Brunswick School, Whanganui, 1969.
We have just watched the most exciting moment of my entire 10 years. On a borrowed black and white television we saw Neil Armstrong step onto the moon. Mr Taylor has our attention. Oh where are mankind's limits now!
Soon, said Mr Taylor, by the time you children are adults, the human race will have solved world hunger. Our needs will be met. And we in the rich countries will have more leisure time. We should start now to think about our ambitions. Medicine, engineering, music? We will discover new wonders in this world and beyond.
We'd all seen the Biafran children half our size with their swollen bellies and pleading eyes on TV. "Eat your dinner. Think of the Biafran children," is Mum's most recent illogical but effective dinner time tactic.
Back in the classroom our lesson is to imagine the kind of job we want in this exciting new world at our doorstep. Clearly, being a girl I couldn't be an astronaut as such, but what about a space hostess floating around the command module serving weightless drinks to the astronauts? Watching between drinks for the Earth to rise above the moon's horizon, just like in the picture.