A New Beginning
The Beginnings of a Normal life The Beginnings of a Normal Life
new tires. I went to the head of Yagur and pleaded their case, and eventually they got a loan from Yagur to buy the tires. Even before the settlement was established, the truck was earning money for the new kibbutz. At about this time, I faced a tragic personal loss. When our group was discharged from the Palmach, they returned to Yagur and lived in tents on the kibbutz. In November 1949, the group left for Mash’abei Sadeh. However, a smaller group, including Shimshon, my roommate for all those early years in Israel, went first to a place in Herzliya that functioned as a transfer location for provisions to be shipped to the Negev. Shimshon contracted a case of meningitis that was not diagnosed in time, and it proved to be fatal. He was only twenty years old. His death was a great loss to me. When Mash’abei Sadeh was established, his was the first grave in its cemetery. Even today, I am still very much saddened by Shimshon’s death. Life at Yagur evolved after independence. Despite the terrible re- cession, known as the Tzena, when we survived on dried milk, dried potatoes, dried eggs, and frozen fish filets — I will never eat them again — we were building the new State of Israel. Each person was doing his part and we were very dedicated. I was no longer consid- ered a child, and developed friendships with kibbutzniks outside of the Dror group. Immigrants were arriving from all over the world, including Algeria, Tunisia, and especially Morocco. There was no housing or jobs, and they had to live in tin boxes and tiny bungalows in ma’abarot (transfer camps). Earlier on, Yemeni immigrants had come to Israel on planes, which many of them had never seen or been on before. They were wonderful people and very industrious, but they came from a very primitive country. A popular story was told that after the plane land- ed in Lod Airport and they were put into buses to go to the transfer camp, the Yemeni immigrants started to scream because the bus did not lift off into the air. Tzena,
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