Fifteenth Sunday Salon 11.20

Outside the sky has the watery whiteness of whey. The fog is a surprise because yesterday the air smelt of spring. I should have gone to aerobics but I spent too long over breakfast talking to Hodmandod Senior, and I am still in my pyjamas now, reading Tamar Yellin's book. Everything is quiet. A man in a flat cap walks briskly by, and once he is past it is as if the street settles down again into stillness. It is a good day for reading.


Tamar Yellin is especially good on evoking a sense of place. I particularly like her description of Tel Aviv:

'This is the city which was founded on sand by zionists, and look what it has become. A tangle of dead ends and one-ways, unexpected barriers and sudden pavement. A labyrinth designed to fox the visitor. A city which began as a dream and grew dense, like a jungle; which began white and is now a general grey. The white visions of the dream have turned dark with salt. a hot moiture hangs in polluted air: the air pounds with the noise of traffic and work, sirens and horns and the hearts of hundreds of thousands of people.'

I have never been to Tel Aviv, but now feel I have a good impression of the place.