Israel
Atlit
We arrived in Haifa, Israel, on the
27th December 1949. From the port in Haifa we were taken to Atlit which was now
a migrant camp. It was still surrounded by a barbed wire fence and had watch
towers every fifty metres or so. Atlit was established in 1930 by the British
Mandate as an internment camp for people trying to enter Palestine illegally.
These were Jews fleeing persecution in Europe and after WWII it was mostly
Holocaust survivors who began streaming in. Because of pressure from the Arabs,
the British put restrictions on the numbers allowed to enter Palestine, the
result being that people were running the British naval blockade and forcing
their way in and many died in the process. The British detained some in Atlit
and shipped others to an internment camp in Cyprus.
The British Mandate ended on May 14th
1948. David Ben Gurion, the Prime
Minister, declared the State of Israel the same day.
Atlit consisted of many large
barracks which housed entire families in rather spartan conditions. Spare
blankets were hung from crossbeams to partition areas off so as to give some
privacy to each family. There were communal toilets and dining rooms and we
stayed there for three long months.
As a seven year old, I was oblivious
to the hardships that were endured by the adults and together with other kids
we had a great time especially when we climbed up into the watch towers. These
were steel structures with a trapdoor in the floor. From the tower you could
see all over the entire camp.
In May 2016 Helen and I went on a UIA
(United Israel Appeal) trip to Israel. Part of the tour included Atlit. When we
went into the barracks, I got a big shock as memories from about 67 years ago
came flooding in. When I calmed down, I was able to tell the rest of our tour
group my recollections as a seven year old of the conditions in the barracks.
While I couldn’t remember the bundles hanging from the crossbeams as seen in
the photo, I did remember the blankets that were nailed to the crossbeam.
The photos below were taken when
Helen and I were on a UIA tour of Israel in May 2016.
Watch Tower Inside the barrack
Ami Kam
(My Nation Has Risen)Founded 1950
(Spelling of Ami Kam on sign posts in
Israel was AMI QAM)
From Atlit, twenty one families
joined together and elected to go on the land. Some were from Shanghai but most
were from Harbin. The place chosen for us was Ami Kam. Ami Kam was seven kilometres north of
Binyamina, east of Caesaria and twenty three kilometres from Haifa. This was in
the very narrow part of Israel, so the distance to the West Bank controlled at
the time by Jordan was only about five kilometres.
What was there when we arrived was a
barren hillside on which we set up our tents. Down below was a valley covered
in stones because the soil had been washed away over two thousand years of not
being used. The ground was rock hard. This was our Promised Land.
Our family consisted of Babushka,
Dzedushka, mum, dad, Nellie and me. Babushka and Dzedushka were in one tent
which doubled up as the kitchen and dining room, and the rest of us were in the
second tent. This was a big step away from our house in Shanghai where we had
servants at out beck and call.
Early in the piece when we had a
storm and a lot of rain, our tents got washed away. After they were put back up
again, deep trenches were dug around them so the rain water would run off the
tents into the trenches and down the hill. That solved the problem.
A communal shower and toilet block
were built.
The laundry was another story. We had
a creek that was running through the middle of our valley and that was mum’s
laundry. Sounds idyllic and rustic but it was yet another hardship to endure.
Nothing was easy.
An Israeli couple, Moshe and his wife
lived on our moshav and were our advisers. We were supplied basic necessities
such as tents, camp beds and bedding. We were supplied a truck for emergency
use and a tractor to plough the land with. We were also supplied a first aid
hut and a hut to be used as an armoury. We were given rifles and Sten guns
(submachine guns). Moshe trained the men in their use and care, as guarding at
night was mandatory because of the close proximity to the border. I was seven years old at the time and used to
nag Moshe to show me how to use the rifle. Eventually he obliged and showed me.
He let me hold it, aim and shoot (without bullets of course) which made me the
happiest boy in Ami Kam.
Next I pestered him to show me how to use the Sten
gun. Again he obliged. He took out the magazine and let me hold the Sten gun.
To cock the Sten gun required a bit of strength because the spring is rather
strong and I was unable to do it. So he helped. I was now holding the Sten gun
with my right hand and my left hand holding where the aperture for the magazine
was. My little finger on the left hand curled around the gun and went into the
space where the magazine sits, so when I pulled the trigger the spring loaded
piston was released. It shot forward and almost severed my little finger. Moshe
patched it up and sometime later a no nonsense military doctor came and quite
unceremoniously ripped the dressing off, cleaned the finger up and applied a
new dressing. This was not enjoyable. I
still have the scar today which I refer to as “just an old war injury”.
Initially we were supplied basic
necessities but we had a Kibbutz a short distance away, Shmona Esre (18 in
Hebrew) where some of our women went to pick grapes and in return we were paid
with food provisions. After the camp was
set up, the next task was to clear the thousands of stones littering the
valley. The stones were gathered by all the men and women and taken to the side
to form a fence. This was backbreaking work as you would be continuously
bending down and then carrying the stones over to the fence. It’s worth noting
that our people came from the lap of luxury where they never lifted anything
heavier than a fountain pen or manicure scissors and here they were working
like labourers.
Once the land was cleared, they had
to plough the soil, and because the land had not been used for some two
thousand years, it settled into a rock hard surface that the tractor was unable
to penetrate. They had to resort to using picks to turn the soil over inch by
inch. The valley was quite large and it took weeks to do this. Everyone joined
in and everyone had blisters. This was heavy work.
The fields had to be irrigated, so we
had pipes and equipment delivered to us and Moshe showed us how to cut the
pipes, join them and attach taps where necessary. We had a well at the bottom
of the hill which was quite deep and had the coldest and purest water. The well
doubled up as our refrigerator because we had watertight containers into which
we put foodstuff requiring refrigeration. We then lowered them down into the
well on a string. It sounds primitive but it worked. A motor driven pump would
pump the water up the hill to the tanks supplying the shower facilities and
general use. In the summer the tank water would become quite hot, so the men
coming back at the end of a hard day’s work had the pleasure of a hot shower.
The first crop they planted was
tomatoes. After some weeks we had our first fruit. The tomatoes were the size
of cherry tomatoes and after they were picked it was obvious they were not
suitable as eating tomatoes. Hand mincers were used to mince them and then they
were canned. It was a communal effort. The whole moshav turned up and took part
in the processing.
The second crop was substantially
fertilised and our people were now more knowledgeable so the next lot of
tomatoes was a good crop. At various stages they also grew cucumbers and when
the season was right, we had a large crop of corn.
Moshe was our main adviser to show us
the whole process from planting to caring for the crop and harvesting.
Ploughing was usually done at night.
When the man who was ploughing the field was due to go out one night I did my
usual. I nagged till he agreed to take me on the tractor with him. What a
thrill. However, the problem was that there were two bums but only one seat. So
I remember him having to stand while I was seated. Not easy while he was
driving the tractor. Not surprising, he let me stay only a short time.
Once the crops were progressing
regularly the next project was making building blocks for our future homes.
This involved mixing cement by hand. When the texture of the mix was right,
they put the cement into a metal frame, shook it down, then covered it with a
wooden tray and turned the whole lot upside down so the cement was now resting
on the wooden tray. After placing it on the ground, the metal frame had to be
removed without the wet cement collapsing which did happen quite often. The
resulting block was about 40cm X 25cm and 20cm high and had four chambers to
allow the circulation of air which would help combat the heat of summer in the
house.
This process went on for months and
all the men doing this became deeply suntanned and developed strong muscles.
They worked in teams and there was a lot of rivalry and pride involved when at
the end of each day, they counted how many mixes each team made compared with
the others.
We had quite a good rapport with the
kibbutz nearby. We visited them and had a very pleasant time entertaining them
with Russian singing and they in turn turned on Israeli singing and dancing for
us. One evening in Ami Kam we had a social evening and our men made from wire
the name Ami Kam and wrapped the wires in cloth soaked with kerosene. When it
became dark they set it alight and in the darkness it was quite spectacular.
The problem was that the people on the kibbutz thought we had a fire, so they
came racing over en masse to help put out the fire. They then stayed for
another social evening with us.
There was an abandoned Arab village
called Sabbarin we found just north of Ami Kam. Our people took the truck to
this village and everyone picked whatever furniture they fancied, loaded it
onto the truck and brought it back to Ami Kam. A big washing and scrubbing then
took place with the result that we all now had furniture for our tents ranging
from chairs and tables to cupboards and benches.
The other thing they found in
Sabbarin was a cache of guns and ammunition sufficient to start a small war.
This too was brought to Ami Kam. They declared to the authorities a certain
amount and kept the rest to bolster our rather meagre supply of arms.
Dzedushka became sick. After a short
time dad walked to Binyamina, about seven kilometres away and went in search of
a doctor. The story was that no doctor was willing to come out to Ami Kam. So dad came back and a mattress was put on
the back of the truck and Dzedushka was taken in this manner to Haifa hospital.
Dzedushka died a couple of days later
and there was some talk that the illness was prostate related. He was buried in
a cemetery in Haifa which Helen and I visited in 2016 when we were in Israel
for a United Israel Appeal tour.
Binyamin Ben Moshe Grinshpoon
Dzedushka’s tombstone in the
Haifa Cemetry
Despite the pioneering spirit and the
enthusiasm of being “chalutzim” in the Promised Land, mum and dad were finding
that life in Ami Kam was proving to be very difficult for them, so when
Dzedushka died, some soul searching was done about staying on. Nellie and I
were not getting any education and the future was without any tangible
prospect. So, after less than a year, and with heavy hearts, we moved on to
Kiriyat Chaim near Haifa.
Kiriyat Chaim
We moved to Kiriyat Chaim towards the
end of 1951 and settled into a ground floor flat in a typical suburban block of
flats. Nellie and I went to the local school where we started learning Hebrew.
Dad got a job in Haifa and had to commute daily.
David in school in
Kiriyat Chaim 1951 (Photo labelled Haifa in error)
Top row 4th from the
left
Behind our back fence was Kiriyat
Motskin and in the block of flats directly opposite us on the first floor lived
my uncle Arcadia, wife Freda and their son (my cousin) Isia (later in the US,
Ike). Isia was born in 1933 and was 9 years older than I was. He was tall and slim and I idolised him. He
was totally rapt in aeroplanes and on the occasions when I visited them, he
would take me into his room which was covered from end to end with pictures of
every imaginable plane. Ike dreamt of being a pilot in the air force but was
unsuccessful because he was too tall. He was devastated. Instead, he joined the
army, and when he finished his service joined the air force as ground crew and
made a successful career out of it.
We were in Kiriyat Chaim for about a
year when dad landed an amazing job in Jerusalem as the branch manager for a
British company called Steel Brothers. With the job came accommodation in one
of Jerusalem’s more prestigious suburbs, Talbia. So we moved to Jerusalem.
12 Rehov Disraeli, Talbia
Two sets of stairs, one from the main
gate the other from the garden, join and lead up to the first floor apartment.
Mum and dad on the
steps leading to our apartment
12 Rehov (Street) Disraeli
We occupied about three quarters of
the top floor of this massive house. Another family lived in the other part of
the top floor, to the right of our main entrance. The ground floor was a
Tourist Club.
Our area consisted of two huge lounge
rooms but we only used one. We had four bedrooms, three verandas, a kitchen and
two bathrooms. By Israeli standards this was a palace. The big veranda faced
the border which was a little over 1km away, and every now and then the
Jordanian soldiers sitting on the wall would take pot shots at us and we
regularly had spent bullets on our veranda with holes in the wall. The walls
were thick and made of Jerusalem stone, as strong as granite. It would take
a direct hit from a cannon to cause damage. There was also another room on the
left of the main entrance which was my junk room where I kept an amazing
collection of useless rubbish including an old truck tyre. The door was always
closed so there was no need for anyone to see the mess.
The
apartment was furnished with all the furniture we bought in China prior to
coming to Israel. It was kept in storage till we came to live in Jerusalem. The
furniture was the typical Chinese ornate furniture made of heavy wood carved in
typical Chinese fashion.
Nellie mum Babushka and
I sitting on our main veranda
Nellie and I went to school. My
school was at the bottom of the hill sitting in the middle of an olive grove.
The school was about 0.5 km from the border and the wall facing the border was
pockmarked with bullet holes.
David in school Bet
Hayeled (top row third from right)1952
Nellie in high
school (third row first on the left)
1952
Our Hebrew was improving and I had no
problem fitting in with all the other kids. Soccer and sport in general was a
great way to mix because kicking a ball did not depend on your ability to
speak.
I saw a movie called Ivanhoe and was
very much impressed by the knight in shining armour. So for Purim I made myself
an outfit of a knight from bits and pieces and this earned me a first prize.
The outfit consisted of a large
cucumber tin with a piece cut out for the eyes and nose with a plume on top
made of streamers. The dress with sides cut out was Nellie’s velvet dress and
the tights were hers as well. The epaulets were from chains from an old bed
which I wound around and wired to shape. The spear was an old broom and the
spear guard was Babushka’s aluminium form for making jelly. (I was roundly
chastised for ruining it). The shield was the lid of a garbage can bent to
shape. A wide leather belt and arm guards completed the outfit. Everything was
painted silver and on the shield was painted a red lion so that I was Richard
the Lion Heart.
David is Richard the
Lion Heart Purim 1953
During a routine medical examination
in school it was discovered that I had a heart condition called ductus
arteriosus (patent duct). It involves a blood vessel that by-passes the lungs
before a baby is born, and is meant to seal off at birth. Mine didn’t. This
meant that some of the blood after I was born still by-passed the lungs and was
not oxygenated, which meant that I was one form of a “blue baby”. After any
exertion my lips and fingernails would be bluish instead of pink. In essence, I
ran out of breath rather quickly and was not able to do any long distance
running or any lengthy exertion.
Heart surgery all over the world was
in its infancy so a top English cardiac specialist, Professor Brock, came to
demonstrate to Israeli doctors how to perform this operation. I had the
distinction of being Israel’s first ever heart operation. My operation entailed
getting into the chest and tying off the blood vessel and so forcing all of the
blood to go to the lungs for oxygenation. Four weeks in hospital and problem
solved. I have a scar starting from almost the centre of my chest, all the way
around almost up to my spine. In later years I was still unable to do long
distance running because the operation interfered with the development of the
diaphragm and I finished up with having only a half lung capacity on my left
side.
Professor Brock was knighted by the
Queen and became Sir, and later still became Lord Brock.
In 1954, the Arabs started a boycott
of Israel. Any company that dealt with Israel was not allowed to do business
with any Arab country. The result of this was that many companies abandoned
Israel. Steel Brothers, the company that dad was employed by, felt they had to
leave as they were doing a lot of business with the Arabs. End result was that
dad lost his job and we lost our beautiful home.
Shortly after, dad landed an amazing
job with the government so we moved to Ramat Gan where we bought a flat close
to the Elite Chocolate factory. Nellie and I went to the local school and life
went on.
Ramat Gan
1954
Dad got his contract with the
government for two reasons. English was a relatively rare commodity in Israel
at that time, and dad had a reasonable command of English, but he also had
experience with contract work dating back to his work in China.
The job entailed going to Persia
(Iran) to negotiate purchasing oil for Israel. The Shah of Persia was in
control of the country and was partial to Israel so the atmosphere was
friendly. Dad spent a couple of months in Teheran doing the contract work, came
back for a couple of weeks to Israel and then returned to Teheran together with
the minister for energy. All the relevant documents were signed by all the
parties and dad’s signature appeared on all of them as well.
There was an element of subterfuge
that then took place.The Persians (Iranians) did not want
to upset their Arab neighbours by selling oil to Israel so a scheme was
hatched. The ships leaving the Gulf with oil for Israel needed to go through
the Suez Canal rather than going all the way around Africa. But any ship
destined for Israel was barred from going through the Suez Canal. So the ships
leaving the Gulf port had a name and a flag and were listed officially as going
to Europe. Once they went through the Suez Canal and reached the Mediterranean
Sea, the name on the ship was changed and a different flag was hoisted before
the ship went to Haifa. After the oil
was offloaded, the ship went back to the Mediterranean, reversed the name and
changed the flag before going through the Suez Canal on the way back to the
Gulf. Dad said that this went on for years but also said that it was probably
known this was taking place but suited everyone to keep quiet about it.
When this contract was finished dad
was again without a job.
Bar Mitzvah
We sold our flat and moved into a
granny flat while waiting for the Visas to move to Australia. In the meantime our
neighbour asked me one day how old I was. I said twelve, nearly thirteen. He
asked me if I was ready for my Bar Mitzvah. We all looked blankly at one
another because no mention was made of this up to that point. So after some
discussion with the family, he took me to an old religious man whose business
was collecting junk using a horse and trailer. He was to prepare me for my Bar
Mitzvah. His horse smelt better than he did. After he tended to his horse every
evening I got my lessons, and some three weeks later I was standing on the
bimah in the synagogue on Saturday morning and did my bit. Being fluent in
Hebrew was a major plus and in later years I realised how lucky I was when in
Australia the boys have to learn a new language before the Bar Mitzvah learning
even began. For the kiddush, Babushka brought a lekech and a bottle of wine to
the synagogue. A far cry from the Bar Mitzvah celebration we have become
accustomed to in Australia.
The whole family gathered from every
part of Israel and when we returned home from the synagogue, we took a few
photos. Sima and his family were still in China.
David’s Bar Mitzvah family gathering 24.7.1955
Nellie David Ike Genia Arcadia Babushka dad mum Freda Lyolya Fania
Nellie Ike David Genia
Arcadia dad and Lyolia
While we were still in Shanghai, dad went on a business trip to Australia. He spent most of his time in Sydney and instantly fell in love with the place. He even negotiated to buy a house in Mosman but that fell through because of fifty pounds. It may not sound like much now but in the late forties that was a huge amount of money.
We had an application for Visas to the US for some time without any results. So when dad finished with the government contract we applied for Visas to Australia which were approved within a couple of weeks.
Australia, here we come.
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