These people were all Ethiopian Falasha Jews, something I never knew or let alone had ever encountered.
Anyhow back to the plane..
The old man held a broken framed black & white photo of a young boy in army fatigues.
I indicted and he handed me this sad old picture, whence I easily repaired the broken frame.
He smiled & thanked me in yiddish,
'lawhaala!
The hostess plonked down the standard inflight tray of 'whatever, offered me coffee ignoring my new pal.
I reminded her "somebody had paid for his flight.
He proceeded to follow my every move I made, removing plastic wrapped rolls, lids off trays, ect.
I dispensed with the plastic wrapped plastic cutlery opting using my fingers instead, clever!
"always at 'one with the common man me...
'chicken and rice'
We didn't speak but an understanding and warmth developed between us.
Still being stared at by the two fretfully popping up and down daughters ? acolytes ? temple maidens ?
who knows....
Anyhow toilet time explanation, location was required this should be fun.
nb: Also, one could smoke on planes then..
And I'm pretty sure that this lot, the only planes they had ever encountered before,
where those
'silver flying birds high up above their skies.
Anyhow that was all cool until disembarkation, normally my mates collected me off the tarmac,
but I wanted to watch this.
All these cowhide boxes tied up with string flowed up baggage retrieval with 'tripe ? seeping out.
Walking outside only to be surrounded by loads of TV newsfeed camera crews and hundreds of welcoming,
mournful, clapping, shouting, crying people. 'Surreal to say the least!
Turns out the old boy was some top Ethiopian Jewish leader and was on the last plane out.
It was called Operation Moses I found out later....
Ps: Operation Moses was the brainchild of then Associate U.S. Coordinator for Refugee Affairs, Richard Krieger. After receiving accounts of the persecution of Ethiopian Jews in the refugee camps, Krieger came up with the idea of an airlift and met with Mossad and Sudanese representatives to facilitate the Operation.
Pss: Schindler ? The ring was inscribed "Whoever saves one life saves the world entire.
P*ss: It was more like 1983/4 time and dementia...
