COMMERCIAL FARMS

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 August 1942, Page 3

COMMERCIAL FARMS

LIFE IN PALESTINE

A description of communal farms in Palestine is given by a Wellington airman serving in the Middle East in a letter to his parents. “Members work on the farm, receive clothing, food, living quarters, but no money,” he writes. “If they choose to leave the colony they may do sb at any time, but can take nothing with them. It did not seem possible to me that anyone could live under such conditions and be happy, so I decided to see for myself. The other members of the party were not interested, so I went on my own.

“Roughly speaking, the principle of the communal settlement is this: land is held as common property. All ablebodied members work without wages both on the farm and in household administration. All income goes into a common purse, which runs the farm and maintains members, their children, and their parents in Palestine. Members have no private property; they live in houses built, owned, and maintained by the settlement. They eat in a common dining hall with a communal kitchen and use common laundries and sewing rooms. The children live from birth in children’s houses where they eat, sleep, and play, and learn. These children’s houses have their own kitchens and laundries. The older children attend die communal school. There is also a communal dispensary and a communal library. The settlement v.-nich I visited was situated about 30 miles from Tel Aviv. The trip out was like all other trips in public conveyances in Palestine, rather dull. Hebrew and German languages predominated and one did not hear a word of English. Indeed, the difficulty was to find someone who could understand English when you wanted information.

VILLAGE WITHOUT SHOPS. “The settlement itself can best be described as a small farming village without any shops. Grouped, round the central office were the children’s homes, the married people’s homes,, the dining-room, the school, and other domesticteuildings. Below the small hill on which these were built stretched the orange groves, fields of grain, and vegetable gardens of the settlement. “My guide took me first to see the school rooms. Tn the teachers’ conference room several teachers were studying. No children were being taught id the time, but the rooms wore like those of any small modern school. Not far away was an older group of buildings which accommodated a small library and a couple of rooms for the teaching of music. Round these a pleasant pardon had been formed during the fifteen years of the settlement’s existence. “Not far from tire school rooms are the children’s living quarters. Children over 12 years of age share sleeping accommodation, two to a room, in nleasant and modern buildings. Younger children sleep four to five in a room, also in modern buildings. A wide passage outside their sleeping quarters serves as a playroom. When I was there three- or four little Mr Is were playing on the floor. They I seemed as happy as possible. I asked them to smile when I wanted to photograph them, and they gave me some "of the best grins I have seen. There was absolutely no trace of shyness in their make-up. “The communal dining-room was Jone of the oldest buildings in the I settlement, and in consequence was not very attractive. It is built to accommodate the nine hundred members of the community at one sitting. Six people sit at each table. The food is cooked at a big kitchen at one end of the hall. Children eat in their own dining-rooms, so there are no family meals. Everyone sits where

he pleases. The food is plain but wholesome. There are no dining cloths on the tables. Cutlery is short. On one side of the hall is one newspaper in a glass case to enable members to read the current news. On the opposite wall is an assignment board. Members of the .community who have no set job like school teaching and who might be classed as ordinary labourers, are liable to do different jobs each day according to the needs' of the settlement. For instance, a man may be working in the fields one day, or in the factory, or in the stables, the next. Each day he looks at the assignment board to see where he is required to work the next. THE LIVING QUARTERS. “The living quarters vary from very small cottages to converted hacking cases. Some live in concrete .buildings. The small cottages accommodateteie married people who have been longest on the settlement. Collectively they are known as Millionaire’s Row. The cottages are small and boxlike buildings, each divided into two rooms.. Both are bedrooms and in each lives a man and his wife. All their goods are contained in that single room. Further away are the homes made from packing cases. In the main these are occupied by single people who have fled from the countries of Europe. In spite of their small size some of them are very attractive. One occupied by the widow of a wealthy Italian was furnished with taste. This hut was better than most of the others, and the guide explained she had had money to furnish it. But the money taken to furnish it would not have exceeded £5 at the outside; she had been a member for two years and did her snare by working in the vegetable garden.”