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Paul Hayward, who was at Jever as a young boy, son of the NAAFI Manager, recently visited Jever and sent us this report - 23May13.   L to R: Robin Parkinson-Bates, Maurice Parker, W/O Peter Meenen PR Officer for GAF Regiment/GAF Jever and Paul Hayward.

"I feel sure you will be pleased to know that - as a direct result of your very kind efforts and introduction to Maurice Parker - my visit to Jever with my erstwhile school colleague went off very well indeed!   We met up with Maurice right outside the GAF Jever guardroom as planned, then we were taken on a 1 hour ride around the base - I even saw the old 'H' block of temporary accommodation, where my parents and I once lived at the end of the runway - it's still there!!!   Lots of memories came flooding back, so it was a super trip and my colleague Robin told me it he'd genuinely and thoroughly enjoyed the experience too.   Even though he hadn't lived there, he'd been on brief visits to Jever, and RAF Jever at the time.   Peter Meenen, our 'tour host' whom Maurice Parker had arranged for the occasion, was also a character we both really warmed to!   Sadly, my (Mr Watson's!) primary school just outside the GAF Jever gates is now in a parlous state.   Demolition can only be a short while away....   Jever town, on the other hand, is looking really lovely and charming like never before.   I visited the house where I once lived, and we also ate very well in the "Haus der Getreuen", owned by the Jever Pils brewery.   It's a place I'd never previously been into, although my parents frequently mentioned it in conversation at the time we lived there!   Prince Rupert School is now virtually non-existent.   Almost all physical reminders are now gone - hardly surprising - but just one or two bits and pieces still survive here and there, plus of course the school's memorial, the ceremony for which Heather Watson so ably translated!   One final 'coincidence' to relate.   We travelled back from Wilhelmshaven by train (having flown to Stuttgart to see some other things for my friend Robin, while on his holiday over from Australia).   The trip involved 4 trains, and at Osnabrueck we joined a young lady on our 2nd train, travelling with her very young daughter from Rostock to join her navy husband attending a conference in Duesseldorf.   Turns out, she was born in the village of Neustatgoedens just outside Jever, went to school in Wilhelmshaven, and met her future husband whilst living in Jever!   This world is getting smaller by the minute, and coincidences are getting more common....!!!   (Thanks to Paul Hayward.)
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