sandway:
Efes. Just been reading your last couple of little anecdotes concerning the girls who provided their services in Yugo. In the late 70’s there was a girl from Maribor by the name of Angela. Skinny girl with bad teeth. I was homeward bound north of Nis on one occasion and saw her and another girl thumbing a lift so I stopped. As soon as they clambered aboard she started on about ‘Johny’ a Promotor driver she knew. It turned out Johny was a big boy and size did matter, to her anyway. After a while I realised she was talking about John ‘Welly’ Ward who is the driver shown above on the right of John Preece’s old smashed up unit which Welly had been driving. I dropped the girls off at the National early evening and went in for a meal. The two girls followed me in and then Angela demanded I buy them a meal. I told them both to ■■■■ off and the last I saw of them was sitting at the table of an Austrian driver. Good luck to you I thought.Another girl who worked the National was Sonja. She was a nice girl, not one of the brassy ones who often frequented the place. One evening I was in another drivers lorry mid evening having a drink when Sonja walked by. The other driver asked her if she would like a coffee which she readily accepted. Her english was good and we had all had a laugh. However, at nine o’clock sharp she informed us she had to go to work, almost like clocking on and with that she jumped out of the cab and we watched as she started knocking on doors of lorries behind us. It wasn’t long before she disappeared into one. I heard a few years later that she married a dutch driver and was living in Holland.
Yes Sonja I remember - probably because her English was good and she was a very decent person. A bit sad, she started hooking to pay her school fees and then got used to the money and said it was hard to stop…
I remember being snowed up in 3 foot of snow at The National in Belgrade with John Preece and we were sitting in our cabs enjoying the newly fitted cab heaters and a few beers… There came a knock at the door and John asked, “who’s that?”. I opened the door to reveal a very tiny gypsy girl shaking with cold and I advised John it was “one of the girls”. He said “tell her to p… off” and I told the girl, “my friend says come in”… The poor girl was so cold and miserable and we made her a cup of tea to warm her and gave her a banana (yes, a banana) because she was hungry. Slowly she warmed up and began to feel better and then tried to ply her trade. John explained that we were gay (we’re not in case you wonder) and she made a hasty retreat to find business elsewhere…
Some weeks later when I arrived at the National the same girl was there with a bunch of drivers in the cafe who were showing her some photos of other drivers and as she went through the photos she pointed out those she knew; this one “ficky ficky”, that one “saxaphone boy”…
The next morning I was in The National washroom with my shirt off washing my hair under the tap and all of a sudden the little gypsy girl came in and started soaping my back which caused quite a stir with the other drivers… She told me I could “ficky ficky und nichts bezahlen”. I declined her kind offer… The washroom was where there was a long bank of cracked and broken mirrors over the sinks to which one had a small gold printed label attached which read “Expertly repaired by George Fardell, Lympstone, Devon”…
Do you remember the story of Bugsy taking his wife to Yugo? He took her to Motel Zagreb and nearby is a big lake where drivers would go in the summer and swim and drink beer. Bugsy wandered over to show it to his wife. One of the local girls (I believe this to be Angela from your story) saw Bugsy and shouted “Hello English! Big ■■■■ no money!”. Mrs Bugsy was not overly impressed.