{"id":30176,"date":"2014-05-30T13:25:13","date_gmt":"2014-05-30T17:25:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=30176"},"modified":"2014-05-30T22:28:30","modified_gmt":"2014-05-31T02:28:30","slug":"sri-lankan-housemaid-melani-dimple-in-hot-water-over-hot-water-bottle-incident-after-serving-queen-elizabeth-for-five-years-at-buckingham-palace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=30176","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lankan Housemaid Melani Dimple in Hot Water Over Hot Water Bottle Incident After Serving Queen Elizabeth for Five Years at Buckingham Palace."},"content":{"rendered":"


\nBy Richard Kay and Geoffrey Levy<\/strong><\/p>\n

Bedtime for the Queen on recent chilly spring evenings has not been complete without one of her most cherished pleasures \u2014 a hot water bottle, placed snugly between the silken sheets.<\/p>\n

\""There<\/a>

“There is no doubt that the Queen depends on [Mrs Kelly]. She likes the fact that Angela irons out problems – and that she’s very good at picking up gossip which HM loves to hear’-DailyMail on Facebook<\/p><\/div>\n

Imagine Her Majesty\u2019s shock, on retiring to her large first-floor bedroom overlooking the gardens at Buckingham Palace just the other evening, to find her bed ice-cold. No bottle.<\/p>\n

Instead, it was lying to one side and was unfilled, so the Queen, who has always been a practical sort, made a hot water bottle for herself.<\/p>\n

She clearly saw the funny side, turning the incident into a huge joke when telling her close senior aide Angela Kelly about it.<\/p>\n

For Melani Dimple, however, the housemaid who forgot to put the bottle into the bed while performing other duties, the consequences were anything but funny.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n


\nSri Lankan-born Melani, who had worked as a housemaid at Buckingham Palace for five years, and in the prized position on the Queen\u2019s private floor for two, has since left Palace employment altogether.<\/strong><\/p>\n

There is much sadness and anger below stairs about the departure of Melani, a popular figure who was married recently and was hoping to move into a grace-and-favour staff flat at the Palace mews with her new husband.<\/p>\n

But the anger is not directed against the Queen, who is not being blamed for Melani\u2019s unexpected departure. It is focused on Mrs Kelly, the Queen\u2019s personal assistant and senior dresser.<\/p>\n

\"Angela<\/a>

Angela Kelly, the Queen’s Curator for ‘Jewellery, Insignia and Wardrobe’, has developed a very close relationship with Her Majesty (Mrs Kelly pictured receiving the Royal Victoria Order Investitures at Buckingham Palace)-DailyMail on Facebook<\/p><\/div>\n

Angela is the Liverpool crane driver\u2019s daughter, raised in a council house, who also holds the grandiose title Curator to the Queen for \u2018Jewellery, Insignia and Wardrobe\u2019. These days, though, she is much more than that.<\/p>\n

The close relationship she has developed with the monarch in recent years has now evolved even further, giving her extraordinary influence over who is chosen to work closely with the Queen, and \u2014 just as importantly \u2014 who is not.<\/p>\n

\u2018Angela\u2019s beady eye is on everything that is done for Her Majesty, making sure everything is perfect,\u2019 says one below-stairs figure.<\/p>\n

\u2018The next thing we knew after the hot water bottle business was that Melani was gone. We\u2019re all very upset about it. Everyone\u2019s entitled to make a mistake \u2014 and, besides, the Queen was amused to have to do it herself. I think she found it quite a novelty.\u2019<\/p>\n

Of course, such perfectionism on Mrs Kelly\u2019s behalf and her wish for the Queen to be looked after properly is highly admirable, but the timing of the episode could not have been worse.<\/p>\n

Melani had just been given British citizenship. She was offered a new role training other staff, but she decided to leave royal service altogether.<\/p>\n

\u2018There was no doubt she was upset at what happened because everyone knew about it,\u2019 says a friend of the softly-spoken former maid. \u2018She was very house-proud.\u2019<\/p>\n

But that wasn\u2019t the end of the story. When the Queen heard that Melani had put in her notice, she sent for her because she wanted to say her own farewell to the charming girl who, she understood, was returning to Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

\u2018Apparently the Queen was very surprised when Melani told her that she wasn\u2019t going back to Sri Lanka but was staying in London,\u2019 says a close figure.<\/p>\n

But this isn\u2019t the only departure from the Queen\u2019s floor to have sent a wave of uncertainty belowstairs at a time when, ironically enough, \u2018upstairs\u2019 the Royal Family has been enjoying its calmest and most successful period for years.<\/p>\n

Beverley Jones, who has worked under Angela Kelly as one of the Queen\u2019s dressers for the past 12 years, has also been moved to other duties.<\/p>\n

Bev, as she is known, held the same role for many years to the Queen Mother, who was very fond of her. She was offered a post on the Queen\u2019s floor at Buckingham Palace after the Queen Mother\u2019s death in 2002.<\/p>\n

Now, however, she is to be found in the linen pantry, pressing tea-towels and organising dry cleaning after being moved to the housekeeping department.article-2624790-1DB5AF5D00000578-307_306x534<\/p>\n

\u2018Bev has travelled the world with the Queen and is upset to be no longer serving her,\u2019 says a member of staff.<\/p>\n

Indeed, just five years ago she was among the hand-picked senior members of domestic staff invited to the Queen\u2019s unveiling of the statue of the Queen Mother in the Mall.<\/p>\n

Now, like Melani, Bev is no longer in the gilded circle of the monarch\u2019s personal staff. Of course it\u2019s natural that Mrs Kelly\u2019s rise and rise has created some jealousies among others who work at the Palace. Equally, it is surely no coincidence that these complaints have increased as the Queen herself gets older. At 88, she is in remarkably good health but she does like things around her to be settled.<\/p>\n

\u2018Angela sees it as her job to make sure everything runs like clockwork \u2014 and that includes the people who take care of Her Majesty,\u2019 says an aide.<\/p>\n

Not long ago Mrs Kelly, who has transformed the Queen\u2019s wardrobe to be full of fashionable pastel shades and elegantly cut dresses and skirt suits, gave a rare public insight into her relationship with the Queen.<\/p>\n

\u2018No one has forgotten the time when the Queen was trying on some new clothes in front of a mirror and, turning to [Mrs Kelly], said with a smile: \u2018We could be sisters.\u2019<\/p>\n

In an unprecedented interview, sanctioned by Buckingham Palace, she said that the two of them discuss \u2018anything and everything\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u2018We are two typical women,\u2019 she said. \u2018We discuss clothes, make-up and jewellery.\u2019<\/p>\n

The twice-married Mrs Kelly, who has never lost her Scouse accent, confided: \u2018We have a lot of fun together. The Queen has a wicked sense of humour and is a great mimic. She can do all accents \u2014 including mine.\u2019<\/p>\n

In the six years since she made those candid remarks, her position as the Queen\u2019s gatekeeper and confidante has only strengthened.<\/p>\n

Often, when at Windsor, the Queen will say she is going out for a walk. Staff know that this means she will be heading in the direction of Frogmore, where Angela, a mother and grandmother, lives alone in a grace and favour home.<\/p>\n

\u2018They like to chat \u2014 and they do it often,\u2019 says a courtier.
\nTogether with the Queen\u2019s long-serving page, Paul Whybrew, Angela is among a handful of domestic staff who have been promoted to the royal household.<\/p>\n

But while Whybrew, who appeared with the Queen in the James Bond gag for the opening of the London Olympics, is a much-loved figure among Palace staff, Mrs Kelly is viewed differently by some of those who find themselves reporting to her.<\/p>\n

\u2018The Queen\u2019s diary is getting quieter, which means the workload has been reduced, but the reason why people are now apprehensive of working on her floor is because it means working for Angela,\u2019 a senior figure says.<\/p>\n

To the Queen, however, Angela can do no wrong. No one has forgotten the time when the Queen was trying on some new clothes in front of a mirror and, turning to her dresser, said with a smile: \u2018We could be sisters.\u2019<\/p>\n

There was more in that comment than the mere fact that they are of similar height and build. For there is a genuine warmth between the two women that has grown into companionship.<\/p>\n

\u2018There is no doubt that the Queen depends on her,\u2019 says the courtier. \u2018She likes the fact that Angela irons out problems \u2014 and that she\u2019s very good at picking up gossip which HM loves to hear.<\/p>\n

Angela goes to the odd showbiz party and always reports back what she\u2019s picked up. The Queen loves that.<\/p>\n

\u2018Years ago, Princess Margaret kept her abreast of such things. Now Angela does.\u2019
\nSuch is the trust the Queen has in her that Angela was even permitted to write a book about her \u2014 albeit one that concentrated on her dresses.<\/p>\n

Profits from the book, Dressing The Queen: The Jubilee Wardrobe, went to charity.<\/p>\n

All in all, it\u2019s a remarkable story for someone who arrived in royal service by chance.<\/p>\n

In 1992, she was housekeeper to the then British Ambassador to Germany, and a former driver with the Women\u2019s Royal Army Corps.<\/p>\n

When the Queen and Prince Philip came to stay during an official visit to Berlin, they began chatting to Mrs Kelly, who spoke of her plans to return to Britain.<\/p>\n

Not long afterwards, she received a call offering her a job at the Palace. She started in 1993. Three years later, she was senior dresser, and in 2001 became the Queen\u2019s first ever personal assistant.<\/p>\n

Today, the woman whose father was a gatekeeper and crane driver at Liverpool docks, is solely responsible for how the Queen looks in public, organising her wardrobe and liaising with dressmakers, and also, increasingly, designing her clothes as well.<\/p>\n

She even made the christening robe used for Prince George\u2019s baptism last year.<\/p>\n

But her relationships with others around the Queen have not been smooth. Her partnership with fellow dressmaker Alison Pordum broke up some four years ago after reports of a \u2018verbal confrontation\u2019 between the two.<\/p>\n

On another occasion, royal protection officers were said to have had to intervene to separate Angela from housemaid Hannah Coullett, whom she accused of seeing her then boyfriend, pastry chef Tony Ferriroli. The women were pulled apart as they grappled with one another at the servants\u2019 entrance to the Palace.<\/p>\n

When, later, she had a bust-up with security officials over her Palace pass, she acquired a new nickname. Staff are known by their initials: fiery Angela, who is AK, instantly became AK47.<\/p>\n

None of this troubles the Queen.<\/p>\n

\u2018She regards them as personal issues and nothing to do with her,\u2019 a friend says. \u2018For her, Angela is a problem solver.\u2019<\/p>\n

\"Today,<\/a>

Today, [Mrs Kelly] is solely responsible for how the Queen looks in public, organising her wardrobe and liaising with dressmakers, and also, increasingly, designing her clothes as well-DailyMail on Facebook<\/p><\/div>\n

So it was to Angela that she dispatched the Duchess of Cambridge ahead of her and William\u2019s hugely successful trip to Australia and New Zealand, to provide her granddaughter-in-law with some jewellery.<\/p>\n

\u2018Angela gave Kate all the right things to wear,\u2019 an aide says. \u2018The Queen would have done that herself once, but now she trusts Angela to make the right decisions. We later heard that Kate had to sign for the jewels she borrowed.\u2019<\/p>\n

Friends of the Queen have suggested that Mrs Kelly\u2019s rise coincided with the loss of the two most important women in HM\u2019s life: her mother and sister Margaret. Angela denied this, insisting in her 2007 interview that theirs is \u2018just a working relationship \u2014 but a close one\u2019.<\/p>\n

A Buckingham Palace spokesman said: \u2018We do not comment on individual staffing matters.\u2019
\nBut it is understood there has been a \u2018streamlining\u2019 of staff involved in the Queen\u2019s wardrobe in recent times, with more use of existing outfits.<\/p>\n

An insider said: \u2018People are moved to different roles from time to time. That\u2019s healthy, and as it should be.\u2019<\/p>\n

For Angela Kelly, meanwhile, there is no talk of her moving on. This year marks her 21st anniversary working for the Queen. She\u2019s now 61 and fellow staff have been pondering how long she will continue.<\/p>\n

Perhaps there is a clue in that interview. \u2018I hope the Queen and I grow old together,\u2019 she declared. <\/p>\n

Courtesy:Daily Mail<\/em><\/p>\n

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By Richard Kay and Geoffrey Levy Bedtime for the Queen on recent chilly spring evenings has not been complete without one of her most cherished pleasures \u2014 a hot water bottle, placed snugly between the silken sheets. Imagine Her Majesty\u2019s shock, on retiring to her large first-floor bedroom overlooking the gardens at Buckingham Palace just …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Sri Lankan Housemaid Melani Dimple in Hot Water Over Hot Water Bottle Incident After Serving Queen Elizabeth for Five Years at Buckingham Palace.’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30176"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30176"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30176\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30226,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30176\/revisions\/30226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}