Swapping lives with the elderly

2011-02-21 15:46:22

21 February 2011 Last updated at 12:06 Share this page Delicious Digg Facebook reddit StumbleUpon Twitter Email Print What can the old and young learn from a life swap? Continue reading the main story In today's Magazine The time Britain slid into chaos 7 days quiz Does the Queen do fashion? 10 of your Vidal Sassoon cuts

Age is said to come with wisdom, but do the young still expect to learn from the old and can they teach their elders anything?

At 73, Betty Dunbar admitted it was years since she had sat down to talk with a teenager. And her opinion of them was not good.

"The youths that I've come across are obnoxious," she says. "Respect? I don't think there is any."

Living in a retirement village in Surrey, she is one of four million pensioners in the UK who live isolated from younger people.

So when four young people spent three weeks with Betty and her neighbours, both young and old found they still had some life lessons to learn.

Never too old to have fun

A good night out for 83-year-old Roy Hone normally sees him spending time at his local bowls club.

But while spending a week with 24-year-old beautician Zoe Day, he ended up in a gay bar in Southampton, singing karaoke into the early hours and trying his first "jagerbomb" - a cocktail where a shot of Jagermeister is dropped into a glass of Red Bull.

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