esperance

Esperance David – Reflection

INT: Did you like Scotland?

ED: Yes, I think so. They were more open, you know. I worked in a school in Scotland, in East Kilbride. That came after, really, Sandhurst wasn’t it? And they were very, very nice, you know. The headmaster was nice, a retired army officer, sergeant major, so the school was run on those lines. Listen, everywhere I went I was a foreigner, you know? And to the Home Office, do you know how they referred to us at this time?

INT2: No.

ED: We had to go to the Aliens Department in the Home Office. The Aliens, we were aliens.

INT: And do you still feel very foreign now, even now, or do you feel a bit more Scottish? What do you feel, what do you consider yourself to be?

ED: I don’t feel Scottish, I don’t feel English and I don’t feel Israeli either. And Baghdad, I don’t want to know. So I really, no, this is my house, I made it my home but it’s not really, you know, like them, they were born in England. They were born, you know, Britain is their home, but you can’t divorce yourself from where you are really. I was there until seventeen years old, I was grown up, you know, just…

INT: So, my last question is, if you look back now on your time here, once you’d got to Scotland, what are the highs and lows that stand out for you?

ED: For Scotland or for me?

INT: For your whole life.

ED: All in all, it was an interesting life. It wasn’t milk and honey. I’ve had to fight all my life, maybe I still fight now, you know? Because it wasn’t easy getting, or acquiring, anything. It was always, you know, kind of, not a hundred per cent, it was more fifty per cent more that I should give of myself or do more to really get. Even at school, you know, I was Mrs. David, the notorious Mrs. David, if you like. I had to. I wouldn’t let anyone walk over me and they were inclined to do that because I’m a foreigner. It doesn’t matter if we lived in England for ten, fifteen years, I’m still, you know, I’m here. Wherever I was, I’m a foreigner, you know? I’m an alien.

[Laughter].

INT: And the high points? What would you say, what…?

ED: The high point, getting married and having my own home. Life was very tough, as I said. David wasn’t even qualified yet, but we managed somehow or other. Yes, and I didn’t teach until Michelle grew up and the other two were grown up enough. And I taught, I was here in, twenty years in here and about three, four years in East Kilbride, yes. So, until I retired here, yes.

INT: Well, thank you, we’ve had a fascinating afternoon and it’s very kind of you to share your memories with us.

Esperance David – Integration

INT: Did you find it easy to integrate into Scottish society, or did you feel different?

ED: Jewish society or anything?

INT: Jewish and the wider society.

ED: Well, the wider society, I went back to work when we had another…

INT2: You had a son in between all that.

ED: A son in between, I didn’t work for five years and Lil was about four, five years, and Tony was two years, two, three years, and I was working at that time. Michelle was born in Scotland. Yes, she’s a Scottish lass.

INT: Ah, that’s nice. And the people here, were they welcoming?

ED: The people here, well, the people here, the neighbours were nice, where we were in Loughborough. We didn’t know many people, but the house we rented was from a Jewish woman and we had, David had a friend who was Jewish and he was working with him in Loughborough, and his family, and they came and saw us. With two small children, there wasn’t really much chance to go and socialise or do anything, especially when we were strangers to, let’s face it, to the Jewish community as well. I don’t think they took to us very much. We were just as foreign as anyone else, you know? People from Baghdad, you know, that was a different world.

INT2: You weren’t there for that long, because you were in Sandhurst for eight or nine years.

ED: Yes, well I’m just abridging a bit. We were in Sandhurst.

INT2: But that was a big bit.

ED: That’s a big bit, yes, we went from Loughborough to Birmingham, Sutton Coldfield, and Tony was born there, and then David, you know, had to move in the job. He was offered a good job in Sandhurst and we moved to Sandhurst for a few years, there, for five, six years. Tony was going to school and Lil was just going to grammar school, and David was offered a very, very promoted job, by an American firm, Honeywell, very well…you see Honeywell boxes everywhere, and he worked there and I was working as well, but I stopped when Michelle came.

And then he couldn’t take it. He couldn’t take the American way of life. It was a rat race, whatever he did wasn’t enough and it was a very worrying job, and he became really ill. So, he had to just leave. He just couldn’t take any more, he was very, very ill. So I was working and we managed, took Michelle to nursery school, while he recuperated a bit

Esperance David – In Scotland

INT: Yeah, and he got a job in Scotland in what year?

ED: Well David was still doing his apprenticeship but to have an Honours degree wasn’t enough to be a chartered engineer, so there was a big concern, an electrical factory, the Brush [Electrical Engineering Company], so he was doing it there, and I was there. We got married, you know, and we had a little flat and, as I say, Lil was on the way. So we went, with Lil, to Israel. I was showing off, and David was showing off, and all that. That’s another thing.

And then we really, honestly and truly did try to live there, because his mother was on her own. My family and his family were there and we thought, well, okay, we did our stint in England, we’ll go back and settle with the folks there[ in Israel].

Things were getting a wee bit better, ‘53, four, five years later, but he couldn’t fit in. Israel, as I keep saying, wasn’t like Israel of today. Everyone was shouting, there are no queues. People would fight one another in the shops to buy something, to get something. Things were very scarce and jobs, for what he was qualified to do, there wasn’t anything like that. They were not sophisticated. Electrical engineer is like an electrician, you know, doing wires and things like that, but he wasn’t like that and he stayed, I don’t know, four weeks’ holiday or something like that, and he really became very ill, he said, “Well I’m going back to [ England] to see what’s happening”.

At that time we were living in Loughborough and so he wrote to me. He said “Well there’s no way I can really live in Israel at the moment, so you stay as long as you like but I’m back to my job”, and he developed an ulcer and he really was very ill at that time. He said, “Take your time, I’m doing fine”. So, anyway, I stayed there for about two, three months, and I thought maybe he’ll get better, but it didn’t work out, so we had to go, and that’s it, we broke off with Israel, we bought a house and moved on and moved on, you know?

INT: And when did you come to Scotland, what year?

ED: Sixty-eight, was it ‘68? Sixty-eight. Michelle was born in October, we moved in in January.

Esperance David – Life with her husband David

INT: We haven’t heard about your husband, how did you meet him?

ED: Well, that’s a long story, isn’t it?

[Laughter].

ED: Well, while I was in Israel on my first visit, I was staying with my mum and dad, obviously, but my brother got married and his wife was five months’ pregnant and they didn’t have a house yet, or a flat or anywhere to go. So they stayed, while waiting to go somewhere. So I stayed there and Lulu, that’s my sister-in-law, she said, “Well, go and take your shower and put your, whatever you have nice something, we are going to a wedding.” We are going to a wedding, nobody knows me here and I don’t go where I’m not invited. “No, no, they know you are here because this is one of my cousins and I’m going and you’re coming with us. They said to bring her with you.” So, I looked at mum, she said, “Well, why don’t you go, there’s nothing else to do?”

So I went and there was a cousin of David there, she was invited there, and she sat and she was talking with my sister-in-law, on that kind of table, and she said, “Oh, you must have, David is here, you must have met David, he’s from London, here on holiday.” “Who’s David, who met David?” “He’s from Baghdad.” Well, he didn’t live next door and even then, so Jewish people in Baghdad, I didn’t know, I didn’t know him from… And she said, “David”, right across, you know they still do that in Israel, and David came and I was introduced to David.

And, you know, I came back to London and he hadn’t finished his studies yet. I was working and we just, kind of, really met very casually, not like today, you know? And I was living in London; he was in London, finishing. I was staying in, what do they call them now? In a guest house, kind of thing. He was studying and working in the evening, to keep himself. And then he finished his studies and there were four other guys with him, and to celebrate their fortunes and misfortunes, they took me to the opera that night, and they were teasing David, he’s got Honours and one of them did not quite pass. And Honours is, those days you don’t work for Honours, if you sit an exam and you do very well, over the mark of passing, you get an Honours degree. So they were teasing him for that. So anyway, they all went and he said, “Well I’ll take you home”. It wasn’t very far, and we sat and talked, and you know, we just talked and we eventually got together.

INT: And, once you were married, did you speak in Arabic at home or did you…?

ED: Yes, in Arabic at home and, every now and again, a word in French and a word in English, you know. If it happened to be because, you know, my mum and dad didn’t learn English. That’s how we arrived in Scotland.

Esperance David – Life for Esperance in England

INT: So you must, you were in Britain…

INT: They were in Israel, building the, when did you see them again?

ED: 1953.

INT: So, you studied?

ED: I finished my study, then I was teaching.

INT: Oh you were a teacher?

ED: I was teaching.

INT: In London?

ED: In London, I was teaching in London? No, well I was living in London at the time, but I, it’s a long story. I met some friends, when I was in Eastbourne. And I had no money and my family were all disbanded and just scraping a living, they had to…my dad is very, he’s got such a lot of go in him, he doesn’t stand still. They had this house and a little garden, so he started, you know, to put in potatoes or courgettes, or something, to live, you know, literally off the land

INT: You were teaching.

ED: I was teaching and I went to this Jewish school in Brighton. The man who owned it, it was a private school, he was Jewish, Irish-Jewish, but all the teachers were Roman Catholic. I was the only Jewish girl there, and he was a bastard, he was a real swine. He treated me so, so badly. One of the teachers who was running the school, he was so sympathetic and I used to go and cry and he said, “I’ll go and have a, how dare he treat you like that, when your people are suffering for it, and you are here, you are working very hard”, and spoke to him. No, well that’s the way it is, he’s running a school and that’s it.

Oh that’s another really, quite a sad story, he was nasty, he was really nasty to me, very much, to the extent I’ll just tell you this. It was Yom Kippur and I’m raised not very frum, but I am Jewish, so I wanted to fast for Yom Kippur. My college were dishing out, there wasn’t even bacon at that time, God knows what it was, rabbits and all kinds of things, and I didn’t want it, I wanted to have a kosher meal. So I went to a café, would you believe it? How your mind works at that time. Went to a café and asked for two fried eggs and that was, as kosher as that was to me, to fast on. I used to work every other weekend, so that was Yom Kippur there and it was a Saturday, and I was working on Saturday, Yom Kippur, and the headmaster, and he wasn’t Catholic, he was just Church of England or something, he came up at lunchtime and he said, “Are you all right?” and he brought me a cup of tea. I said, “No”, “Not a cup of tea, glass of…?”, “No, no, that’s our Day of Atonement”, “And you are working with young children and it’s three o’clock now?”, “Yeah, yeah, that’s all right, that’s all right, that’s fine”, and he went and had a barney with the head teacher. He said, “Well, she’s Jewish, so I’m Jewish, it’s a mitzvah that she’s working with children, with Jewish children.” What kind of a mitzvah is that? I’m Jewish too, and there were other people to take over.

INT: But the children, the children were Jewish as well?

ED: The children, it’s a Jewish school. The children were Jewish, the owner, that’s the principal, Mr. Eliasuf, I’ll never forget his name, he owned the school, but he appointed, he employed Catholic, most of them were Catholic. But this headmaster who ran the school, he wasn’t Catholic but he was also not Jewish, and he was very sympathetic. He was such a nice man. So, I said, “Well I really need to leave, Mr. Kemp”. He was, kind of, nice to talk to, he said, “You don’t leave now because that’s your first year”, that’s how I remember it was my first year. “It’ll be a bad spell on you to leave after, the fault will be on you. Anyone will ask why did you leave, not finishing a year?”

So I stomached it and finished a year, and I said to him in due course, “I’m leaving”. So I’d been writing applications and I’d been asked for an interview, for Sunday. For Sunday, to go for an interview, I was to be on duty. He wouldn’t let me go to the interview. I was heartbroken, so I went, crying, to Mr. Kemp. “He can’t do that.” Well he’s doing that, what could I do, I live there, and I’ve nowhere to go? He knows I’m leaving and he knows I’m looking for a job, he doesn’t allow me to go for an interview, and Sunday was my day. Sunday was a Sunday, everybody was…So anyway, he said, “Well let’s face it”, that’s Mr. Kemp, the headmaster. He said, “Go and phone”. ( It was a head teacher owning a school, a private school), “and tell her that something happened. Make up a story,” he said, “I don’t care. Tell any story and tell her you just can’t make it, if she will see you the next Sunday, when you are off duty”. So I went to the phone, there was a phone in the school, he wouldn’t let me use the phone, “You can go outside and phone”. This telephone is a pay box telephone, To tell him that I’m cancelling my interview. It’s not so easy to get an interview and cancel it. So, Mr. Kemp said, “Well just go outside and make that phone call, for God’s sake.” So I phoned and I don’t know what I said. I said, I think, there was a teacher, I don’t know, I made up a story, who fell ill all of a sudden and I had to take over, so it sounded very good and very kosher, very sympathetic. And this is it, I went the following Sunday and I got the job eventually. It was in Surrey, near Epsom, near Dorking in Surrey. Mickleham, it’s a nice, lovely little village in Surrey, it was very nice.

INT: Do you think he was so harsh to you, especially, because you were foreign, you’d come from somewhere else, or was he like that with everybody?

ED: No, I was the only one in that position. He was strict, to be honest, I mean they all took him for what he is, and they knew how to tackle him, but he was absolutely nasty to me, he really was. And, as I say, it shows you, from what he did for Yom Kippur, I never forgave him for that, he was really nasty. For someone else, who is not even Jewish, to be more sympathetic, and after that, to not let me use a phone, to not let me. So what? Am I a prisoner there? I get notice, due notice, and he knows I have nowhere to go, I have to look for a job, and that’s an interview for a job.

INT: You were very brave.

ED: I wasn’t brave. When you are in, I was cornered, what do you do? You’re just under this kind of thing. That Mr. Kemp, he was the angel, because I didn’t, to tell you the truth, I didn’t even know how to write an application for a job. I was in Brighton, a very well-known friend asked me for a Friday night, for Sabbath evening, and she said, “Well, what are you doing?”. I said, “Well, I’ve just come from holiday, from the other place”, what was it?

INT2: Eastbourne.

ED: Eastbourne. And, “Nothing really”, so, “What, you’re doing nothing ? I said, “Yes.” “Oh”, she said, “let’s finish dinner and there is this Eliasuf, that school, he’s always looking for new teachers”.

INT: Probably he loses them so rapidly.

ED: Absolutely, they don’t last there like I did. So she picked up the phone and she phoned him up, “I’ve got a blah, blah, blah, newly-qualified, excellent, very nice young lady”, and all that, “Yes, send her to see me on Sunday.” That was Friday night, he picked up the phone and he would not allow me to pick up the phone for Saturday. But he picked up the phone.

Esperance David – In the 50’s in Baghdad

So the regent and his family were killed by that coup [in 1958] by them [by the Revolutionists], because there was a coup in the government at that time. So, from a kingdom, that was done away, literally done away, killed all of them, and they established the republic and, from then on, it became Iraq as a republic. They had a president and all the rest of it.

INT: And when was that?

ED: That was when I was away, in the early 50’s, after Israel. I didn’t see any of that.

esperance

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