Diary of George Booley, 5th Battalion, AIF, 1914 - Part 6 of 8

it was all novelty to us, the Niggers
driving them would be yelling out
"Gee. Gee", but they make the word last
about 10 seconds, when they want the
horse to stop they say something like
"Yis, s, s, as", with no end of stress on the
last of it, the only two words we knew
of Arabic was one Pronounced "Yalla"
& another "Emshe", they mean some
thing like "Clear out you---" (as
many adjectives as you like) of course
the chap added a fair share in English
too, at any rate after a very hard
day we got our things all shifted &
a few tents up, two tents for each
Company was all we had so it meant
meant sleeping out in the open, &
as luck would have it it rained
a bit just enough to make things
miserable, they tell us it only rains
here twice a year, so we thought
it would'nt matter much if we
had to sleep out, the next day we
began to get the lines laid out a bit
& all the tents up that were available
however in a few days more tents
came to light & by some of the  

chaps pinching some timber &
stretching their water proof sheets
over the top we all got under cover,
on about the third day the others
began to arrive & it was not long
before this desert spot was a big Military
camp, some very fair roads have
been laid down by carrying limestone 
on camels & then rolling with a
steam roller. The boys were greatly
taken with Cairo as the first 3 nights 
the camp was almost deserted, one
night there was only 6 of us in camp.
of course they were all away with
out leave, however since then steps
have been taken to stop that & now
by aid of guards, picquets, etc, there is
not much leave taking. The first week
or so everywhere we went we were
mounted on donkeys, we began to
find out that these niggers knew
something about the value of money
they very soon cleaned the chaps out
of their money & at a time when it was
needed, we were getting practically
nothing to eat sometimes a loaf of bread
we cut up between 7 of us & no jam
or anything else to eat with it & very  

little tea to drink, it was good to be
able to go to Cairo for a feed, I dont think
there were many in the lines at this
time who possesed a penny. I had
some & was thinking of putting up three
brass balls & turning money lender, the
funny part of the food business was we were
saying nothing as we thought it would
improve as soon as they could get things
fixed up, but one day we said something
& were told that we were getting our
ration that is the ration for soldiers
in Egypt & that is 1 lb of Meat (bone weighed
in) & 1/2 lbs of bread & 6d allowances for
extras, jam, butter, etc, we near dropped
dead when they told us this & wasted
no time in putting our case before the
heads with the result we got more
but at the time of writing this our
food is not what it might be especially
as we are working hard in fact
several of the Doctors have sent in
saying that we are being overworked.
Our meals run out now for Breakfast
sometimes porridge & bread & jam
more often only bread & jam, dinner
we take a small roll of bread & some
tinned fish which we most of us
hate the sight of. & tea we get stew  

& bread, but no jam or anything like
that to finish with. Since we arrived
here, they have decided to pay only 2/-
a day for privates, it wont effect me in
any way, & I think it is just as well
for most of the chaps too, as this place
is no good to young fellows with too
much money in their pockets in fact
General Maxwell the Commanding
Officer of Troops in Egypt said the same
thing in a letter to our Officers, he said
we are a young army & have too much
money to spend. We were here about a
week before we started training but
when we did we started in earnest &
have kept at it ever since. At the
particular time I am writing we are
all very impatient to get away from
here, day after day we see the chaps
dropping out on the march the hospitals
are nearly full & a good lot of
it seems to be nothing else but over
worked the hours have been very
long far too long for the food we get,
it is getting fairly warm too, the days
are like a early summers day & we
are in the middle of winter, to my idea
the climate here is a very tricky one
the nights get quite cold & the quick
changes from heat & cold catch the 

fellows in a bad way & in many cases
turn to Pneumonia, we have lost several
of men through this, so far only
one from our Battalion & that was Sergeant
Turner, he was a fine little chap
only a lad & well liked by everyone,
I could not believe it when I was told
he was dead, just a couple of days before
he was Sergeant of the Guard I was on
it rained a little that night & was
fairly cold & some of us had to sleep
out in it so I suppose that helped
a bit, we were all very much disappointed
at not being able to go to his
funeral, only a firing party (his own
Section) & the pall bearers, that is beside
the Band went, we all subscribed &
are having a stone put over his grave
before we leave here I hope to go out &
have a look at his grave. We were
told some weeks ago that we would
be moving away from here in a few
days, but apparently the plans are
changed, & we are still here, this has
been a big disappointment to us
as there is fighting near Immaelia
& that is not 100 miles from here
& we are kept here padding about
the sand & certainly not a learning 

anything & as the scrap there, is almost
a sure thing it would be the best thing
to do to top up our training if they
took us there, another thing that
worries b us more than anything
is to see that Terriers are going to
the front well there are Terriers here
certainly they may be made of the
right stuff but as far as a body of men
go they cant compare with our fellows
& to think that they go to the front
& us stay here is very galling to us,
& taken all round we feel very dissatisfied
especially as our Brigadier
has now started to pick holes &
pass very nasty remarks, but I suppose
we will have to put up with it
& wait for whatever turns up. Well
now I had better say some of the things
about Cairo that have struck me,
the one thing I could fill this book
about but would not look well
is the morals of the place, unless one
has seen it they have no idea that
such places exist, before landing in
Egypt our Chaplain gave a sermon
on "When East meets West", & Port Said
is the place that they reckon joins the
two, he said. that all the worst from 

the East & West met there & that all
the vices from both sides were let
loose & mixed together there, well if it
beats Cairo, it certainly should never
exist, there are hundreds of young
fellows in our lot who will rue the
day they set foot in Cairo, you can
walk for an hour in one part of it &
the sights, smells, ect, will satisfy
you for the rest of your life, this part
is all the old part of Cairo, the buildings 
are of stone & this does away with
any chance of them setting fire to it
& burning it out, the streets, well you
cant call them streets they are only
about 8 feet wide, there are no such
things as pavements & drains, there
appear to be no sanitary arrangements
at all, I wonder that the people
dont die out of disease, I am very pleased
that we have been innoculated
since we left, the buildings look as
if they have been bombarded & never
put up again. In what we term
the decent part of the City there are
some very nice buildings, but you
only have to walk about 50 yards from
any of them & you are back in the
dirty holes again, if the decent shops &
buildings were all in the one part it 

would make a nice place, all the big shops
are run by French or Greek people as a rule
so far I have not seen an Englishman in
one of them, it is hard to make yourself
understood by most of them, when you
do meet one who can talk English
they are very nice & will do almost any
thing for you- Nearly every second place
you see in the main streets are Cafes or
bars, you can get Beer or Spirits any
where, at some of the larger Cafes the
people sit out on the footpath some of
them you will see close on 200 chairs
& there are people of all Nationalities
sitting there drinking, gambling, eating
some of the funniest dishes you
ever saw, gambling, or smoking, they
smoke big pipes I forget what they
call them but they look like one of of
those soda-water affairs for home use
that you see in Australia with a big
pipe stem in it, the glass bowl is full
of water & it rests on the ground, it
looks funny a first but you gradually
get used to them, of course in the decent
part the streets are properly laid
out with footpaths & the roads ashalpted
but you see no end of funny things
even there, one Sunday afternoon I 

was in & saw a Native driving some
Turkeys along the footpath, as soon as
you get off the tram you are surrounded
by Niggers, some boot blacks & the rest
hawkers with everything imaginable,
when you ask them how much for an
article they start about 3 times as high
as it is worth I have seen them start
at 6 piastres & come down to 1, even the
best of the shops always start higher than
the value of the things, you have to barter
for everything you buy, if you go into
a Restuarant they nearly drive
you mad first one then another, then
you will feel something at your feet
& it is a bootblack under the table
they make you swear even if you
dont want to, then there is always kids
wanting "Backshees" that means money
or a present, one night there was a kiddy
about 10 or 12 carrying a baby about
a year old & she held it out & said half
"Piast" as they pronounce Piastre, I thought
she wanted to sell it, but she soon
made it plain what she meant, it is
funny when you are making a deal &
they are satisfied with what you offer
they will say "Gib it money", of course
the boys all pick up these sayings & 

are always quoting them, it was amusing
at the Camp picture show the other
night to hear the different remarks
passed it was as funny as a circus.
There is a fine gar public gardens in
the city called the                   . Gardens
there is a fine Bandstand & a skating
rink, it is the hardest place ever I
was in to find my way about, once
I leave the main streets I never know
where I am, but nearly every street of
any importance runs out near the
Gardens so I know where I am then.
The best way to see any part you want
to is to pay a few Piastres to a Garry
driver & he will take you round, a
Garry is a vehicle that I mentioned
before that we saw in the distance
at Aden, they are like a phaeton
with a pair of horses in some of the
pairs are lovely beasts! The Zoological
Gardens are splendidly laid out but
the animals there are not nearly as good
as the Melbourne zoo, there are one or two
Australian Parrots there & that is all
the Australian Natives I saw. Some
of the Hotels are splendid buildings of
course they are used chiefly by Tourists
it was amusing the Heads declared a
couple of the best of them out of bounds.