STILL SMILING

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 304, 23 December 1943, Page 5

STILL SMILING

"QUEUE" CHRISTMAS Australians Face Austerity Festive Season N.Z.P.A. Special Correspondent Rec. 11 a.m. SYDNEY, this day. With so many of the season's normal commodities in short supply, Australia's 1943 Christmas may be remembered as the "queue" Christmas. Each morning thousands of hopeful city shoppers form ration lines to await store openings. Australia is accepting with resigned cheerfulness a festive season of unparalleled austerity. On the depleted food front there are few sweets or dried fruits. Nuts, crystallised table fruits and tinned fruits are of! the market. Due to shortages of material, Christmas cakes and puddings are rare. There is no cream. Pork is unprocurable; ham and poultry are difficult to obtain. Cordials are scarce, beer supplies unequal to the demand and spirits are pz-actically unobtainable. Tobacco and cigarettes are at their lowest ebb. Books top the Christmas presents popularity list. With shop toys fabulously expensive and incredibly shoddy, many parents have made at home their Christmas gift toys. Sales of war savings certificates are a record. Retail stores report boom sales of hardware and household necessities, which are replacing normal Christmas gifts. Stores expect to be out of these lines for several months of the New Year. The reduction of train transport to half the number which was running last Christmas will keep most Australians in their own homes. But reduced holiday resort accommodation is packed to capacity. In the cities no extra trams or buses are being provided for Christmas crowds.