SOCIAL BACKGROUND TO SERVICE LIFE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21933, 30 January 1946, Page 4

SOCIAL BACKGROUND TO SERVICE LIFE

“'THESE rooms are haunted by the memory of the men of Crete, of Alamcin, and Cassino. This place lias been a home away from home for New Zealand soldiers, sailors, airmen and nurses. It, lias been a meeting-place for New Zealanders from all the services, and from all over the wo rid A’ These phrases, applied by Colonel F. Waite, overseas commissioner for the New Zealand National Patriotic Fund Board, to the New Zealand Forces Club in Cairo on the occasion of its dosingdown. might apply equally well to any number of similar institutions scattered throughout the Middle East and. the United Kingdom. For elsewhere as in the Forces Club at Cairo, devoted people whose age and physical condition debarred them, from active-service roles expended their enthusiasm and energies in providing a social background for the men whose lives were at stake in the great conflict. Activity on behalf of the forces took many forms, and ranged from the strictly utilitarian communal lints located on the fringe of the battle areas, and manned perhaps by organisational -workers or by details of men and women from formations occupying the areas; to the more elaborate club premises coverin' 1 - much ground and affording- a wide variety of attractions gracing the larger cities through which troops passed on route to and from ‘battle. . , • To the servicemen and women abroad, the thought of home s ever-present, and nostalgia for the atmosphere of borne is one o the most common by-products of long separation. Happy is the man or woman who finds, ns so many New Zealanders found personal friends in some of the countries through which they pass or in which they live for a time. Less happy, perhaps, but still not tragically isolated, is lie or she who can make contact occasionally with a gathering-place of their kind, such as was provided by the service institutions. Deep indeed is the debt ot.gratitude owed to the voluntary workers who staffed those institutions, and pointed in their self-imposed tasks through discouragements and stram up to the time when the last handful of servicemen and women had 1 In almost every country in the world to-day there are the buildings which were temporary “homes away from homo loi service-people of all nationalities. The decorations luuc hoc stripped down, the collections of souvenirs have been dispersed, the Equipment removed and the buildings, in many instances, turned to other uses. But about them will chug i£ the flavour of their war-time use, and they will be blessed by tne grateful memories of men who passed through themporta s o:n u path to glory, sometimes to destinations ocyond the sight, of mem