Description
Mr. Floyd explains the differences he felt between the attitudes and culture of Egypt and Lebanon.
Murray Floyd
Mr. Floyd was born January 10, 1931 in Toronto, Ontario. After receiving his education, Mr. Floyd became employed with a bus company. He later married and together he and his wife raised 4 daughters. Mainly for financial reasons, Mr. Floyd decided to join the military and enlisted in the Army. He took his basic training in Val Cartier and accepted his first posting to Vancouver with 11 Company having an occupation of Furniture & Effects Clerk. In 1964, Mr. Floyd traveled to Beirut, Egypt where he witnessed a great culture shock. His career would give him 2 tours to Egypt and later on in his career traveled to England to serve as clerk in logistic operations. At the time Mr. Floyd moved his family to England which proved to be a positive experience for all. Mr. Floyd retired from the military and resides in Toronto, Ontario.
Transcript
Egypt and Lebanon are two different countries, attitude wise and Egypt’s Rafah, and Gaza it’s just terrible, it was just terrible to see. The way the people lived. They lived in, under bushes, right in our camp actually, some of our laborers who worked for us, you know, they uh... We used to have to sign in and out to go out of the gate to go to the restaurant outside of the gate just to get, for exercise to get out of there. We used to think that the guards in the perimeter were there to keep us in rather than keep the Egyptians out and you felt that you were the intruder; we were there to help them and you seen the way they lived. I often thought that we’d of been further ahead instead of sending troops out there we should have sent farmers and industrialists, people that could have taught them how to improve their lot in life and learn to do things but they weren’t interested, they weren’t interested. It was like hand it out, give us what we want and we’ll be happy.