“I’ve never thought I’d live to see a world like this,” said Irene Sinclair who, at 110 years old, is Hackney’s oldest-known resident.
Born in Guyana in 1907, Sinclair arrived in Britain in 1957, and has lived in Hackney since the early 70s. After attending a harvest festival celebration at the Parish Church of St. Michael and All Angels in Stoke Newington on October 14, Sinclair reflected on how Britain has changed over the past six decades.
Sinclair is great-grandmother to three teenagers, and spoke with sadness about how gang crime is causing havoc on Hackney’s streets.
“I never thought there would be guns and knives,” she said. “I don’t know why they do it.”
Though she is full of praise for the “amazing” improvements in modern medicine – she modelled for soap brand Dove at the youthful age of 96 – Irene laments the state of today’s NHS. She regularly has to wait two weeks to see her GP, which used to be unheard of. “What can you do?” she said. “They say, ‘I’m busy.’”
