I lived with wife Christine and children Alison and Mathew at No 5 Strada Bitolia. It had a 2-storeroom basement in front, another basement at the back with maid’s room, shower etc and the central heating unit. The ground floor had an entrance hall, toilet & wash basin, lounge, dining room with patio in the front, kitchen, walk-in pantry and toilet at the back and both halves had stairs down to the basements as well as up to the 1st floor. The back stair also led to the back door, back garden, side gate, woodshed and garage (electricity, heating, inspection pit, hot & cold running water) with access on to the next road, Strada Putul lui Zamfir. This was handy for the Bucharest-Dynamo stadium round the corner on Calea Floreasca. The first floor had two landings, three double bedrooms, a bathroom and a large cupboard with access to the attic. When I left I tried to take the house it with me.

My duties in Romania were threefold: administration; spying and reporting sightings to MoD; partying. Well, someone had to do it and at 10 a.m. at Attaché Association Meetings I might have sandwiches, drinks and chat with my ‘fellow’ Attachés from NATO, Warsaw Pact and other countries (Peoples Republic of China (PRC), for instance). At 12 noon it might be formal lunch with Attachés, Ambassadors or First Secretaries. At 6 p.m. cocktails and nibbles at Diplomatic Receptions. At 8 p.m. formal dinner, or ‘Buffet Supper,’ with these esteemed gentry and their good ladies and my wife was included in invitations other than Attaché Association functions. I admit it was rare but sometimes I attended the four events mentioned IN ONE DAY!

Additional to official gatherings there were also informal ones for a buffet type of meal, or barbecue, with drinks and dancing in someone’s house or garden. Because we had friends in other embassies as well as our own, my wife and I were guests at American parties as often as British. And at other nations, too, but we had to ensure that every invitation we accepted was repaid by a similar invitation to a do in our own house. And there was me always thinking I was the opposite of a party animal! A few British names - Neil (ex RE) and Audrey McGregor, Don (ex R Sigs) and Marit Munro, Tony (ex RAF) and (lovely) Rita Cross, Brian and Sandra Taylor, Reg and Sybil Gilmour, Jim and Catherine Leonard.

In ’71-’74 Romania was in the Soviet camp but was a Westward looking nation and for many years Romanian chickens had graced Sainsbury’s shelves. This openness long before Mihail Gorbachev meant Bucharest’s diplomatic community had reps from every country. I could be at a party at the PRC Ambassador’s and meet my NATO colleagues and Warsaw Pact ‘colleagues’ and have the pleasure of being openly barged into by two North Korean officers (as happened on 10 October 1973). I told a friend in the tiny South Korean legation this tale and was able to add that the East German DA had told my wife he’d seen the PRC Assistant DA, Lt Col Li Iun Chi, giving the North Koreans a heck of a roasting and discovered it was because they’d “assaulted a NATO Attaché.” Me! Li Iun Chi and I were friendly (we conversed in a mix of Romanian, Cantonese and English) but the aggressive wee Koreans didn’t know.

While in Romania I met and spoke with Presidents Nicolae Ceausescu and Fidel Castro but I achieved two military milestones as well: I was promoted WO1 wef 5 October 1973, just after my 35th birthday and, only three months before, my LS&GC Medal had been presented to me by Ambassador Derek Ashe CMG. When I left Romania I missed four things: the unrepeatable opportunity for exciting operational work; the terrific formal and informal social life and international contacts; the wonderful, attractive and very liveable-in house at No 5 Strada Bitolia; and my permanent escort of pinch-faced leather coated Securitate secret police whenever I left my house, usually just two in a Dacia 1500 but once six men and two woman in three cars.