NEW ZEALAND TROOPS

Waikato Times, Volume 132, Issue 22151, 24 September 1943, Page 5

NEW ZEALAND TROOPS

MUCH BETTER CONDITIONS

(N.Z.E.F. omci.il War Correspoiuteein NEW CALEDONIA

Those who can look back on more than half a year in New Caledonia never cease to wonder at the transformation in living conditions at all the New Zealand camps. Where once the sole evidence of Army habitation amid acres of gaunt trees was an array of tents with muddy, logstrewn approaches and a few wisps of smoke from a rough cookhouse, now the lay-out is systematic, the felled trees cleared and used as firewood and the dilapidated cookhouses replaced by clean, concrete-floor structures.

Thanks to the efforts of the people of the Dominion, through the National Patriotic Fund Board, the men have an increasing number of recreational facilities. They build [their own tables and chairs, but most I messrooms now have dartboards, | chess and checker sets, radios, play- | ing cards, table tennis and quoit j games. Outdoor sporting gear is arriving in good quantity. | This is winter—the dry season of i the tropics—when temperatures in ’ New Caledonia hover round 55 to 60 I degrees by breakfast time and may rise to 80 degrees at mid-day Nights j are chilly in the hills, but on the average the winter is well-nigh perfect. New Caledonia is at its best I just now.