Pete and I are in a darts team! Its called the Odd Bods
2 NZs: 1 Italian: 1 UK: 1 Scot: 1 UK Danish: 1 UK Greek:
1 Bulgarian:
(Jan's letter home. Sep 77.)
I was a bit lucky here in that the sports I liked and was reasonably proficient at were readily available, squash, tennis, spear fishing, even rugby.
Benghazi had a purpose-built sporting facility called sports city. This recently built area had a soccer stadium, running tracks, tennis courts, squash courts, Olympic size swimming pool, gymnasium, cycle track and associated facilities.
Here we had a good modern sporting complex. But where were the sports men and woman? Apart from an occasional soccer match, the facilities were hardly used. The whole complex had been built for the one time Benghazi held the Pan Arab games.
The one exception that was well used was the squash courts, which were open in the late afternoon and early evening. A man who was referred to as the coach ran them, his name of course was Abdul, and he was in total charge. He was a nice chap and I got on well with him, I was reasonably proficient at squash and wouldn't have too much trouble beating him.
After we were settled and I had got to know a few expatriates, I enquired about the possibility of playing squash, I was told about the sports city facility, and was also told I would be accepted providing I did not beat the coach. One afternoon I drove down to sports city, found a place to park and wandered around marveling at the deserted facilities. The squash courts were adjacent to the tennis courts and I went inside. I immediately felt at home.
The familiar sound of squash racket hitting a ball, feet pounding the floor, heavy breathing, voices raised in argument as a point was disputed. I could well have been back at the Burnside squash club in Christchurch.
There was a small office where Abdul sat behind a desk. I told him who I was and asked if I could join the squash centre. We talked for a while, then Abdul said "Okay we have game". We played and Abdul won several close sets. He was as pleased as punch and I became one of his group.
I was at first the only expatriate playing apart from a couple of young Egyptians. Now and then, he organised small tournaments which I usually won. This he didn't mind, but when he organised a Benghazi open it was a different matter. I entered this but after a couple of rounds, he took me aside and without actually saying so intimated I should not be in the final.
It would not reflect well on him if a foreigner ended up beating the young Libyan who was expected to win. This was a bit of a problem, as I really wanted to win that tournament, so I went ahead and ended up as a finalist. Did I win that final? No. I didn't even play in it. The final was supposed to have been played on a Wednesday evening. Abdul changed that to the previous night advising everybody but me. I duly turned up on the Wednesday night, but no one was there.
When I tracked Abdul down a few days later he said "Where were you on Tuesday? I had to default you." Oh, well, some you just can't win.
For all that, the squash courts were great and we soon had a group of expatriates playing regular weekly games.
Running.
I had always liked running, and usually managed several kilometres a day in New Zealand. Running in Benghazi was a different matter, the locals obviously thought you were mad, dogs and kids thought you were fair game, and anyway wearing shorts always produced disapproving stares.
However that wonderful institution the "Hashhouse Harriers" came to the rescue. I had never heard of them, but soon found out that they were an international running group. They were totally non-serious and non-competitive; there only aim in life was to get out for a regular run and to have as much fun as possible at the same time.
It all started in Malaysia at a British army base where a group of soldiers organised a weekly run and always managed to end up at a Hashhouse, which, as far as I can gather is what the soldiers called the local cafe bar type place. These runs and the parties afterwards were very successful, and as the soldiers were eventually posted to other places, the concept of the run was spread by them and is now found in every corner of the world.
The Benghazi Hashhouse Harriers met weekly either at someone's house or a pre-designated point. The run was completed and because there was no Hashhouse to go to, everyone ended up at the organizers house.
The responsibility of organising a run was shared around the twenty or so regulars who turned out each week. The organiser had to set the course, and provide the food and drink.
A Hashhouse run always follows the same format. First a course is selected, this could be anywhere and varied from the local streets around the organisers home, to a run miles away in the country.
Once the course is chosen the organisers mark the route in some way, this again varied but probably the most popular way was to use toilet paper, mainly because it was cheap and degraded away after a couple of days. Tying a piece of the paper to something at regular intervals marked the trail. Most of the time when the leaders passed a marker, the next marker could be seen ahead. At intervals, however a different coloured marker indicated that the next one had to be searched for.
The leading pack came to a halt then spread out calling searching, searching
while the back markers trotted up for a much appreciated rest. When the new marker was found the finder called "on". Everyone shouted "on", "on" and headed off in the new direction.
All this was a source of absolute amazement to any local who happen to be present when the pack of mad expatriates thundered by puffing and blowing and shouting " SEARCH " or " ON, ON ". It was all good fun and some of the parties afterwards were something to remember.
When a German chap organised a run, the whole German community pitched in and the party afterwards lasted well into the night, being run on the lines of an Oktoberfest complete with steins of homebrew lager and the singing of German drinking songs.
The Hashhouse Harriers was really quite an institution. A grand master kept the book, which contained the organiser's roster and other important details such as any newspaper articles, photographs, or other items dealing with the local group. There was also correspondence with other groups, historical details and the like. Hashhouse Harriers can be found in most major cities of the world, as well as some of the more remote places. I was not surprised to find on my return to New Zealand that Christchurch had not just one, but two Hashhouse Harrier groups.
The sports city complex had a running track that we sometimes used, but I found that a little too serious for my liking. The fact that I couldn't keep up may have had something to do with it. I decided that the once weekly hash run would suffice.
TENNIS.
If anyone asked you, "what is the best climate for tennis"? You would probably say warm, low humidity, and not much wind. That pretty much describes the climate of Benghazi for much of the year. Therefore, tennis was definitely on the sporting agenda for the expatriate community.
Very conveniently there were four hard courts situated alongside the ring road not far from our villa. These courts were pretty much the domain of the expatriate community, which I think tended to annoy the Libyan gentleman in charge of opening them up. I got this impression because of the way he acted when he turned up to unlock the gates and found a bunch of expatriates impatiently waiting for him.
I guess he didn't like the idea that he was only there to open up for us non Libyans. It was worse when he was late, as we simply climbed over his gate and started playing, this really got him going, but all he could do was rant and rave in Arabic which got him no where at all.
In all the time I played on those courts, I hardly ever saw a Libyan playing. I don't think the local people were too lazy to play energetic sports. I do think that there was something in the overall system that made it difficult for people to enjoy the many things that we take for granted.
For instance, none of the schools I saw had tennis courts, indeed there was little evidence of any sporting facilities except for perhaps a soccer field. There were no sports shops in Benghazi, and there is also the fact that many sports requires the wearing of shorts which they don't like doing in public, and that's just the men!! Women in sport would be almost totally out of the question.
So what tended to happen was that the powers that be in the city council would spend large on amenities such as the tennis courts, then happily sit back and say "There you are good people, here is a fine set of tennis courts, now use them ".
But no one did, no one came forward to organise things such as a club, competitions and so on. That's where their system fell down. It is easy enough to spend money on inanimate things. It is not so easy to change the way people think. I think I can safely say that you will not see a Libyan sports person featuring in the world rankings except maybe as a soccer player.
I had regular weekly games with two or three friends, one of whom, called Nedco Todorov Todorov was a Bulgarian who became a good family friend. Another friend was a fellow U.N. worker. Bjorn Flatjord was with the world health organisation. He was a Norwegian and as we were of similar age and ability we had some great battles on the court.
An American family by the name of Davis lived a couple of streets away and John Davis was a tennis fanatic. He organised an annual tennis tournament among the expatriates and presented a suitably inscribed cup. I take great pleasure in telling people that I once played in the Davis cup competition. Unfortunately, I was never good enough to win it, as it usually went to one of his two son's who visited regularly from their university in the States. John always held the tournament when they were visiting.
SWIMMING, SPEAR FISHING, SNORKELLING, BOATING.
Benghazi is of course on the Mediterranean coast, long stretches of beaches lie to the West of the city although only a few are easily accessible. The beaches were the stuff of dreams. Kilometers of golden sand and clear warm water.
If they had been on the northern edge of the Med. they would have been covered with people and surrounded by high-rise hotels! There was none of this sort of development anywhere in the thousand kilometers of Libyan coastline, except for the three beach clubs mentioned earlier.
Even the few villages and small towns on the Tripoli highway are sited well back from the sea. Access was difficult as there were very few formed roads leading from the highway to the coast.
The Benghazi Libyans did frequent the town beaches during the hot weather. Families would picnic there and some would go for a swim. This was quite funny to watch, as they would go in with all their clothes on. Not for them bathing suits that would show sinful amounts of bare flesh.
The effect was spoiled a little when they came out of the water as their thin robes clung to them with the same result as seen at a wet T-shirt contest!
There it was then, miles of beautiful unspoiled beaches, just the thing to take the children to whenever the chance arose, do a little sun bathing, a little swimming. Well not exactly! There always seems to be a fly in the ointment somewhere. There were two flies actually.
One - great globs of oil would drift ashore.
Two - frustrated Libyan men would appear.
The frustrated Arab men were really a product of the, to our eyes, restrictive attitude of Moslems where women are concerned.
In our society there is nothing remarkable in a family group or groups relaxing on the beach dressed in their bathing costumes, however skimpy they may be. To an Arab man however this behavior was akin to a tourist in Soho visiting his first strip club.
No sooner would we get settled when they would start to appear. Often they would just wander around obviously eyeing the girls and eventually disappear, sometimes unfortunately if in a group they would become more persistent, just standing and staring and even at times exposing themselves.
This usually produced some ribald comments from the ladies, but also meant we had to pack up and go.
This situation only arose when there was just a few of us and usually at the more remote beaches.
Because of this regular trips were organised and we went in large groups. There was safety in numbers, and besides it was more fun that way.
Still it was a pity that Jan and I, and the children couldn't just nip off for a few hours to our favourite spot without taking the risk of being hassled by randy Arabs.
Ever since I had worked in the Pacific Islands, I had been interested in spear fishing, so I was very pleased to make friends with an Italian chap who also had spear fishing gear, including a spear gun. Mario and I spent a lot of time swimming off the beaches and rocky points looking for suitably sized fish to capture, though almost always without success.
Unlike the coasts of New Zealand or Fiji the Mediterranean had been pretty well fished out. Still it was good fun, the water was clear and warm and the underwater scene is always interesting.
One of the English expatriates had a sailing dinghy, which he would take on the regular group trips, and was happy to let anyone have a sail. Needless to say I made full use of his generosity. I didn't go too far from the beach, because it was an odd feeling to get a kilometer or so off shore. It was quite lonely as there was no other boating activity at all. It was well known that the Libyan military got suspicious of any strange boats near one of their many military sites.
Even with the drawbacks the beaches were great for recreation and proved to be a godsend during the heat of summer.
RUGBY.
As there were a lot of British expatriates in the country its not surprising that regular games of rugby were organized. These were pickup games with the teams made up from the various contracting firms on an ad hoc basis.
We managed to persuade the Benghazi university to let us play on their soccer field. They didn't like the idea very much as they thought that we would damage the surface, but in the end we managed to get the use of it once every couple of weeks during the winter.
It was good rough rugby and I was forbidden to play by Jan, (I had broken my arm the previous year playing in a friendly airport game). I was roped in as referee. I knew the basic rules and what I didn't know I made up as the game progressed. No one seemed to mind if I was authoritative enough and any way I could tell they needed a spell every now and then.
The games were popular with some of the bigger contractors from outside Benghazi as it gave them the chance to come to town and have a good party afterwards. What the Libyans made of it is hard to say, some of them came to watch but I think it just reinforced their idea that all expatriates were mad especially the British.
Next page. Chapter 12 Touring round