Y.M.C.A. IN EGYPT.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXXI, 21 February 1916, Page 8

V.M.C.A. IN EGYPT.

The following is an extract from a letter written by a Wellington Volunteer Sister in Egypt: "The tea-rooms are situated in the Esbekiah Gardens, which are under the V.M.C.A. The tables are all outside, and in the middle of the gardens the V.M.C.A. has a roller-skating rink, just like a large terms court, with a stage at one ena, and along one side writing and reading tables, fitted up for tne soldiers under a shelter, the side of which screens it from the rest of the gardens. _ At the other end is the tea place in which we do our work. Along the fourth side of the rkik are the tea tables for the men, for whom the tearooms have been started. They skate and have skating hockey matches, and in the evening there are moving pictures, entertainments, concerts, etc. The tea-rooms are just supposed to pay for themselves, not to make anything. The soldiers come in at all times in hundreds from three to nine, and they make the tea their proper meal. Numbers of them say how much tney enjoy seeing white women, and the ones jnst back from the Dardanelles especially enjoy it. It seems to be a, thing they cannot see enough of. Any one who had money could do splendid work of this kind, and for several friends to combine and do it would be just the very thing. There is no question of its being appreciated." Miss Wilson gives a vivid picture of the way in which the soldiers thronged the place. She writes: "We had five or six helpers, with natives to do the washing up, but even then we were s© rushed we did not know what to do. Even the crusts of-bread with paste on them, to which we were finally reduced, the soldiers took willingly, "and food that had been got for two "days' supply at least went in this one day. Over and over again the men will come and say: 'May I shake hands with you, Sister? You are the first white woman to whom I have spoken for months' (it might be ten, twelve or more months, as the case might be). Over and over again they say how splendid it is to be surrounded by their own kind and to oat proper food again, and that just to talk to us is a pleasure."