MY VERSION OF EVENTS....

Lidia's Lasagne" This dish is one that Mum would have been taught by her mother who in turn would have been taught by her mother and so on. They were all born and raised in a mountain village in southern Italy in the province of Salerno. Much of the cuisine there is what you might call "peasant" food; earthy, rich, a concoction of whatever ingredients they could muster. Today there is something luxurious about it all. I learned how to make it from watching her do it a thousand or more times. This lasagne is "dry" and certainly lacks a béchamel sauce. It is more of a "cake". The critical difference that people first notice is the presence of salami and sliced egg. It is moist without being wet, the ragu is rich and smokey and the eating experience is one of great oral satisfaction; plenty to chew! Traditionally, the meat would be a blend of whatever they could get; rabbit, pork, horse et al.  I make it now with a mixture of pork and bee

1.      My name is Miriam Lamprell.  I am 79 years of age and I lost my only child, Debbie, in the fire at Grenfell Tower. I have asked Mike Volpe to read this because it is impossibly hard for me to stand up and read this out, but I am here. And I will be coming to the Inquiry, as difficult as it will be to find out what happened to Debbie. 2.      I had Debbie in the maternity hospital in Walthamstow in 1971 and brought her home to the flat in Hinds Park where I still live. Debbie and her father, my husband, Reg, lived there together right through her childhood and she stayed with us all through her early adulthood when she took her first jobs, until Debbie moved out when she was 31. We were an incredibly close and happy family. We loved Debbie and Debbie was devoted to us.  We were blessed with Debbie in a way that is very special. 3.      Because Debbie was an only child we encouraged her to have her friends round to play as much as possible. She wasn'

Edited text of the talk I gave yesterday at the  Opera and politics Symposium – Trinity Laban May 2019   It is very good to be here today to talk to you on a subject that – hard as it is to believe – I have been banging on about for thirty long years. Let me begin at the beginning. I work in what is widely regarded as the most mysterious, inaccessible, white, middle-aged, middle-class art form known to humankind – opera. Except, opera isn't itself any of those things. The audiences can be, although there is a huge misconception about the vast bulk of those who enjoy the art form. I myself come from a  working class, immigrant background but I had the chance to attend what was called the 'poor man's Eton', a school called Woolverstone Hall, an ILEA school that took poor, bright inner city kids and gave them an Eton style boarding education. It also put culture and performing arts at the heart of its cur