Mike Harries was born in Loughor in the front room of a farm. His parents were Calvin, an Electrical Fitter with SWEB, and Alice, a tailoress/catering manager (she learned her trade making uniforms during WW2, aged 15 years old). They lived at Bryn Farm. Mike went to school in Penyrhoel and turned down a place in the Swansea College of Art to join the Army as a Junior Leader in the Royal Regiment of Wales at the age of 16yrs. As a young theatre medic in the RAMC he served a tour in Northern Ireland.

Mike and his young family spent many years living in West Germany and his description of travelling with them through checkpoints into East Germany provides a vivid illustration from this extraordinary period in recent history. Mike was later promoted to Warrant Officer and became a Document Inspector in the RAMC, a role he thoroughly enjoyed, enabling him to travel to Brunei, Cyprus and Nepal. He served 21yrs and just over two months in the Army followed by a further 13 years as a locally employed civilian working as a Crown Servant for the British Sovereign Bases in Cyprus before retiring to France.

At the time of writing his account, Mike was preparing to move from France to live in one of the Greek islands.