Taking the years in her stride

Joy Forbes chats with energy from the comfy armchair in her bedroom at Amberley Resthome, which sits snugly beside her wireless radio.

Forbes (neé McEwan) was born in 1924, so this October she will turn 102. Although, at a guess without knowing her birth year, you’d place Forbes in her early mid-eighties.

What’s the secret?

Nothing fancy. Regular walking, reading, listening to the radio, jigsaw puzzles and piano playing.

Oh, and playing scrabble, which she does regularly in the resthome and recently attended the Tea and Scrabble event at Hurunui Memorial Library in Amberley.

Forbes enjoys visiting the library to replenish her pile of books, admitting she reads “any kinds of books and doesn’t stick just to romances.”

At the weekends Forbes attends church in Woodend, describing the congregation as “marvelous people.”

Travel has always been a topic of keen interest.

Forbes was in her mid-teens in the early 1940’s when she left her home in Pukekohe and jumped on a southbound train.

Her destination was Nelson.

“I wanted to know what the South Island looked like”

When Forbes’ train ride reached the bottom of the North Island, she boarded a boat to cross the Cook Strait.

Nelson is a place Forbes looks back on with fondness, enjoying the weather, the hills, the people.

She picked tobacco 40 miles west of Nelson, and in the off season she graded it.

“I loved it so much, that open space.”

It was on the tobacco farms where she met her late husband Bill, and together they moved to Bill’s home city of Christchurch.

Life was busy raising three children in Bryndwr but Forbes still found time for entertaining, an embedded love of hers and her parents.

In the evenings in front of local crowds she danced solo and in groups, performed solo singing and played the piano.

“We had to sew our dresses ourselves, and if someone couldn’t sew, I made theirs too.”

Forbes had owned seven sewing machines over the years, as she kept wearing them out.

Her mother and father danced and acted, so it was how she grew up. Forbes’ daughter in England teaches and performs dance and drama.

Always enjoying travel and independence, Joy has visited England three times, Europe, and went on a three-week holiday to China with a girlfriend.

“It’s amazing that some people have never seen the other side of the world.”

Growing up, Joy remembers the first wireless radio and the first television, on both she’d enjoy Charlie Coons the piano player.

“We were the second house in the street to get television, people could come around and watch it.”

Forbes remembers World War II, she’d use three ration coupons to buy a nightie.

No matter what was going on in life, even maintaining a ten acre block on Pound Road in Christchurch where they moved when the children were older which boasted an extensive garden and crops, Forbes always made time for walking and entertaining.

“I don’t sit down much.”

When it comes to walking, Forbes has always been a big fan.

“I used to walk two miles with the dog every evening after tea.”

It didn’t matter what the weather was doing.

“We had a samoyed and I made him his own raincoat, so it didn’t matter if there was rain, hail, or snow.”

Forbes has hiked the Milford Track, the Queen Charlotte Track, and these days enjoys walking around the resthome’s gardens each day.

“I’m quite hyperactive I suppose.”