Give a Little, Get a Lot

Sharing harvests of fruit and home- cooked meals brings together an entire street

Sharing and caring in a Melbourne street.

IHAVE LIVED IN MY SUBURB for the past 53 years. I’m one of the oldest residents in our street. At age 83, I’ve seen many people come and go, from different age groups and different nationalities. My wife, whom I met in Australia, and I were both refugees from Hungary. I escaped in 1956 after the Soviet Union invasion, arriving in Melbourne in 1957. During our working years when I worked as a diecaster at Joseph Lucas, a motor industry parts manufacturer, the people in our neighbourhood didn’t really socialise much, especially the men. Sometimes we met out on the street and exchanged a few words, but that was all. My wife knew more people by name, but we often did not know much about them.

After my wife died four years ago, I took on some charity work, which meant visiting some of my neighbours – whom I got to know and discovered were both generous and kind.

I grow vegetables in my backyard and have a few fruit trees. I share my crop with my neighbours. In return, I receive some of their homegrown fruit and vegetables and meals they’ve cooked. One family gives me pasta dishes, another gives me spring rolls, and a third family surprised me with a beautiful Easter platter.

Recently, during lockdown, one thing had been bothering me – I hadn’t seen my 95-year-old neighbour for a while. Like me, she is one of the four original residents in the street. I wanted to make sure she was alright so I paid her a visit. The door was open so I walked in. It was a relief to find her fast asleep. I tried to wake her, unsuccessfully. Since I was delivering fresh bread to people in the neighbourhood, I left her some rolls.

A couple of days later, another neighbour told me how surprised the lady was that someone had left her some bread. So, I visited her again.

She was in her kitchen happily playing a game on her tablet. When she saw me, she invited me in and we had a long conversation about the days when her husband and my wife were still alive. During the conversation she asked if I had any fruit on my quince tree. She told me she loved quinces. I told her that unfortunately they were all gone, but I had cooked soup with the last ones only the day before. So I headed home, which is just across the street, and returned with some quince soup and quince cake.

She loved the soup and the cake. In fact, she loved the cake so much she didn’t even bother with a knife to cut it, she simply bit into it! That was a very rewarding day for me.

Other ways I keep sane during lockdown is by looking after my little budgie, working in my garden, trying out my wife’s cake recipes – which today was a resounding success – and doing a little exercise. In fact, I am in the process of making a movie titled Keep Fit

During Covid, in which I show off the wetlands at Namatjira Park near where I live.