Facing green windows, a structure lined with cracks, stained dirt, burdened by metallic boxes, bars and pipes, underneath a grey sky, the tapping of plastic insects, scuttering in a frenzy, low murmurs - a void at its centre, a held breath.

Sitting in a charity's office based inside an old tobacco factory, North London, observing two minutes of silence in remembrance of Victory in Europe Day, 70 years ago, the distorted reflections of fellow colleagues on the windows across the way.

My father as a child, playing amidst the rubble of bombed homes.