(23b) Bournemouth,
England,
31-3-42.
Dear Mum and Dad,
Here we are, in England at last, and more-or-less enjoying the vagaries of the famous English climate in early Spring. We landed in Scotland about four days ago after a very quiet and uneventful trip across the Atlantic with only one day’s rough weather. My ex-sailor father stood me in good stead and I was not sea-sick; Tom was less fortunate. We came directly down to the South of England by train, but, through travelling three quarters of the way by night, missed much of the scenery. I was a source of considerable annoyance to Tom, who was getting wildly enthusiastic about rustic houses down in the valley, to such an extent that I was compelled to point out that they were very probably damp and uncomfortable.
We are at present very comfortably quartered in what was formerly one of this seaside resort’s numerous summer boarding houses. Many of the chaps who were in training in New Zealand at the same time as us have been arriving here for the last couple of months, and I have met a whole bunch of the lads whom I hardly expected to see for months. Yesterday Ray Boag was in town, heard that I was around and started out to look me up; unfortunately, by the time we met I had only a few minutes to chat before a parade. I tried to meet him again at the station before his train left, late at night, but went to the wrong one; so that was that. He told me he has been in England for eight months and still has seen no action.
It was a surprise to see him so soon, but it may be a long time before we meet again as I don’t know where we are going to be stationed. However, it is good to be renewing old acquaintance. I have also met a lot of the boys from Taieri and New Plymouth.
We have a good chance of some leave shortly, so I will hop around England a bit. We have our new uniforms on order and should be into them tomorrow; I think I’m going to look like nothing on this earth, so it may be a bit of a shock. There is a £45 uniform allowance, which is, surprisingly enough, more or less adequate.
I guess you want to know just what sort of a place this England is. From what I have seen of the countryside, everything is very nice, and rather appallingly neat and orderly, besides being quieter than Sunday in Hastings. Somehow, though everything is so nice, I don’t think it’s my kind of a country – I think I would prefer the States, so that’s heresy for you. Most of the boys are, of course, very enthusiastic because there is no snow, but after the weather changes we have had in our short stay nothing would surprise me about this climate.
I suppose you know all about the rationing system from the home newspapers, so I won’t re-hash that very much. Where we are at present you would scarcely know there was a war on, and I am certainly far from starving on the food we have had so far. Officers get a liberal allowance for their initial purchase of kit, and though the civilian ration is not very big, no one need be a nudist.
Of course, before we came over here we heard all sorts of yarns about what we could and could not get in England, but most of them have been proved false. Naturally, many things we have taken as a matter of course in New Zealand and Canada are rare here, but in a number of ways we have been pleasantly surprised. I think we will get along very well.
It appears more than probable that we will be stationed here for several weeks before we move anywhere, and we have at least four months’ advanced and operational training to carry out. In the meantime, after our leave, we’ll have a bunch of lectures, so it’s back to school again for all of us.
We have had one rather interesting test since we came here; it’s a night vision test, to see how good your eyesight is. It often results in some peculiar things. I get an average rating on that, which surprised me as I didn’t know I was doing even as well as that.
It’s funny to be in a country where people scarcely bother to look up when a Hurricane or Spitfire roars overhead, as they have been doing quite a bit, but naturally we ex-Canadians are developing aeroplane neck by the dozen as it’s still a novelty for us.
We have been to the pictures here once or twice – of course, to an Englishman it’s the “cinema”. The shows start early and finish usually before ten o’clock on account of the blackout. In moderation, this blackout business is quite a bit of fun, and so far I have been charging around without striking much trouble. Of course, I managed to find the wrong station last night, but that was due to a mistake in address. Night life practically stops dead at ten, and there seems to be very little in the way of eating-houses at that hour. All sorts of odd happenings take place in the darkness, and people are apt to grab hold of one frantically inquiring for all sorts of unheard-of places. I personally have already found out what to do when in doubt – you ask a policeman. It works, every time.
Well, it’s a day or two later now, and in the meantime we have collected our new uniforms and are getting used to the feel of them. Will send you a snap one of these fine days.
Of course, I have a bunch of close on 100 shots from our trip in the States, but I don’t think it is much use sending them home. I still get mad every time I think of Dad’s razor going down, and it seems pretty certain that some snaps I sent will have gone the same way, but at least I still have the negatives with me.
We went to a stage play yesterday – “The Divorce of Lady X”. Remember seeing it as a movie about three years ago? The play was good, but the picture was better.
By the way – my numbers are slipping again, but I hope the one on this letter is O.K. If I double up, you’ll know what has happened. I think that’s all for this time, so it’s a case of “to be continued in our next”.
Love from
Arnold G.