Where Were You?
W“HERE WE ARE WITH OUR VERY FIRST ROYAL COVER.”
here were you when you heard the news of Queen Elizabeth’s passing? Strangely, I was on Cunard’s MS Queen Elizabeth cruise ship having just spent the day in Rome and had just set sail for Naples. When the news broke, I was in the card room on the third deck playing a game of Rummikub, there may have been a cocktail involved. I admit that does sound a little Cluedo-like: I was in the drawing room, with the candle stick holder and Colonel Mustard. Suddenly, the music stopped and there was an announcement from the captain. Everyone was in disbelief and shock, as he told us that the Queen had died. It went very quiet, and then people started to cry and strangers hugged each other.
Passenger Rita Moore from Wales said to me, “She is all we have ever known, she never put a foot wrong.” As the realisation of the announcement swept across the ship, the rest of the world also learnt of the sad news.
The Queen had been onboard our ship, in fact, she had christened it in 2010. A few nights later I watched a show in the Royal Court Theater from the Royal Box where the Queen had sat some years before. The staff were very excited that I was sitting in the very seat that Her Majesty had sat in. Days later there was a service onboard remembering the monarch, a condolence book to sign, and the television in the Garden Pavilion and The Lion Pub was permanently on the BBC so passengers could watch the latest updates of her casket leaving Balmoral and the days that followed. We all swapped stories about the Royal Family and our opinions on different members, but what was constant was the undivided loyalty and praise for the Queen. For more of us, she was all we’d ever known, and somehow most passengers thought she would always just ‘be there’ and carry on.
I always have said that MiNDFOOD would never cover with the Kardashians or royals. Leaving that to other magazines to cover, it has been almost 15 years since I made that claim and so here we are with our very first royal cover. The groundswell and interest around the Queen and the traffic to our website – a month’s worth of visits in one day, in some cases – cannot be ignored. Also there has never been a woman who has held a position like it in history before. We moved deadlines and secured the cover image that I think reflects the warmth of the Queen.
When I was 12, my Mum and Dad actually met the Queen and Prince Philip, when the royal couple was on the 1977 Royal Tour of Australia and New Zealand. What I remember most was hearing discussions around the fact that Mum was expected to wear a hat and gloves. She didn’t own either and so hats duly arrived from women at our church to try on. Mum settled on a yellow straw number and cotton laces gloves – très chic! (You can see her and my dad in the picture above).
The Royal Tour marked the Queen’s Silver (25th) Jubilee, and the royal couple visited 11 centres throughout New Zealand. During this visit, the Queen also opened the new executive wing of parliament known as the ‘Beehive’.
MiNDFOOD acknowledges the extraordinary role Queen Elizabeth II played and her dedication to service to the Commonwealth for over 70 years.
May she Rest In Peace.