LEAVE IN NEW YORK

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 250, 20 July 1942, Page 2

LEAVE IN NEW YORK

Experience Of New Zealand Airmen WONDERFUL HOSPITALITY OF AMERICANS The wonderful hospitality of . American people to New Zealanders in the armed forces is referred to by SubLieutenant L. F. Hayward, Wellington, in a letter to his-parents, Mr. and Mrs. F. A. Hayward, Houghton Bay. Lieutenant Hayward, who is in the Fleet Air Arm, recently spent his final leave in New York after finishing his training in England and in Canada. Before going overseas he was in the head office of the Railways Department. His companions on his visit to New York were two other New Zealanders, including Sub-Lieutenant H. Van Staveren, a son of Mr. and Mrs. B. Van Staveren, also of Wellington. On their journey from Canada to. New York the party had to spend several hours at Waterton, a - town in New York State and’about 250 miles from New York City. “We wandered around Waterton for the short-time we. were there and visited the U.S.O. Club, which is a club specially for the forces,” writes Lieutenant Hayward. “Being New Zealanders, they greeted us with open arms and turned on a free meal for the three of us. We had two or three very pleasant hours there and met dozens of American soldiers, and believe me they were jolly fine chaps.” After arriving in New York they booked rooms and went to a nearby restaurant for breakfast. “We ordered our meal, but before we could pay for it some elderly chap insisted on paying the bill,” the letter continues. “Though he was a civilian, he was an American Army engineer and had just come 'back from some islands after supervising the construction of aerodromes and bases.” Experience in Restaurant. Lieutenant Hayward states that they had been in New York for three days and had only spent a dollar or so, so they decided to go to a really first-class restaurant and have a meal worth two dollars. He adds: ‘We started offi and had a cocktail, then soup, lamb, green peas, and finally strawberries and cream and coffee. The bill came to two dollars 20 cents each. What a feed! However, before we had finished the waiter came across to us and said that some gentleman and his wife over the other side of the room were going to pay dur bill for us. When we had finished we went over and sat down with them after thanking them very much, and we had quite a long chat. The chap was an American, but his wife was a London girl. He had been in the U.S. and the British Navy during the last war. They were big music publishers in New York, and they told us some of the music they had published, both classical and modern. . . They left us their address on Broadway, and any time we are in New York again we have to look them up.” The three New Zealanders had a similar experience on their last night in the great city. “As we still had a few American dollars left we decided we would go into some other ‘posh’ restaurant and have a two-dollar 50 cents meal each,” adds Lieutenant Hayward. “So we picked out a really high-class one again, a French restaurant called Louis the 14th. Me walked iu there, and it was such a high, class place that most of the people already there gave a grin at seeing sailors coming into such a place for a meal. . . . After we had finished the wine a young chap and a very pretty young lady came and sat at the next table to us. Immediately he sat down he insisted on us having another wine on him. Then he pushed his table up to ours, and we had a good old chat with him and his wife while we had our second course and our strawberries and cream. . . . “They reside in Ohio just south of Lake Erie, and they have their summer residence on the lake and have their own speedboat. He also has his own private aeroplane and landing field. They extended au open invitation to us to stay with them at their home if ever we should be iu the .States again. They’d give us the time of our life, they reckoned. . . . They were really a wonderful couple. ... Of course, they paid our bill, two dollars 50 cents each, and before leaving they insisted that we write to them. , . . After this visit to New York aud mixing among Americans, I can tell you they are jolly fine people. They couldn’t have treated us better. Tffeir hospitality was unrivalled. If ever I want to see any place again its New York and America.”