N.Z. Aid To Women Of South Vietnam

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30962, 19 January 1966, Page 2

N.Z. Aid To Women Of South Vietnam

If New Zealand women wanted to help the women of South Vietnam, they would probably do best to send medical supplies for civilian use, Mrs D. W. McNicol, wife of the new Australian High Commissioner to New Zealand, said yesterday.

Mrs McNicol, who was living in Vietnam when civil war broke out about 10 years ago, said she was very pleased to hear that Mrs Doreen Grant, of Christchurch, had personally opened an appeal fund for the women of South Vietnam, through the North Canterbury Centre of the Red Cross Society’.

New Zealand had representatives in South Vietnam who would be able to advise how the money could be spent to the best advantage, said Mrs McNicol, but she felt sure that medical supplies for the civilians would fill a great need. She did not recommend sending parcels of tinned foods.

“I have seen these aid parcels opened by women who do not recognise the contents as food,” she said. “So it often ended up on the black market.”

Giving an example, she said a consignment of large tins of cheese spread had been sent from an overseas country in aid parcels when she was there.

“The women thought it was soap and tried to use it for washing their clothes,” Mrs McNicol said.

Their staple diet was rice and they ate a great deal of bread, she added. They had plenty of fish and made a fish sauce on which they said they

could live almost entirely because it contained so much nourishment. “Vietnamese women are very charming and, collectiveI ly, they are the most beautiful : women I have seen. They are [ great lovers of family life and this war must be tearing [ them apart,” she said. “I I have a great deal of sympathy for them, particularly the i women. When we were there [they were just beginning to 1 take their place in community life.” j The lunar festival, held I about this time of the year, [was always celebrated as a 'family gathering in the home ' of the eldest member of the family. Any visitor was most 5 welcome to share the festivities and have a special “moon cake.” I “These cakes, made from [ rice flour, have a predominant flavour of honey and are a I bit like melting moments, ! she said. . 1 Mrs McNicol was studying !law at the University of Ade-

laide when the Second World War began and then switched her interests to Red Cross work as a driver.

“I have kept up my interest in Red Cross wherever I have been, and through it I have met residents of the country I would not have known otherwise,” she said. As the wife of a diplomat, Mrs McNichol has lived in Washington, Cambodia, Vietnam, London, Singapore and Pakistan before coming to New Zealand.

“One of the joys about my husband’s appointment to New Zealand is that I shall be able to garden again. It is one of my special interests and we have been deprived of a garden for a good number of years,” Mrs McNicol said.