A Tribute to Effers
Created | Updated Jan 20, 2013
Farewell Effers
It is with great sadness that we must inform you of the passing of Effers on the morning of Christmas Day, 2012.
News has been filtering through via her friends in h2g2, who received regular news from a personal friend, Magda.
Effers had decided to keep things as private as possible during her latter months, and it is with sincere thanks to jwf and anhaga that they have allowed the Community to share their sad news. Also thanks to Clive for giving us permission to use his photograph of her.
Effers was a very complex person. Read her journals and you will find how well read she was. She enjoyed her photography and art. She had travelled extensively, often sharing her experiences with us in the threads. She loved her back garden, sometimes spending nights out there to watch the local foxes, or just look up at the sky. She spent a long time building a pond – she wanted to see what would turn up in it. Then the drought set in, followed by persistent rain. This didn't put her off making her observations of life in and around the pond.
Living in a multi-cultural area of Peckham, a lot of her near neighbours were foreign students and shopkeepers, Effers always made an effort to get to know them. One student brought along his Vespa scooter and they talked for hours about it. Now whether she fell in love with the student or his scooter we shall never know, but she certainly bought herself a brand new Vespa – a purple one! With great pride she took delivery of it and was looking forward to learning to ride it.
About a year ago she applied for tickets to the London 2012 Olympic Games. She proudly informed us when her tickets to the boxing arrived. Prior to the Olympics she took a walk around the Olympic Village area, and was very excited about the entire affair. She gave us full details of what she had seen and what was going to be there for the games in August.
Please go and view her journals, you may be pleasantly surprised to see how varied her interests were.
We leave you with just a few of the quotes left by those who knew Effers. Please leave your own messages, they will be appreciated by her friends.
Today I received a small package in the mail that had been forwarded to me at Effers' wish by her friend who was with her for her final days. It contained an Olympic pin showing the British and Canadian flags and the Vancouver and London Olympic logos. It is, I think, a suitably modest memento.
anhaga
She died peacefully at 6am Xmas morning just as the rest of the whirled was wakening to open their gifts.
Damn her irony!
She used to rant about an h2g2 bug that shows the
'eyes' open on pages of other deceased hootooists.
She would be mad as hell to know that now her eyes
will be opened when we visit her homepage (which
she left as a modest tribute to the end she knew
was coming).
jwf
We were sat in one of the parks heading over to the march. I had my sign propped up against the bench and I shared with her my 'energy boosting' dark chocolate hobnobs.
I'd just got a new lens so convinced her to let me test it out and take her photograph. She demolished the biscuit, lit that cigarette, and I took the picture.
Clive the flying ostrich
Really sad to hear this news: I had noticed her absence and was actually going to post in Ask, asking if anyone had heard from her. I know we bickered like siblings at times but I think this place will be a poorer place without her. I'll certainly miss her.
Rest in peace Effers. Lord knows she deserves some.
HonestIago
I can't think of any words... I'm sure Effers would appreciate the irony of that.
Mr Dreadful
Terribly sad and unexpected news – I didn't even know she was ill.
We went back and forth from wild agreement to wild disagreement here on h2g2, but it was always lively and interesting. I will miss her.
Dogster
...I'll end with a
. That smiley always makes me think of Effers, every time I see it, and I have no idea why. I hope it doesn't come across as disrespectful in this thread, it's meant as a farewell nod to a big character.
Deb
Various Contributors
