out when she least expects it - effin and blindin when she's barmin (mad) or London callin when she's bawlin. In other words, it eels it when she feels it.
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