SYDNEY CASTS MAGIC SPELL

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIII, Issue 25, 30 January 1942, Page 8

SYDNEY CASTS MAGIC SPELL

NEW ZEALANDER'S PRAISE

Y.W.CA DOES GOOD WORK

Writing from Sydney to friends in Palmerston North, Miss C. Ashton, former secretary of the Palmerston North Y.W.C.A., states that Sydney Y.W.C.A., where she has been stationed for a year, is doing a grand job in the city, especially for the men of the forces.

"Hundreds of soldiers, sailors, and airmen come in every week for dancing, meals, billiards, and other games or to use the library and writingroom," she wrote. "Of course, the girls are here too! They act as general hostesses to the men and, believe me, we never lack sufficient girls! It is interesting to see the really high standard of general conduct that holds and which sets the tone for the general atmosphere. It is very rarely we get any 'obstreperous' behaviour. It has been most stimulating working on a big staff alongside interesting and 'different' folk. I have gained a tremendous amount from it." "SORRY TO BE LEAVING." . Miss Ashton has been appointed to the national staff as secretary for youth interests and leaves for Melbourne this month. "I am sorry to be leaving Sydney though," she states, "for it has cast a really magic spell over me. I. did not like it at first —the noise and the seemingly unceasing hurry of crowds of people rather overwhelmed me. I do hot find the city itself beautiful except for the gay shops and the entrancing splashes of colour that the many and varied fruit barrows give, but the harbour and surroundings are very lovely. The harbour deserves everything that has ever been said of it. i It is glorious—any day, any season, any weather. Every time you go out on a ferry you find something new and lovely that you have missed before. THOSE "WIDE OPEN SPACES." "I have been lucky this year in seeing something of New South Wales as well as of Sydney. I had a very interesting trip in- the winter while we were having our Y.W.C.A: Services appeal. I went on a 'speaking tour,' as did several other staff members, and, the towns assigned to me were. Narrandera, Jerilderie, and Deniliquin. Guess you don't: know where they are! They, are on the flat, arid country, much qt\ which has been made into good farm-; ing land by the big irrigation works. You have no idea how flat and bare \t is. You travel for miles without seeing even a tree —just nothing but those 'wide open spaces' Australia is noted for—nothing between you and the sky. The 'roads' in places are a quarter of a mile wide—made that way for. stock, and on one journey I made, we passed numbers of mail boxes on gates or mostly just on a post, but nary a sign of the house could you see! It was too far away! Fancy living year in and year out in those isolated places—more cut off than ever now because of petrol rationing."