“TREASURES” SHIFTED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 August 1941, Page 6

“TREASURES” SHIFTED

ENTERPRISING NEW ZEALANDERS IN EGYPT. AMBULANCE AS SLEEPING QUARTERS. (N.Z.E.F. Official News Service.) CAIRO, June 30. It was only 14 miles behind the front line in a sector in which fighting has been taking place in the eastern desert quite recently, and a New Zealander was working a caterpillar tractor engaged on road improvement work. For strategical reasons an order was received to move back quickly and commence work elsewhere. This New Zealanders has "acquired” an abandoned Italian ambulance .which he was using as his sleeping quarters. He was faced with a long tow, but was determined not to leave his precious find behind, and set off with the vehicle behind. For miles this queer combination travelled at a snail’s pace, and at last he arrived safely with his travelling bed.

Another instance was met which shows that the well nigh famous quality of . scrounging which characterised the N.Z.E.F. in the last war has not diminished in any way. This concerned a sapper who in his “spare” time was making a lorry out of odds and ends from vehicles which had been left by the wayside as of no further use. This soldier was also amongst those who received the order to move and he was quite disappointed because he had not completed the job sufficiently to allow the truck to be driven under its own power. He was driving a power grader so not to be outdone he promptly attached his nearly completed truck and towed it away with him to finish it at a later date.