Lazarus Hiwilepo arrived [in London] from his homestead in war-torn Northern Namibia, where he had to bury his books in holes to escape suspicion by Koevoet who searched his rondavel frequently. He came with one suitcase, which had also been stored in a hole, and from it he produced a paisley dressing gown and patterned woollen jumpers. He asked how he could change some money. He then showed me a fistful of old crumpled notes in different denominations, which had been put in his collection box by parishioners. The money was Angolan. In the middle of a war, people had waded across the Kunene River through land-mined fields, risking the danger of [being shot] on sight as they crossed the border, to get to the church service. We couldn’t get the money changed in England.

The impact of the war in Northern Namibia was brought home even more starkly when Lazarus received a cable to say his three-year-old daughter had died of measles. There was a curfew in his area at the time and the family had not risked taking her to hospital at night, and she had died. Before he returned home early, I went with Lazarus to West Ealing to buy some small presents for him to take home for the local children. Amid all the glitter of Christmas the only things he thought suitable were pencils, which he insisted on cutting in half so it was not too extravagant. He also took home two books of mine on adoption as he had absorbed several children into his family whose families had been destroyed by the war. He said he would have to keep the books in the ground, as the South Africans were suspicious of any books except the Bible.