CHILDHOOD IN MOASCAR
As Remembered By David Clafton
Unlike most of your subscribers, I was just a schoolboy when we were in Suez. I was born in Jerusalem which was in Palestine at the time. My dad was in the RTR section of the 7th Armoured Division. My mum was a welsh girl (from Port Talbot of all places) and they met when she was a NAAFI girl at Bovington and my dad a trainee there.
After my birth we apparently moved about a bit in Egypt, firstly living in the suburbs of Cairo. When it looked like Rommel might take Egypt we were hurriedly shipped off to South Africa and when it was safe we returned to Blighty and spent some time living with my grandparents in Port Talbot. We were then shipped back to Egypt where we lived in ‘K’ Block in Moascar.
Life there was lovely. I attended the local school in the mornings and spent many afternoons in what was called The French Beach on Lake Timsah. Our buses were Army lorries. There were many German POWs building the flats and swimming pool that many Canal Zoners probably enjoyed the use of.
My dad was de-mobbed in 1948 and we were shipped back to England on the S.S. Orbita, docking in Liverpool.