I met Rose only once, in 2015, when I was staying with Gil. Gil took me to meet her neighbour and I will never forget the visit. Rose was really lovely, she was immediately very kind to me, although I was a complete stranger to her, and she told me wonderful stories from her life. It was amazing how she could remember names and years and long past events, while her short-time memory was so bad, as Gil told me. And one thing – Rose told me I was beautiful. I didn’t feel really beautiful at that time, and this remark of hers brightened my day. And as you can see, it still does :-).

She was nearing her 100th birthday then and I learned from Gil about the great tradition of the Queen sending a personal birthday card to centenarians. As I am an English teacher, since then I have kept telling my students about that, as an interesting fact, whenever it comes to the topic of long life.

And since it really happened then, in 2017, I have been adding another bit. Gil told me that when Team Rose applied for the Queen´s card, they received confirmation from the Queen´s office saying exactly when the card would be delivered to the sorting office.

Their local postman, who was on holiday that week, interrupted his holiday and went back to work for that very day because he didn't want to miss the opportunity of delivering the birthday card from the Queen to Rose himself!

I find that very touching.