Theme: Experiencing war - survival, shelter and food. Mikelina Vella was born on the 5th of January 1927 in Mosta. Her parents had owned a drapery shop and she had eleven siblings. She had spent the 1950s and 1960s working as a cleaner for British service families in Sliema and Ta' Xbiex. She later worked as a batwoman for Royal Air Force (R.A.F.) airmen until 1974 and then worked as a cleaner at the Mtarfa Military Hospital between 1974 and 1979. Her last job was in the laundry section of St Vincent de Paul retirement home and she had retired in the early 1980s.