Melb grandma ridin’, swimmin’ and skatin’
A Melbourne grandmother, Vivienne “Viva” Brophy, celebrated her 80th birthday with a family gift of a 30-gear racing bike to replace the old one she rode to South Melbourne market every week.
Viva Brophy, so nicknamed by her extended family of five children and their six offspring, also line-skates and has a daily swim in Port Phillip Bay, even in the middle of winter. As well, the go-go grandmother now speaks five languages fluently, having decided to become a linguist while pregnant with her fifth child.
Born in Dublin she told the ‘Herald Sun’ newspaper she became determined to live every day to the full after experiencing poverty in early childhood when the diet was bread and jam for breakfast and supper, a potato for lunch, and a boiled egg after Mass on Sunday.
Then trips to the coast were a rarity but now Viva Brophy impresses even hardened athletes pounding along near the beach as she enters the cold water. They tell the Melbourne grandmother that they wouldn’t be able to save her if she got into trouble but Viva just smiles and ploughs on.
