I came to London for the first time
in 1961. 1961.
My husband thinks I should actually
have some sort of pearly outfit.
I'm from York, so North Yorkshire,
so the sort of hardest part
of Yorkshire.
All of my family
are Arsenal supporters.
Myself and my youngest son Harry,
we're the black sheep of the family,
we follow Spurs.
My first memories of London were
coming to London for the weekend,
and the family would kind of,
we'd have a weekend down in the city,
where the main event
was to go and see a show
in the West End,
which I was always
very, very excited about.
It's just too congested,
it's just too much noise,
there's just too much going on.
London to me
was all about Duran Duran,
and tea and biscuits,
probably the Royal family.
In London you can lose your identity
and be anybody you want to be,
I suppose.
To move to a city like London,
which is so accepting and, you know,
there's huge diversity, it seemed
like an ideal place for me to go
and set up my life, really.
The International Olympic Committee
has the honour of announcing
that the Games of the 30th Olympiad
in 2012
are awarded to
the City of London!
Well, that day,
I travelled to my local station,
and my daughter was with me,
she was about 12 at that time,
and normally
she would walk to school.
But because we were so excited
about the Olympics,
she said,
"Mum, I'll see you to the train."
I just thought, "Oh, I could do with
"another ten minutes in bed,"
so I reset my alarm and thought
I'd just get the later train,
the overground train.
My habit has always been
to arrive early.
I don't like being late.
Perhaps it's a personality defect.
I can't do it.
It's only myself and my daughter
in the mornings,
with a bit of shouting,
managed to get breakfast down her,
and then we left out together,
because her school wasn't far
from the station that I go in to.
It was just a typical morning for me
except that I had a lot on my mind
because I knew
we were going to start
this big move of the library
following day.
So I came in half an hour earlier
than I normally do.
So she walked me to the station,
and I saw a train the station,
and I thought, "I'm not running
for that one, I'll get the next one.
"It can wait." So I was talking
to her, I said goodbye to her,
and I caught the next train
into work.
I've been commuting for
10, 15 years, or more, now.
Generally people don't talk very
much to their fellow commuters.
Sometimes you get a group of people
chatting to each other,
and then you'll notice other
commuters looking over at them,
wishing that they would be quiet.
Because they just want to
tuck into their newspaper or book.
It's just like, "Excuse me.
Excuse me. Excuse me!"
You know, I mean,
nine times out of ten
they're usually a tourist anyway,
so they don't understand
the etiquette of tube behaviour.
So I would look around, and try
and get a smile out of someone,
or give someone a smile -
something like that anyway. Yeah.
Sometimes some people
think you're a bit weird.
I suppose they're all
people going somewhere.
I have no painting skills whatsoever,
but I love doing this.
I love colours,
I love bright colours.
Here's the people going somewhere,
again.
I think
there's this thing in me that,
I don't really want to be counselled
out of where I am at the moment.
It may sound a bit odd, you know,
but I don't want to...
It's as if I'm going to be
counselled out of not...
thinking about my son,
you understand?
So I tend to...
I tend to do it this way.
For me, this is the best way
to do it.
It's almost, I still want to hold on
to part of the anger as well.
The angry feeling of my son
being taken away.
You know, and it's like
I need that part of it as well,
to keep me going.
Got off the Victoria line
at King's Cross
and I made my way
to the Piccadilly line.
And then an announcement was made
that there was going to be delays,
and in that space of a few minutes,
loads of people now started
to make their way onto the platform,
and then before I knew it, the
platform was heaving with people,
and the train still hadn't come in.
So yeah, ran straight to the top,
and the way that
Moorgate tube station is,
the escalator's at the top,
and then I did a right and then
you're immediately on the platform.
And then... a tube
was coming into the platform,
and I thought, "What a result!"
And then at 8:48, the train came in.
Couldn't get a seat.
So I sort of went to the right
and stood in front of the chairs,
but just a little way
from the doors.
It's only one or two stops
to travel like this,
where I couldn't raise my hands.
I think the bag I was carrying
was trapped
somewhere two or three feet
away from me,
so my left arm
was probably stretched out
and caught between two other people.
I mean, I'd travelled
on the underground at that time
for about 17 or 18 years, and I'd
never been on a train that packed.
I was looking round
the other passengers
because there was a chap
sitting opposite me,
James, I believe his name was,
who had caught my eye,
and so I was just looking
at the other passengers.
I'd finished reading the newspaper,
I wasn't listening to an iPod.
And the train
pulled out into the tunnel.
I remember the eastbound train
coming in the other direction,
on the tracks alongside us.
I was still reading
the Metro newspaper...
and I remember there was
suddenly a very loud bang.
This is a book which we were asked
to contribute, each family,
some photographs and some words.
There we go.
There's a picture of David.
And we just wrote a couple of pages
talking about him
growing up at school,
and the holidays. Holidays.
He was a bit sensitive - you know,
if anyone said to him,
"Your hair is stuck up,"
or anything like that...
He took to wearing this cap,
because he had lovely thick hair
and he'd wear a cap.
He wore that cup, we couldn't
get it off him, could we?
But he had a Goth phase
in his teens, which was quite...
That was quite funny.
..Funny, wasn't it?
Him and his girlfriend at the time,
Jenny.
I always tell the story,
I came home one day when he was 15,
and he was putting on
Jill's mascara.
And I remember thinking,
"Oh, my God, what have we got here?"
And of course he was just going
through the goth phase.
He took to big, black baggy
trousers. The whole black outfit.
Black cap, black top. Dyed his
hair black. Dyed his hair black.
I mean, David was...
He was fun, you know?
I can't talk about it.
You'll have to do it. All right.
You have to remember, David was 22.
And we'd spent 22 years guiding him
and trying to get him ready
for the world.
And in fact, we kind of...
When he started this job
that took him to London,
we kind of breathed sigh of relief,
didn't we, cos we thought...
"We got him through his teens."
Job done.
We've got him through his teens.
No drugs, nothing to worry about.
He's never been arrested. No trouble.
We just thought, "Thank God for
that." And then he started this job,
and we thought, "Absolutely
fantastic, job done."
There was a flash, and lights,
and lots of buzzing.
The train shuddered to a halt.
And I remember
seeing in the window opposite me
a white flash with a mushrooming,
fiery cloud around it.
And then before I had hardly even
registered that,
I was just engulfed in the blast.
Just a huge blast of wind and fire.
It was so ferocious,
you wouldn't be able to imagine it
unless you'd actually been there.
I just remember this light,
this white light that was just
completely in front of my face.
We were sort of all
enveloped in this light,
and it was a sort of feeling of
pressure,
it just wouldn't sort of,
it wouldn't go away.
The force was such that
I really thought that my head
was no longer attached
to my shoulders,
and I remember
hearing the screams,
which of course
doesn't make any sense
cos if I didn't have a head
I wouldn't be able
to hear anything,
but I remember hearing the screams
and I just thought that everybody
was screaming at me.
I thought this was just an isolated
event that had happened to me.
The blast seemed to go on... forever.
I expect it was only a few seconds.
But it seemed to go on and on.
I was sure I was going to die
at that point.
And I can remember just thinking
of my children, and thinking,
"I don't want to leave my children
now, they're not grown up.
"I haven't finished
the job I'm doing as a mother."
I just started to see
this light smoke,
sort of like...
coming, like, past me.
And then I felt quite light.
And then just I thought to myself,
oh, that I was now
beginning to float.
And then I just said to myself,
"How embarrassing,
I feel like I'm going to faint."
And that was it,
I just went into darkness.
Just went into darkness.
Duty manager. Tony, it's Darren.
Hello, Darren.
What's happening, mate, do you know?
204, apparently, has reported
hearing an explosion on his train.
Explosion on train, yeah?
Or a bang on his train.
Hello, pips?
Hello, pip controller here,
just to let you know we've got
a T op, 0850 at Russell Square.
CC information, hello?
I'm assistant manager at Aldgate,
we've just had a big explosion,
there appears to be something
ahead of the train in the track.
Has anyone been injured at all?
We're not aware that anybody's
been injured as yet, no. OK.
But there is smoke. Yeah?
We've lost all power as well.
No power? OK.
Now, you're not the only one
who's actually had this done,
so I'm going to confirm
with my manager,
and we, we'll be in touch with you
in a sec, all right? OK, yes.
Cos I don't know what,
whether anything's been called out.
Soon as I know, I'll ring you
back, all right?
OK, thanks. Thanks, bye.
No, it won't be that one,
I don't think.
Well, I wrote to
Tony Blair about 11 days...
I suppose, it must have been,
after Emily had been identified.
And I wrote to him and said,
"I utterly blame you and George Bush
for the death of my daughter."
I suppose,
"yours sincerely, Sarah Jenkins."
And heard nothing.
And was incensed, and wrote again,
and heard nothing.
On the third time of writing, I
put a stamped, addressed envelope in,
because I felt he might be short
of envelopes, really, and nothing.
And then the next occasion
I wrote and put a biro in
and a stamped, addressed envelope,
and heard nothing.
And on the fourth occasion I wrote
with a stamped, addressed envelope,
another biro,
and just scribbled on the back,
"If on holiday, please forward."
I've got it here.
"I'm writing on behalf
of the Prime Minister
"to thank you for your further letter
of the 13th of August.
"I'm enclosing a copy of the
Prime Minister's reply to your letter
"of the 22nd of July,
"which crosses with your letter
of the 13th of August."
"Dear Mrs Jenkins,
"I'm desperately sorry to hear about
"the death of Emily Rose,
your daughter.
"It is impossible for anyone
"who has not lost a child
in terrible circumstances
"to understand the agony
you must be suffering.
"I don't think it would be
sensible to go over the arguments
"about the causes behind
the explosions on the 7th of July.
"I continue to believe, however,
that the people to blame
"for taking the life of your daughter
and so many others
"were those that planned
and carried out the bombings
"in London on that day.
"I also recognise
there is nothing I can say
"which will help ease
your pain or grief.
"Yours sincerely, Tony Blair."
Do you think he feels responsible?
I don't know what he feels
in the middle of the night.
No, I expect, I expect Mr Blair
doesn't feel responsible,
wouldn't you?
As the smoke cleared, I could see
a little around the carriage.
And I realised, there had just been
a huge amount of devastation.
The doors were blown off,
there were great pieces of buckled
and twisted metal lying around.
All the windows were blown out.
I realised my shoulders and hair
were covered in glass.
I couldn't believe I had survived,
I think it's given me a huge respect
for the resilience
of the human body,
that any of us could
have survived that,
when you saw what it had done
to the carriage.
The first thought
that went through my mind
was that I was at home in bed
having a nightmare,
you know, those nightmares
you get when you're in that position,
you either daren't move,
or you can't move
because something's
frozen you in that space of time.
I thought, "Oh, it's one of those,"
then I thought, "I don't like
this very much, go back to sleep,
"and when I wake up
it might be different."
But, of course, when I came to again
it wasn't different,
I was, it was still dark.
I could smell smoke,
and then I woke up
and found myself lying on
a train track,
um, beside a train,
and I could see that
we were at a platform,
because I could see, "Aldgate"
written on the other side.
I could see the platform
on the other side.
So, there was a train,
there was myself,
train tracks, and then platform.
I thought I had fallen out,
and almost like, nobody had noticed,
sort of thing.
You know, "Trust me
to lean on the door,"
and, "What idiot
would lean on the door?"
"Something's bound to happen
at some point."
Um, and it didn't occur to me
that there had been an explosion
or anything like that.
You know, it just wouldn't
cross your mind.
I could see this white thing,
and I thought, "What's that?"
And then I looked up
and it was my new trainer,
that, I'd only worn them
that morning,
and I know this sounds
so, uh, not shallow, but...
It was my new, sort of, Adidas,
shell-toe trainers, white.
You know, it was mid-summer,
wasn't it,
I'd just worn them
for the first time that morning.
And I could see it on
the top of this, the metal,
and, with, like, blood all over it,
and I just thought,
"That's my trainer,
"what's that doing up there?"
You know, um, again, not
really realising that, you know...
I know now what extent my injuries
were, you know.
But not realising that actually,
my leg was up there,
it was still attached to my leg.
People were screaming out
that they can't feel their legs,
they can't feel their arms, do you
know what I mean, they were in pain.
It was so much...
It was just chaos down there,
it was just madness.
There was limbs,
you could see parts of peoples arms.
Oh.
Some people scared me
cos they just looked so scary,
I just felt that I couldn't even
reach out to them
and ask them if they were all right.
And that hurts me, because I felt...
Because I knew I needed help,
and I just felt like
I couldn't help them.
Sometimes you can't even find
the words to describe
what went on down there.
Everything was just black and white,
and the only thing that was in...
Oh, it was like a horror movie,
the only thing that
was in colour was the blood.
It was just horrible.
Just really horrible.
I didn't check myself over because
I knew I hadn't been injured,
seriously injured, I hadn't been hit
by anything or struck by anything.
But James, the chap that was
sitting opposite me, he stood up,
and was getting very agitated,
I think he was very concerned.
Well, I thought I was going to die,
and I was upset because
I wanted to go to college still.
Cos I was expected to
go to college, still.
And I was just worried and nervous
and anxious,
and not very happy.
He mentioned to us
that he was autistic
and needed to get to his father,
I think it was,
and just, you know,
wanted his father.
So, we just had to keep
reassuring him that we would be OK,
and we would get out.
Come on, Bibi, come on, Sally,
you coming?
This is Sally,
she's named after Lee and Sam.
And we had her in the October
after it happened,
so, she's named after Sam and Lee.
So, Sally.
They had been together for 14 years,
they would have still
been together now.
Move all these, these are my
next things to put into my files.
Yeah, yeah, so...
As you can see,
I am a terrible hoarder.
Loads and loads of bits and pieces.
And... I don't know what else
I've got in here.
All these photographs, there's Lee.
Dancing away. Not knowing what to do.
He was like a dad
before he got to be a dad,
you know, like an older dad.
He danced like a dad? Yeah.
Embarrassing dancing?
Yeah, embarrassing dancing, yes.
Terribly.
There's Sammy,
doing her dance and her jig.
And this is all Lee's stuff
that we've kept together.
His coat... and some clothes.
There's his, er...
beige trousers.
And his shirt, that he used to wear.
He just... isn't with us.
So that I can touch any more,
but all this stuff, I can touch.
This is his, his things.
It just means that I've got him.
Here.
I need...
to cling onto something
that is him.
I can't hold him any more,
but I can hold his things.
This was taken by a newspaper.
I saw this the day after it happened,
and didn't believe it.
Didn't want to believe it.
But that's my Lee.
Taken...
That's my Lee,
trying to be resus-ed.
That's my boy.
My handsome man.
Nobody in my carriage was hurt,
we weren't knocked over
or anything like that.
And then we noticed that smoke
was coming in through the end door,
of the carriage.
So I got my warrant card out.
I said, "I'm a police officer,
let me through."
So I left my carriage,
walked through to the next carriage.
And then it became apparent that
something quite bad had happened,
because people were coming
towards me with blood on them,
shaking, very slow, covered in dirt.
I thought, "Oh, we've had
an accident. We've hit something."
I thought
I was going into a train crash.
That's when I remember
this figure coming towards us,
um, from that carriage.
And then... I just remember
these piercing blue eyes,
'of this lady, and I just saw her,
and all I kept saying to her was, '
'"My name is Martine Wright,
please tell my mum and dad I'm OK,
' "my name's Martine Wright."
'She said, "Help me, help me.'
"I think my gut's hanging out,"
I think's what she said.
And I said, "Yes, I'll help you,
you're going to be all right.
"You're going to be all right.
Help's coming."
And then she gave me something.
She said,
"Put that round your left leg."
And again,
it's one of those sort of...
It's quite vivid,
my memory of that is quite vivid.
And I just kept thinking,
this is out of a Western.
This is out of a Western film.
I remember being a kid and watching
Westerns with John Wayne and stuff.
Someone had been shot in the leg,
and then you'd get a belt
and tie it around, tourniquet
round your leg to stop the bleeding.
I just remember just pulling it
so tight, so tight,
and just... And not remembering
the pain, I don't remember the pain.
'Network operations manager.
'Darren, I don't know
what's gone on down there,
'but people are coming up here
with blackened faces,
'all blood in their faces
and they're very distressed.
'So it definitely looks like
an explosion, yeah?
'Something's gone badly wrong
down there.
'We really don't know at the moment,
we just had a loud bang.
'People are coming with cuts,
all covered in shit. All right.
'Is there any more casualties
than just the one you know?
'No, just walking wounded
at the moment,
'and the one we know that's
under the train with legs missing.
'All I know at the moment.
All right, OK.
'We've still seen
no ambulances here.
'They're on their way,
obviously, we've...
'You need to make them aware
it is a big incident, we want a few.
'Yeah, OK. Cheers.'
'I could see people
in the carriage alongside, '
and they were frantically
trying to pull open the doors
on their carriage.
The people in the train beside us
started smashing the windows,
to try and help.
People were passing over
bottles of water.
But obviously there wasn't
a huge amount they could do.
There was one or two people
climbed over,
I think they had first aid skills.
We did start shouting across
saying, "We need some help here,
"first-aiders or people with
medical knowledge, training.
"We need some help here."
I was aware that there was
quite a lot of attention
around the middle of the carriage.
There was a guy who looked like
he was wedged in a hole,
trying very, very vigorously
to get out.
So we tried to help him get out,
I suppose, without thinking,
that's what you do.
He wasn't well. Um...
He wasn't well, I knew,
because he wasn't moving.
His limbs that I could see,
his arms were not flailing around.
But he had facial expression, um...
As I walked towards him, again,
I said who I was.
I did ask him his name but
he wasn't able to tell me a name.
'He said nothing in a verbal sense,
'but it was comforting to him
to have somebody talking to him.
'I climbed out of... beyond him
to the far side of the train, '
telling him I was going underneath
the train surface to see why he was,
could I release him from whatever
was keeping him trapped in there.
'And what I found was
the lower half of Stan's body
'was no longer attached to
the top half.'
And his torso
had been severed in that way,
by being blasted into the floor
from his seated position,
and obviously, it acted in
a very sort of knife-like way.
Very soon, and I don't think
I can even give you
a measure of 30 seconds,
a minute and a half, I don't know,
a very short space of time, um...
his life ended.
He stopped breathing,
and as you do that,
and the brain starts to shut down
and your muscles relax,
and I was able to lower Stan
to the track.
I did it for...
partly selfish reasons
for my own comfort,
that I'd done what I could
and he wasn't left
in that foul position,
and also, because, um...
I just felt it would be, er,
the right thing to do.
I noted also that
his eyes were still open,
and I do remember actually
closing his eyelids, because...
For one real positive reason,
it felt wrong to me, incongruous,
to be still looking at a world
that he was no longer part of.
I said a short prayer for Stan,
whether he was a man
of a religious following or not,
that I felt I wished him
a safe journey to wherever it was
that he believed he was going next,
as I closed his eyes.
A very...
A very hard moment,
very hard moment indeed.
"Stan Brewster, 1953-2005."
"Construction of this unique walkway
was led by Stan Brewster,
"chartered civil engineer
of Derbyshire county council,
"tragically lost his life in the
London bombings of July 7th, 2005.
"Stan took a special pride
in this project,
"and the walkway now stands
as a permanent reminder of his
professional life and work."
Half site, half was built on,
like, stilts. As you can see.
And then this part...
This part was, like,
cantilevered off this wall.
I couldn't, I couldn't build
something like this!
When you're young, I don't think
you appreciate your dad, like,
you know what I mean?
Until you grow older.
And that's what,
that's what I kind of miss now.
I kind of miss when you're that age
and your dad says,
"Let's go out and do something
together," and it's like...
at that age, you don't really
feel like doing it with him,
do you know what I mean?
And that's what I kind of miss now.
I'd love to go and play golf
with him,
love to go and have a pint with him,
it's things like that...
Oh! How you doing?
I'm all right, yeah.
I think it's easier when you, like,
I don't know.
I think it's easier
when you ask me questions.
It's hard, it all messes up in your
head, it's hard to get it out.
'The day after we knew
what had happened to Stan, '
'Mark, he was just 17,
and he'd got his driving test.'
And I can remember
sitting on the back lawn,
and there was loads of people here,
and I said,
"Mark, I don't think you're up
for this, to do your driving test."
And he walked up the garden and said,
"Mum, I'm going to do it
"cos I want to do it
to make you smile again."
And off he went and did his driving
test, and he came back and passed.
He ran up the garden, crying.
And I was crying as well,
and he said, "I've done it, Mum."
And I said to him,
"Dad would have been proud of you."
But he said, "I've done it
to make you smile again.
"I just want you to smile again."
People always said, like,
you've got to be strong for your mum
and your sister and that.
It's happened now. It's the way
you deal with it, I think.
You got to get on with life, like...
There'd be no point living if you...
You've just got to enjoy
what you've got.
I mean, my dad wouldn't want me
to just curl up in a ball, no way.
It'd be wrong to do that.
Hello, Pic. Hello there.
We heard a loud bang
in the region of Russell Square
on Russell Square westbound platform.
Then our TT tripped. I've had
the DSM go down at Russell Square.
He could find no damage to the
platform area but there's something,
I can't get in contact
with anyone at King's Cross
but customers are detraining
themselves from West 311
which is over the crossover
just west of King's Cross. Yeah.
They're walking east
and detraining themselves
onto the westbound platform.
All right, look after
whatever you can
and I'm going to get a decision now
on what we're going to do.
All right,
I'll come back to you, Gary.
We need ambulances and water
to Russell... To King's Cross.
I understand what you're saying.
And Russell Square.
Yeah, we'll get what we can to you.
At Russell Square,
it's one of the deepest parts
of the Piccadilly Line
and it's quite a way down.
I believe there's about 179 steps
on the emergency stairs
at Russell Square.
I went down to have a look to see
if there was anything untoward.
It's a single-track tunnel and
it's very dusty, it's quite humid
and it's very compact.
Once the train's in there
and moving,
there's not no space
for anything else.
Throughout this,
you read the stories of people
who acted in a heroic way that day,
but I can't count myself
amongst them
because the only thought in my mind
was to get off that train
and get home to my family.
My daughter would have been... six...
five-and-a-half or six years old
so I certainly didn't, you know,
I didn't want to let my daughter
grow up without a father
so my only, my only aim
was to get off that train
and get home safely to my family.
All of a sudden I heard this
very commanding voice that said...
The driver said that once he's
checked that the power is off,
I want all those who can
to walk to the front of the carriage.
There wasn't many of us...
that walked, that, you know...
listened to the train driver
or that was able
to leave the... the carriage.
Everybody was
quite polite, surprisingly.
So there was a line of people
in front of me,
just people walking quite slowly
in front of me
and I had my hand
on the person in front of me
because I was bleeding
quite a lot from my head
and I was worried about fainting
and we didn't know
if the tracks were going to be live
so I didn't want to,
I didn't want to fall over.
There was a guy that had been
screaming for some considerable time
and he was immediately behind me,
but he kept falling over,
so I turned around
and said to this guy,
"Hold onto the back of my jacket,
when you're going to fall,"
which he did, and occasionally...
It took about 10, 12 minutes
to walk to Russell Square,
he fell and the guy behind him
picked him up
and he held the back
of my coat again.
And we walked
towards Russell Square.
When I was walking round
checking the track,
I noticed a light
in the westbound tunnel
by the east end of the platform
and the light got closer and closer
and whilst this was happening, I
realised there was something wrong.
When the light got to me,
it was the driver of train 311
with about 12 to 15 seriously,
some seriously injured customers
bleeding very heavily,
very traumatised.
We helped them up onto the platform.
I asked the driver,
"What's happened?"
And he said, "I don't know,
"but there's people down there
that need help."
And after that,
I jumped down onto the track
and made my way into the tunnel
towards the train.
We've had reports of explosions
at Edgware Road, Liverpool Street.
I've just spoken to the Pic.
They believe they've had an explosion
at Russell Square. Right.
We're trying to establish
what all lines have got
and what they're doing as we speak.
That's all I've got, but it looks
like all lines are having problems
and people are self-detraining. Three
separate incidents? Three, yeah.
Code Amber? Code Amber? Yeah.
Hold on one second.
Code Amber the whole network?
Code Amber the whole network. We're
going to stop the whole network.
All right, darling. Code Amber,
get them into stations and stand by?
Yeah, that's all we're going to do.
OK. All right, mate. Cheers. Bye.
I could see people coming out of
Edgware road with bandages on,
black faces, you know, soot, blood,
there was a guy at the ticket
barriers, some underground staff,
and I said, "Are there
many more people down there?"
And he said, "Oh, yeah, loads.
The train was full."
So I said, "Well...
"What are we talking about?"
He said, "There's quite a few
dead down there."
And I thought, "Right, OK.
Are you certain about that?"
"Yeah, yeah,
there's quite a few dead."
And I thought, "Right, OK, well,
"I need to get down there now
and find out what is going on."
So I went through the barriers
and I was trying to use my radio
all the time and it just,
when you try and transmit,
and it's not communicating,
you just get this beeping noise,
like a "beeeep,"
and that's all I was getting all the
time I was trying to use this radio
and then I was trying to use
my mobile phone.
I was getting nothing on that
and I'm thinking,
"I'm not really going to be able to
do too much on my own down here,"
you know, I've got one bandage
with me and that's all I had, really.
But the further I got down,
the less able I was to turn around.
So I just went further down the track
and eventually got to the carriage.
Everything was unrecognisable,
you know, the inside of the carriage,
the seats all seemed to be gone,
you know, the post, the glass,
everything was gone.
It was just like a tube with blood
and twisted metal just thrown in,
thrown on the ceiling,
thrown up the walls, just everywhere,
it was everywhere, and you just
couldn't make out what had gone on.
And a guy was laying there on his
back, just looking up at the ceiling,
and I looked at him and I spoke to
him and I said, "Are you all right?"
Obviously a bit, "Are you all right?"
"No, I'm not all right."
And he kind of said something along
the lines of, "What's happened?"
You know, "What's happened?"
Right, you know, I thought, "Well,
if he doesn't know, I don't know."
Erm...
So I just said, "Can you walk?"
And he said, "No, I can't move."
So I got down and started
to deal with him, really.
Duty office manager. Yeah, hello
there, it's Lee Osbourne in the NTC.
Hello there. I've been trying
to get hold of you.
We've heard desperate shouts
from both ends
at Aldgate and Praed Street
and Edgware Road.
They're still desperately waiting
for emergency services.
We've got two major incidents.
The emergency services have declared
they're on their way down there.
We're issuing a systemwide
Code Amber. Right...
My main concern were the ones,
the people that were alive,
to try and pacify them,
speak to them
and just let them know that
we were there to help
and help was on its way
and hopefully we'd get them
out of there as soon as we could.
Sometimes I felt as if my mind
was just separating out from my body.
As if I was coming apart,
and then I would just have to focus
and think, "No, I've got to just
hold on, I've got to stay conscious
"and just hold on. They'll come.
They'll rescue us."
It was a long period of just waiting.
This is the bedroom
that James used to sleep in.
Where that bed is now,
there was a bunk bed,
but it had a desk.
It was bought for him while
he was at school doing his homework
so he had the desk there
and got up into the bunk bed.
Yes, so nothing,
not a great deal has changed,
but there's none
of his personal stuff in here.
So what did you do
with James's personal stuff?
His letters and things, I shredded
them. I destroyed them, basically.
I... Other people may find that
a strange thing to do
but I just thought it was important.
I just bought that we had no right
to pry into certain things.
It just didn't seem the right thing
to do, to me, and it still doesn't.
I still think that
it wouldn't have...
I mean, I obviously had
to look through them,
but I... no, I just couldn't.
I couldn't just keep them.
It didn't...
We had enough things to remember,
photographs and that sort of thing,
it just didn't seem to be
the right thing to do.
That was taken about... It was Dan.
Yeah, four days before...
It wasn't, it was two days, it was
Monday evening. That was in Prague.
The week he was killed.
He was in Prague, with his friends.
When it happened, it kind of,
you wait for the phone to ring,
you're kind of hoping and praying
and on the...
I think it was the Saturday,
I'd come here, to Mum and Dad's
on the Friday evening
and they just needed to do something
so we did, we made the posters and
we went to King's Cross and stuff,
putting up the posters and seeing
the other people that were up there
and thinking, "I can't believe
that I'm doing this.
"This is... I don't, why is this me?
"Why am I having to do this?
"Why am I having to put
pictures of my brother up?"
And for other people to be able
to walk past and go,
"God, that's really awful."
I want to be one of them.
I want to be one of
those people walking past
going, "That's really awful,
that's really sad,"
and be able to empathise
from afar. I don't want
to be embroiled in this.
I want my life back.
Please give me my life back.
Please let me know, and I remember
standing on the Mile End Road
and just saying, "Just let it stop.
"Please let everything stop
till I know."
But, yeah.
It's OK.
Well, I'm just literally stuck
in another traffic jam
outside King's Cross. What I did see
was at least half a dozen people
who have blackened faces
and in some cases I saw head wounds,
in fact, I've just seen one young
man who was being treated
had a huge bandage
put around his head.
I remembered one thing hitting me
that makes you think,
"What am I doing?" is that
you're heading toward something
that so many people
are trying to get away from,
so you're fighting through
the crowds of hundreds
to get to the point
that they're trying to leave.
As soon as I got out of
the ambulance,
I made the decision that I'd go
downstairs to see what was going on.
As you're going down, you could
start to get a spell of burning
and the air has got, like,
a taste to it, almost,
of burnt plastic and things
and then you start
getting close to the platform
and then it sort of hits you
that this is actually quite real.
The smoke you can now see
billowing down the dark track,
and it's a black hole.
You're looking down a black hole
and you've just got
these little miners' lamps, almost
and you can then hear
screaming and shouting
and the hairs on the back of
your neck sort of stand on end.
Although we're ambulance people,
paramedics or whatever,
we're still human, and I just...
You know, the impulse is to run away
with everybody else.
I didn't particularly want
to go down that train.
I didn't particularly want
to see the things that I saw
or deal with
the things I dealt with.
And then the emergency services
and the paramedics,
they just arrived like a wave
coming through the train.
Fireman, policemen,
ambulance, everywhere,
you know, literally swamped.
I was relieved to see them,
but also very angry.
I'd been there for
quite an amount of time.
I didn't know
it was 40 minutes at the time,
but it seemed like an eternity
I'd been there.
And they brought in
these emergency lights
and I thought I'd been leaning
on a bundle of rags
or, you know, a bag
or something like that
and I looked over and it was...
It was like a big piece of someone,
with a bone sticking out of it.
And I looked at the sleeve of my
shirt, cos everything was now light
and it was just red with blood,
from above the elbow to the bottom.
When the paramedics
eventually did come through
and I decided now was
the time for me to leave
because the experts were here
and I was only going
to get in their way,
erm, I walked back
through the empty train...
and it was empty
cos everyone else had left.
And that's when I started to shake.
You know, that's when
the shock really hit me.
I had to hold on to the handrails
to get myself out of the train
because I was shaking so much.
'It's chaos everywhere.
'I've just come past Russell Square,
they've closed it off.'
'Say again. You just came past
where?' 'Russell Square Station.'
'They've closed it all off.
D'you think it's a major disaster?'
'Well, let's not speculate...'
'Scotland Yard says that at
approximately 8.50 this morning,
'they were called to Aldgate,
London Transport Station,
'to assist
the City of London Police and...'
'There's no sense that this is
in any way terrorist-related.
'There's no signs of anyone
imagining that there might be
'any further danger in this area.'
I took a cup of tea in
to watch the television.
I was watching the news,
news programmes,
and then saw this thing
unfolding and...
of course,
nobody knew what it was,
it was a power surge,
no suggestion it was terrorism.
And Anat was on the phone to me
from a mobile,
telling me the problems
she was having on the journey
and I was saying, "Well, this has
happened and this has happened."
Yeah, we were keeping in touch,
and she got to Euston Station
and said,
"Oh, the trains have stopped."
She said, "I'm outside Euston."
And she said, "There's a great crowd.
"You know...
"I need to get a bus,
what am I going to do?"
And to my eternal regret, I said,
"Well, be smart. Walk back.
"Get on the stop before Euston."
So she did that and then
eventually phoned back and said,
"Oh, that worked." She said,
"I've got a seat on a number 30."
I learned by listening to the radio
that the tubes had come to a halt
and that a lot of people
were getting off the tubes,
getting onto buses
and the traffic was getting
really heavy at that time.
We started work and one of the
employers come down called Roger,
saw the laughter and said,
"Pointless making sandwiches today,
the tube lines have all broken down.
"No-one can get in at the moment."
There were so many people
at the bus stop,
so I was wondering what happened.
I thought it was just a busy day.
I entered Tavistock Square,
and drove on the side opposite
to BMA House, around the square.
In the queue of traffic
coming down was a bus.
And we carried on talking,
she told me about the bus
being diverted down
towards Tavistock Square,
and because I was involved
in a local amenity group,
involved with their newsletter,
Anat said,
"Well, whatever's happening,
"this should make something
for your newsletter."
And as soon as
she said, "newsletter,"
I heard terrible screams
in the background.
Nothing from Annette.
Not an "Oh, my God,"
not a breath, nothing at all,
and then her phone went dead.
And I knew then that...
something terrible had happened.
I knew that, you know,
if she'd had any possibility
of communicating with me,
she would have done.
If I hadn't have been
so damn smart and said to her,
"Oh, beat the queues," you know.
But to actually have
directed her onto that bus...
I heard what sounded
like a firecracker,
that went right across
from left to right,
and the next thing I remember
was lots of noises
and I couldn't open my eyes.
The ceiling of the bus, erm...
crashed onto my shoulder.
And it must have pushed me down and
maybe instinctively
I held my hands in front of my eyes,
which was lucky because I had
some bad wounds on my left hand.
I just heard the sound, and after
the sound I didn't know where I was.
I was on the floor.
I saw some people are dead,
some people with blood
coming from their eyes,
some people with blood
coming from their heads.
People don't normally get
that close to large explosions
and don't know what they look like.
It was loud, but it was a black
centre with smoke around it,
and everything
seemed to shoot out of it,
including,
as I fell down to the seat,
a person that was
flying up in the air
with a complete look of shock
and surprise on her face.
In that second and a half,
so much goes through your mind
and goes in and is trapped
there... this is a bomb,
I'm too close, I could be killed
in the next instant.
And people have been injured.
Everything sort of goes
into your mind and stays there.
I just want to say
something about Neetu.
OK. Shall I start it?
Yeah. Yeah.
"Neetu was my youngest daughter,
who was killed on 7th of July,
"year 2005, due to
a bus explosion in London.
"I always see Neetu,
smiling and laughing,
"and never saw any
disappointment on her face.
"Neetu was
a very special gift from God.
"As a child, she loved school
very much. She was very happy."
Our friend Milan is an officer.
He brought to us Neetu's purse.
This item in my hand is her
London Transport travel card,
because she was travelling
from Hendon Central
to Old Street every day.
If she's running short of money,
she can get money
from any till machine.
And if she wants to borrow
a book from the library,
she also have a library card here.
She will go, on her way back home,
she will go to the library
and get a book.
The damage was the pockets.
See the pockets?
These are all damaged
because of the explosion here.
And the outside
is all damaged in here.
Detective Sergeant arranged to
clean it when he brought it to us.
He said it was all filled with blood.
Everywhere was blood, but
he clean it and brought it to us,
because it is her personal
possession, you know.
So I'm keeping it here.
The only thing was missing
was her mobile telephone.
When I was ringing her
on 7th of July,
I only used to get the message,
"Neetu speaking.
"I'll come back to you
as soon as possible."
We visited all hospital around
London. There were 12 hospitals.
No, we couldn't get any clue.
After waiting seven days and nights,
desperately and anxiously,
there came the day of 14th July,
when two detective officers
gave us this heartbreaking news
that Neetu's body has been
positively identified.
What can I say now?
I...I remember somebody saying
that they were trying
to deal with people
in order of urgency.
A couple of chaps came over to me,
and one of them shone
his torch in my face.
And I remember him saying,
you know, "This one's gone."
Erm, and then they sort of
moved on, and I just... you know,
it's almost sort of like
anger, outrage really.
You know... cos I wanted
to attract their attention,
and I couldn't get the energy
to do it then, it was so difficult
to breathe and difficult to move
and I think that's when I really
got the sort of adrenaline rush or
whatever that I needed to get up.
Opposite where the bomb went off,
there were two quite severely
injured people with lower leg,
traumatic lower leg amputations.
She was blown sort of sideways, with
her legs, what was left of her legs
wrapped round the handrail,
I think, outside the train as well.
Martine, I don't think, really knew
the extent of her injuries.
I'd like to think she didn't.
So we had to unwrap her legs
without any anaesthetic.
I was at the head end,
sort of supporting her shoulders
as we got onto the stretcher.
And I'll never forget it. She
just looked right up into my eyes
and the torch I had
was shining in her face
so her whole face was illuminated,
looked right into my eyes,
let out this horrendous scream
and just reached up
and dug her nails into my arms
and scratched all the way down.
Because I'm sure
she was in so much pain,
she just needed to have
some sort of release.
I think that was what
that was about, but it was...
it was quite
a horrendous thing to see.
I'd never heard
a scream like that before.
No, don't remember...
anything, really, erm,
until I woke up in hospital,
which I think was about ten days
later or nine days later.
I can remember that as vividly now as
I could an hour after the incident.
It's... I'll never forget it.
There was an element of sort of
handing myself over to these guys.
They were helping me and I had,
I could sort of take a bit of a step
back and let them get on with it.
People were in
their pants and socks,
and I remember thinking, "Where
have their clothes gone?" Erm...
you know, I hadn't been...
I hadn't witnessed blast injuries
before, it's not something I'd seen.
And, er, people's clothes
literally get blown off them.
By all accounts, I had my
underpants on, one shoe and a sock,
and that was it.
I remember going up the stairs,
one of them saying,
complaining how, "Why do
we always get the heavy one?"
And I remember, even though I was
completely out of it thinking,
"This guy's... time for
somebody to crack a joke
"in this sort of situation."
After a while, I just sat down
on the floor by the ticket machines
and... because
I didn't know what to do,
and then I saw people
being brought out of the tunnel.
I was near the lifts,
and what I was seeing coming
out of the lifts just broke me.
It's just something you never forget.
I mean, you don't expect to
get out of a lift in a ticket hall
of a London Underground station
and see what would be considered
a battlefield hospital,
working on people,
holding arms and legs
up in the air
and saline applications going on.
The fact that they'd come out
of the carriage that I was in
made it that much worse.
So I thought,
"I've had enough, I'm off."
I remember one particular case.
She was lying right in front
of the BMA House,
and she would look at me straight,
the eye contact we'll make,
I will go and sit by her side,
hold her hand,
put my hand on her forehead,
and she wanted to say something.
Well, she could not say.
She might have just had an injury
which could have been dealt with.
But, without the equipment,
you can't do anything, you see.
So it was very frustrating.
Azuma, when was
the last time you two were...?
The night before.
Erm, she come home from work
and me and my brother
sat with her in the front room
and she cooked,
and we sat and laughed and giggled
and teased her as always.
And I remember she asked me to make
her some tea and I was like, "Oh!
"You're just sending me around
like your servant."
And she came in the kitchen
and really cuddled me,
and then the next day I was
supposed to go to my auntie's house,
so I couldn't find
my keys that night,
so she stayed up with me
looking for my keys.
I ended up being like, "Go to bed.
"You've got to get up at what time?
It's now, like, just past 12."
And so, I just said to her,
"I'll see you tomorrow."
And she was like, "OK,"
and she closed my bedroom door, and
that was the last time I saw her.
Seven years almost down the line,
I still have dreams of her.
I dream of her quite regularly.
Those kind of stuff won't go away.
Just before she died,
when I'd finished my GCSEs,
I had my leavers' prom,
and I made her take the day off,
and she came
and helped me get ready.
We went together to buy my dress.
So, yeah, I kind of
had all that with her,
so we were really, really close.
I think that is what
is so painful for me now.
Cos my friends are now
getting close to their mums,
but my mum's not here anymore.
And I'm not going to have
all that stuff with her.
She's not going to be there
when I get married
or when I have my own kids.
And I think that's a bit painful.
And that's why I don't think
I'll ever get over it,
cos there'll always be things
where I feel like
I need her there and she's missing.
Yeah, that's seven years
down the line.
It doesn't go away.
SIRENS BLARING
We was met by a policeman who had
shut the road off at the time.
He asked me what am I going to,
and cos I had no knowledge
of the other incidents going on,
I thought it was
a very strange question,
so I just said to him, "The bus,"
which was in front of me then.
And he said to me, "Right, OK."
He said, "The walking wounded have
gone through the arch of the BMA.
"There's dead and dying everywhere,
"and we suspect
a secondary device on the bus,"
and then he let me
through his cordon.
We were confronted
with photographers.
It was disturbing
because we were there
trying to deal
with the casualties,
and they were like little ants
all over the place,
quite frenzied around,
trying to get the best angle,
get the best shot they could do.
Some people were already dead.
But I managed, God save it,
I managed to walk.
In the bus, I was located
right behind the bomber.
The one thing that
I still can't compute, I suppose,
if compute is the right word, is...
how can anybody survive an explosion
when they were literally centimetres
close, next to the bomber?
There was a point when Liz and I
were the only two injured survivors
left on the train.
And they started to get's ready
to take me out to an ambulance.
They were getting ready to lift me
onto a stretcher.
And then they change their minds
and one of them said to me,
"I'm sorry,
you've drawn the short straw."
And they decided
to take Liz instead.
And then I was left in the train
for another half an hour or so,
I think.
As they were carrying me out of
the tunnel on the stretcher...
I remember,
after all that time in the dark,
it seemed as if the station
was just glowing with light.
It was a very...
emotional moment for me.
Coming up in the daylight, I can
remember being carried through
out of the station
to the ambulance and just as
they put me into the ambulance,
catching a glimpse of the sky.
There's a glass canopy over
the entrance to the station
and I remember that glimpse of
the class canopy and the summer sky
above it.
It was the most wonderful
thing I've seen.
Once wed confirmed that there were
no more alive people on the train,
it was time to leave.
All these people were standing there,
thinking of their own little worlds
at the time of the explosion,
or before the explosion.
What they were doing at work,
where they were going,
what they've got to do,
or not got to do,
what they got for tea,
if they've just had an argument.
They're listening to the iPhones,
mobile phones,
their Walkman or whatever.
Then all of a sudden, there's
an explosion and they all become one.
You know, some days I woke up
and I would just not stop crying.
It was what am I going to do?
I remember one day saying to my mum,
"What am I going to do?
"I've got no legs,
I've got no legs."
And I remember she grabbed my face.
And she said,
"Martine, you are still Martine
"and you could have had a really bad
knock on the head
"or really bad brain injury
and you didn't,
"so you are still Martine
and you are still here
"and you can get new legs,
you're going to get new legs."
He came to the hospital
and I said to him,
he sat on the bed and I said, "Lewis,
I've got something to tell you."
And he said, "What?" I usually say,
"Don't say what, say pardon."
And I said, "You've got two legs,
now I've got some problems,
I've only got one."
And I said, "Actually,
I've got one and a half,
"so what am I going to do
about walking?"
And he turned around and looked me
and he says,
"You just have to hop
and I just have to help you.
"And let's see who can stand
on one leg the longest."
I'm looking at memos
my counsellor wrote.
Each counselling session,
he wrote down something
and he gave it to me
at the end of each session.
I've never talked to the children
about it and I don't know
whether they've heard from
other people and know anyway.
Um...
or whether, you know,
this will come as a shock to them.
I literally bottled it all up.
I can't remember what I said,
but I just obviously confirmed
the fact that I was on that train.
But I didn't mention anything
about the casualties that I'd seen
and what had gone on
in the carriage.
I'd say I wasn't affected,
but my wife would disagree with you.
She'd say I was...
um, argumentative.
She said it was like...
How did she describe it?
She said it was like
walking on eggshells around me.
That was quite... that was quite sad.
Yes. "I now choose to let go of all
my fears about dying on the tube."
I've never felt traumatised
by my experience.
It brings home to you that you never
know what is around the corner.
Very random decisions can radically
change your future.
If I'd been standing up
on that train that day,
I probably wouldn't be here now.
Because I chose to sit down,
I'm still here to tell the tale.
We had an evil act by four people,
but it was met with this huge surge
of goodness and kindness...
that carried a lot of us through.
A lot of my injuries were related
to basically human shrapnel.
Part of the bomber's shinbone
had gone into my left eye.
It was irreparably damaged from that.
I've been asked a number of times
about my feelings about the bomber
and there's just nothing to grab hold
of, I don't really have an angle.
It's difficult,
it's almost like I'm more angry that
I can't be angry about it.
That probably doesn't make any sense,
but that's how I feel.
There's just no form to it,
I can't see an angle
to my opinion on it really.
I've just had to get on with it,
so my angle really is I've got on
with it, recovered a normal life
and we can enjoy stuff that these
people didn't want to enjoy.
They say that for every action
there is an equal
and opposite reaction,
and it seems
that 95% of what has happened
since then has been positive.
There's been so much fundraising,
outpouring of support.
Everyone has their different ways
of dealing with
the situation
that we found ourselves in.
For us, it was really
a sanity saver
to do something constructive
in Miriam's memory.
This building is an eye hospital,
and the Miriam Hyman
Children's Eye Care Centre is
these few rooms down here.
The first patient of
the Children's Eye Care Centre
who I was lucky enough to meet.
There is with his parents
having an assessment.
We know that if we allowed ourselves
to go on a downward spiral
into the depths of despair,
that it would be
almost an insult to her
if we allowed ourselves to also
lose our lives as a result
of her losing hers.
Unless you've had your family member
blown up in a terrorist attack,
you can't even imagine how it feels.
So it's pointless to try
and describe it,
but I think it's much more
constructive to talk about
how you respond.
Our life is defined by before
7 July 2005 and after the seventh.
It's just like you've got two
separate lives - before and after...
and we don't much
talk about before, do we?
No. Truthful, it's almost
as if something stopped then
and it's easy to cope by moving on.
Since David died,
we went on a cruise on a holiday,
and for dinner you go down
and sit on a table of maybe
five other couples
and you don't know each other,
but the one thing you have in common
is you talk about your children.
So you are always asked,
"Do you have children?"
And you sit there and go,
"Yes, we have a son and a daughter."
And then you're asked,
"How old are they? What do they do?"
And you're so conscious that
you are going to drop the bomb
which is the biggest conversation
stopper when you say...
Everybody is on holiday.
We've stopped... We don't say,
"No, we've only got a daughter."
We can't say that. "So you've got
a son. What do they do?"
"Well, actually...
"he was killed."
I mean,
that's a beautiful photograph of her.
Those two are just absolutely lovely.
She had the most beautiful eyes.
The most sparkly, laughy eyes.
And a very dirty laugh.
Where did she get that from?
I'm not sure,
but not my side of the family.
And I always keep a rose on the desk
for her because she was Emily Rose.
Christian was five years older
than me, so a nice age.
Everything I've learned from him.
It was nice,
he tried to avoid me at school.
He didn't want to mess up
his reputation.
But at the same time, he tried
to protect you. Yes, he always did.
Warning off all the boys. Yeah.
Nanette was born to be a dancer.
She had a dancer's long neck,
expressive face,
eloquent hands
and abundant vitality.
He was really not practical,
he wasn't a practical person.
He found it quite difficult to apply
himself to practical things, really.
That is serious attempt
at putting on sun cream.
In fact, I had to teach and how
to shave on that holiday. Pardon?
Don't even go there!
This is the first time we've ever
spoken to anybody about it,
because it was always too raw
and I just feel like...
Stan was such a lovely man that
I wanted to just tell people
how it's affected us
and how it still does affect us.
I hate the expression "to move on".
People say, "Have you moved on?"
What does that mean?
You can't, I mean, you don't move on,
you learn to live with this enormous
hole in your heart that...
that just you know
is never going to get better
and it becomes part of you
and you get absorbed by...
by your grief.
But you do operate
and you get on with your own life.
But there is always
a hole in your heart.
Tonight, in every country
in the world,
young men and women
and boys and girls
will go to sleep dreaming
that in seven years
they will come to this city
to run faster and jump higher
and throw farther
than anyone has done before.
There are those...
there are those...
who tell the world that we face
a clash of civilisations.
I say to them, "Come to London
and see the world gathered
"in one city, living in harmony
and as an example to all."
I always go to Russell Square
station
and I stand in front
of the plaque.
I take my flowers and I pay
my respects, I pay my respects.
Last year, I was standing in front
of the plaque and I was sobbing.
There was this businessman
and I was sobbing,
and this businessman
was just walking past
and he just put his briefcase down
and he said, "You need a hug."
And we just embraced,
it was just a nice hug.
10 seconds, it could have been,
I don't even know how long it was.
He just said, "Are you all right?"
And I just said to him, "Thank you."
And he picked up his case
and off he went.
And that was amazing
because I've never had that since.
Every time I've gone to the station.
So, if he's ever watching this,
I'd like to say thank you.
You know, when I think about Laura,
a young lady who unfortunately died
who was very, very close to me at
the time, she was the same age as me,
she was in the same profession as me,
and just because of
where she was stood and where I was
sat, I survived and she didn't.
And I find that quite hard
to come to terms with.
But after I had spoken
at the inquest,
Laura's brother spoke to me.
And I...
I think he really helped me
to pile all those feelings aside
that I had about Laura
and about the fact that
I had survived and she hadn't.
And he basically said to me that
Laura was such a fun-loving girl
who really made the most of life
and, you know, did so much
with her life,
she would want you to get on
with your life and to really make...
really make the most of it.
And that really helped a lot
because for a long time I'd been
carrying that around,
you know, feeling guilty
on one side for...
be...
being here and getting on.
And the fact that, you know, other
people hadn't been able to do that.
But it just felt that it was...
it just felt so good to know
that if she had been in my place,
that's what she would have done.
She would have really
got on with her life as well.
So I'm really grateful that he had
that conversation with me.