Walter,
So you've come out of the desert, and reached the "Land of Milk and Honey" ! (make the most of it, for it probably won't last very long !)
... Our eyes nearly popped when we saw the wealth of the food put out for us in our tented messes...
Our reactions, too, when we left strictly rationed Britain in '41 to meet, first the Canadian and then the American hospitality of the Deep South. In Florida and Alabama we, who had hitherto shuffled slowly along a queue of airmen, mugs and "irons" at the ready, to have
something slapped on our plates in the Cookhouse, now sat astounded as we were deftly served by white-jacketed waiters -
and we didn't have do do any washing-up, either !
...We were even more amazed when we found that we received regular issues of cigarettes, pipe tobacco, chewing tobacco, toothpaste, razor blades, shaving cream, chewing gum, etc...
I have noted before how the attitude of the good folk of the US towards their Services differs from ours. They start with the principle: their fighting men must have the best that money can buy (we tend to the opposite view).
...He had everything given him, and received more pay than a British serviceman of similar rank, into the bargain!..
Which gave rise to the unworthy wartime slur: "
They're overfed, overpaid, oversexed - and Over Here !" As a matter of fact, I've been told that the RCAF rates of pay (overseas) were even higher than the US, but don't know if it's true.
Never got any
free pipe tobacco from them, but they were alongside us at Geilenkirchen in the early '60s, and would sell me # a
pound tin of "Robin Hood" tobacco, rather light stuff, but blended beautifully with, and eked out the "Balkan Sobranie" of which I was inordinately fond.
EDIT: # ...for only Dm4 (yes,
four Marks !)
And of course, you'd have a PX (that Aladdin's Cave) to go to - you could forget the NAAFI and its pitiful, overpriced items.
War is Hell (but not for everybody, and not all the time).
Danny.