UNEF Living Conditions

It was hard to imagine though what we went through. We lived in tents and we had one building we lived in for awhile, no roof, no windows, no doors, just a shell of a building, part shell. Our outdoor theatre was against the wall of this shelled building. That’s where we showed our movies and you didn’t live in the elaborate life you’re living, we did have a chance to go to wet canteens, we call to have a beer; you’re allowed two beer only. They didn’t want you to get drunk, you know, or even feeling good. You had to be prepared in case of emergency all the time and in our canteen as well you couldn’t go and buy chocolate bars or tooth brush or tooth paste or writing paper. They just didn’t have it. It took them 10 or 11 months that I was in Egypt, it took them that long to get established and after that I heard that they started selling things like cameras and, you know, portable radios and tape recorders and things like that after but the first group that was there, that first year especially until at least November of ‘57 we had nothing.