The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt

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TEL AVIV, Israel—On Tuesday I went back to the Yuval Gad Water Pipe factory, which I had visited some time ago. The factory has expanded considerably and it is now making very large pipes, though not yet the very largest. Knowing that they will not always be making pipes at this place, they already have begun to develop new things that can be made from cement, such as new types of support for small buildings, etc. This is designed to keep the workmen busy when the need for water pipes slackens off.

We returned to Tel Aviv through a village where we visited some Yemenites who were doing a very primitive type of rug weaving. Mrs. Moshe Dayan accompanied us again and we found that in the family whom she had forewarned of our coming that the charming young Yemenite woman had been afraid of preparing a welcome for us by herself. So, she had called in some of her neighbors to help her. As we walked into the house Mrs. Lash said, "I would certainly say that these open sandwiches and that cake were made by a Viennese, but this is a Yemenite house and these must have been made by a Yemenite!"

In a few minutes we met the young women who had come to help our young hostess with her party and, of course, they were Viennese!

We were interested to find that such close friendships could exist between people of such different nationalities and, quite evidently, people of quite different levels of education.

In the evening we heard a delightful concert conducted by an Italian maestro, Mr. Fernando Previtali. As his opening piece he led the orchestra in Symphony No. 3 in A Minor, Opp. 56, by Mendelssohn. It was most delightful.

On Wednesday morning a Mr. Passman of Malben appeared bright and early to take us to a physical rehabilitation center, Mahane Yisrael. This convalescent home primarily gives work, at a basic wage, to people who are post-tubercular cases. We saw one man who had lost an arm, and we saw many others who are epileptic cases.

Mrs. Lash did not join us in the morning. Instead, she went to visit some Youth Aliyah projects, but she rejoined us in Jerusalem while we were touring a very interesting Hadassah project.

The hospitals here have been integrated with the Public Health Service, and a type of community service has been worked out that should prove quite valuable to both the community and the doctors. The hospital is in the background for use when it is really needed, but a young doctor and a nurse are assigned to an area in which 250 families live. They provide all medical care, with the help of occasional "specialist" visits, which include dental and psychiatric work.

In the afternoon we visited the Knesset, or Israel parliament. It was not in session, however, so we just had a look at the room and a short talk with the Speaker, Mr. J. Sprinzak.

(Distributed by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)

E.R.


Names and Terms Mentioned or Referenced

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  • Tel Aviv (Israel) [ index ]


About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, March 31, 1955

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
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Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

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Transcription created from a photocopy of a UFS wire copy of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library.
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