Page 58 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - Winter 20

For several years it really became my second Those halcyon and happy days spent in the
home, and it was here that I learnt what no Bayit definitely equipped me with a set of life
formal education can ever provide. skills, which have always played, and even
today, continue to play such an important part
A sense of responsibility while having fun,
the leadership qualities needed so that a 16- in who and what I am.
year-old could enthuse 14-year-olds, So, thank you, the Bayit in Sinclair Drive,
independence of thought, the meaning of all you may no longer exist as you did then but
those -isms we espoused, and of course for me you will never be forgotten.
friendships that have endured for more than The writer, George (Yigal) Levine, lives in
60 years.
Tel Baruch Tsafon, North Tel Aviv, with his
It was in Sinclair Drive that I first heard a new Mancunian wife, Linda. They have 3
language which at the time was quite daughters and 8 grandchildren. Yigal was the
incomprehensible. When sitting with the Managing Director of the British Olim
chevrei in the Unique Café, someone always Society and subsequently Deputy Director
shouted out “anyone want odds?”. I always for Trade and Investment at the British
thought they meant what were the odds that Embassy in Tel Aviv. Now retired, he
the Special of the Day was Deep Fried Mars volunteers at the Museum of the Diaspora in
Bar; or when we sang “Hava Nagila” with Tel Aviv, at the Habonim Archives together
great gusto, I also had no idea what on earth with Linda, and is the Israel Representative
a Nagila was. But even then, I could wing it of the Kadoorie Charitable Trust.
with the best of them. I simply cannot
imagine what growing up in the West End of
Glasgow would have been like without the
influence of the Bayit in Sinclair Drive.

With the benefit of hindsight, I can definitely
say that my days spent in the Bayit
determined the future course of my life,
which is currently in North Tel-Aviv. From
the Bayit in Glasgow to the Machon in
Jerusalem, (difficult to imagine two less
similar places), to Movement Work in
Manchester via the Hachshara at the Eder
Farm, and it was in Manchester that I met and 6, Sinclair Drive
married my wife, Linda (she had only been in
Habonim for 5 minutes, so all of my more
farbrente colleagues accused me of
“marrying out”, but interesting to note that
most of them, unlike me, do not live here in
Israel), but I digress…

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