Market day

Went to the Mehane Yehuda market today to have a shufti round. It's Jerusalem's big market with all those promises that you can get anything there but actually it turns out to be pretty small compared to, say, Istanbul or Damascus. That said, the stuff on sale is great and it's all a bit more organised than its Arab counterparts (doesn't that say so much about the Middle East?). There are the usual fruit and veg stalls but also wonderful bakeries, fish counters, places setting biscuits and sweets, and a stall (in one of these pictures) with dozens of different types of halva, some of it actually quite palatable. The place is fairly noisy but it doesn't crowd you like many markets do and we could stroll up and down pretty undisturbed. It's about 45 minutes' walk from my flat so I won't be popping out there for a pint of milk but the pastries were nice and at one of the spice stalls I tasted Za'atar for the first time, a delicious blend of spices that is a kind of Israeli staple and which I can imagine doing a lot of cooking with. I had it first on a spoon and then on top of some soft pita-ish bread fresh out of the oven.

As we were buying the bread a (Jewish) man came past with his shopping, singing and shouting joyfully something about Jerusalem and the Messiah. Further down, a man dressed as Jesus was having a shwarma kebab. No one paid any attention to either of them.

Our Hebrew class continues nicely, in fact at quite a pace and I'm enjoying what I am learning. But of course we chat in English with each other once it's over and Israelis will switch straight into English the moment you trip up on some word or other. So it's hard to practice. A few of us have a pact to try to speak in Hebrew but we soon slip up. Still it's going to be a good way into the language and I can already read pretty well without vowels, which, for those who don't know, is one of Hebrew's biggest challenges for someone brought up outside Israel.

This evening four of us went walking back form college to Ba'aka, the area my flat is in, and ended up passing the Prime Minister's house. The road is closed to traffic and there are little barriers at either end but pedestrians can walk down it, though you can't exactly go up and ring the bell. Obviously there are police and soldiers - with guns - but nothing like the barricade that Thatcher put up at the end of Downing Street and that, if I remember correctly, was to stop people demonstrating.

Another late night and an early start in the morning. At this rate I can forget Tel Aviv, it's going to be 48 hours in my bed come the weekend.

Dx

PS Hope this font size if better. Let me know if it should go bigger still.