Page 53 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - Autumn 21

reason, everyone was singing “Hey Jude” skill that served me well years later, when I
from beginning to end.
There was another group, with friends my
age and from my school year and above,
called Kinneret. This group was senior
Bonim. It was never entirely clear why some
of us were in Arad and others in Kinneret.
A musical interlude: -
Arad, Arad, that’s the group for me
Arad, Arad all of us agree
What’s the group we all love best?
A,
R,
A,
D
I digressed…
Ivy cleaned the Moadon. She was a school-
friend of Gary’s Mum, Alma – a lovely lady.
Around this time, Renée Marcus began
using some of the rooms on the ground floor
for her wonderful Habonim Nursery. Renée
and Ivy were a great team. Later, Adrienne,
who worked with Renée, took over and
expanded the nursery, taking over the ground
floor. (When Gary was a shaliach in 1984-
1986, we sent our son, Assaf, there.)
Climbing the stairs, you would reach the
offices and some more meeting-rooms. One
of them was for a Chotrim group that
Howard Cohen and I led, when we were just
about 14 or 15. I still find it hard to
understand how parents entrusted their
children to such youngsters!
Many a long hour was spent on the Gestetner,
printing all things Habonim. I was a dab hand
at printing and not too shabby at typing. A
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substituted in the kibbutz office, for a brief
stint.
As you climbed higher, you reached the holy
of holies – the flat! Movement Workers lived
there, and it was the ambition of all us
youngsters to live there at some time,
together with our friends. A veritable
commune. The desire was so strong that, in
the early summer of 1970, a crowd of us
broke into the flat, when the Movement
Workers, Phil, Joanne and Stan, were away.
We spent long days there, revising, chatting
and pretending to be grown-up. I think some
fumbling and snogging went on, but in
general it was good innocent fun.
A cuppa in the Manchester Moadon Flat.
From left: Judy Kaye, Rachel (Samuels)
Noymeir, Paul Meyers, Ivri Tasker, Roger Noble
Years later, I spent brief periods of time
living in the flat, when I was still unsure
about my Aliyah that I made in 1972, at age
17. It was just so scary climbing the stairs
alone at night: I used to run up the dozens of
stairs, worrying about an imaginary, mad
axeman chasing me.
In 1967 and 1968, there was a huge spread of
‘foot and mouth’ disease that started in
Oswestry – a trivia fact that lurks in my brain