A Library Like No Other

As part of London's Museum Lates season, I spent an hour touring the Wiener Library for the Study of the Holocaust and Genocide.

Officially established in 1939 by Dr Alfred Wiener, the library was the first to document the Holocaust. Today it contains 70,000 books and continues to accept donations - letters, photos, drawings, leaflets etc. as well as books - from that period in time, in addition to contemporary material. Donations from individuals serve to humanise the victims of genocide, and combat the faceless portrayal of them by their aggressors.

Collecting and making available evidence of more recent genocides is at the heart of the Wiener Library's ethos; it strives to catalogue history as it happens and maintain present day relevance. During the Second World War the library was in fact fully funded by the government due to its usefulness in informing on Nazi atrocities, and after making an invaluable contribution to the prosecution case in the Nuremberg Trial received  the transcripts. At the time of writing, the library's most recent acquisition was children's drawings of genocide in Darfur - harrowing pages of bloodstained childhood innocence that will hopefully preclude future whitewashing by Sudanese government officials and other deniers.

Yet as you might expect, the bulk of the material in the Wiener Library evidences Nazism in European history. In the temperature-controlled bowels of the library where the rarer collections are held, we thumbed through a Nazi arithmetic book from 1941 with questions including how much the government spends on people with congenital illnesses. We also looked at what would have seemed to be a fairly benign Nazi colouring book; an anti-Nazi manifesto printed in miniature and hidden in a teabag packet; a photo album of a Holocaust survivor; and a copy of Der Freiwillige, a neo-Nazi publication still in circulation.

I often hear Jews lampooned for 'harking on' about the Holocaust. But keeping the discourse alive is crucial to preventing genocide reoccurring. With right-wing extremist thought regarding immigration re-emerging across Europe today, I lament at how quickly people seem to forget grave mistakes of the past. Collections like the Wiener Library's plead with us to remember, as well as to recognise that crimes against humanity continue to happen.

Jews, Punk & The Swastika: An Uneasy Exploration

"Rock against racism" is a phrase with which I've been familiar for many years now, having likely seen it emblazoned on tour posters for NOFX, Rancid and the like. Anti-racist activism and rock - especially punk - music seem likely bedfellows, in that the music is an audio assault on conservative/ authoritarian thinking and institutions - Nazis, Black Shirts, the Thatcher and Reagan administrations. Plus the alternative music scene used to serve as a club for those who didn't feel that they quite belonged to mainstream society, a group defined by members that alluded easy social categorisation. This is still true today to an extent, although there is relatively little to distinguish the cliques and associated conformist style and behaviour that have developed in this space to those that are more of the MTV world.

When I bagged an invite to a Jewish Book Week panel discussion, "Jews in Punk", I anticipated a relatively innocuous conversation about the links between minority groups, religious or otherwise, punctuated with the odd amusing anecdote about Gene Simmons requesting maotza ball soup backstage, or the Beastie Boys originally naming one of their most anthemic tunes "You've Gotta Fight For Your Right To Purim Party" (disclaimer: to my knowledge neither of these things actually happened, but wouldn't it be great if they did?).

What I wasn't expecting was discourse dominated by the appropriation of the swastika symbol by some of punk music's most renowned figures.

On the panel were Geoff Travis, founder of Rough Trade Records, Charles Murray, an editor for the NME in the '70s when working for the magazine actually meant something in music circles, Daniel Miller who founded and heads up Mute record label and publishing house, and the artist Toby Mott.

The panel discussion began with exploration of the links between their chosen professions and Jewish identity.

Geoff Travis's family fit the Jewish family cookie cutter of the time: they lived in Finchley and owned a shoe shop in the East End. Despite being a very anti-social teen, Geoff forced himself into a communal situation by spending time on a kibbutz in Israel. This introduction to a socialist way of life ultimately filtered through to his business ideals; he wanted Rough Trade to "have an element of communality, be an open house that anyone could come to... Give people an equal chance to make art, and for that art to reach its highest point." Geoff sees the Richard Branson model of doing business as anathema to him - "I've always wanted the artists to be successful, not the entrepreneurs."

Charles Murray's upbringing was one of quiet and somewhat comfortable suburban living, which he came to resent. "I grew up in net curtain land. I was down with anything that disrupted the smooth surface of bourgeois suburban complacency." When people assume he is of the bourgeois brigade, he is equally disdainful: "They asked if I was an old Etonian - more like an old Estonian!"

Not all of Daniel Miller's family made it out of Germany and Austria during the period of Nazi rule. "I was taught to always question authority." This was reflected in his musical tastes; nothing was to conform or become staid. For a period Daniel felt that music had stopped evolving - and then along came the curious and hypnotic loops of German electronica. Whilst bearing few similarities in sound, Daniel regarded electronic music and punk as sharing much in principle: both aimed to evade norms.

Toby Mott is a long-time collector of not only Rock Against Racism, but also neo-Nazi punk, memorabilia - stickers, badges, posters etc. Jews are apparently the biggest collectors of such items, including names in music like Chris Stein from Blondie. Many feel it is vital that Nazi items be exhibited, so as not to let people forget the atrocities of the past; this is a powerful way of keeping alive the message, "Never again." Collecting is also about regaining a sense of control, taking the insignia away from the perpetrators of old and thereby draining them of the fear and terror they used to embody.

Wedding Jewishness and careers associated with punk is more understandable in the British punk context.  While the London punk scene was always highly political, influenced as it was by Marxism and often geared towards confronting the National Front, NYC's brand of punk tended to avoid serious issues - or at least approached them in a more fleeting and playful way. The Ramones were cartoon characters compared to their trans-Atlantic brethren.

This political bent of British punk has been a bit of a double-edged sword, with neo-Nazi punks swarming the scene as well as those with socialist sympathies. Yet interestingly swastikas have been adorned by members of both camps within the genre.

And so the discussion took a controversial turn, as both panel and audience members debated punk and the swastika.

Siouxsie and Sid Vicious are just two of many prominent figures in the punk movement to publicly wear the swastika. They did this in order to be provocative, yes, but is it anti-Semitic?

Siouxsie's case is not helped by the fact that the Souxsie and the Banshees song Love in A Void originally included the line too many Jews for my liking - and let's ignore for a moment how catchy Hong Kong Garden is, and recognise the hugely racially-insensitive lyrics!

Junk floats on polluted water/ An old custom to sell your daughter / Would you like number 23? / Leave your yens on the counter please... Slanted eyes meet a new sunrise/ A race of bodies small in size...

At one point in the discussion, a lady in the audience with an indiscernible accent called out, "Can we stop picking on Siouxsie?" It turns out that she, an Israeli punk, had herself donned a swastika and rejected the notion that it could necessarily be used in a game of Spot the Anti-Semite. We the audience were then reminded of the Siouxsie and the Banshees song Israel.

Shattered fragments of the past / Meet in veins on the stained glass / Like the lifeline in your palm / Red and green reflects the scene / Of a long-forgotten dream...

I'm still not certain where I stand on the acceptability of punks using the swastika. Given its sinister connotations, you'd think one would give it a wide birth? Or is it understandable that punks have used it to shock, in order to get across a more productive message, shattering the "smooth surface of bourgeois suburban complacency" with jagged-edged words, chords and clothes? Hell, punk was never meant to be polite.

If I have to offer my opinion on the matter, I'd say it's for the afflicted community to decide how to handle the swastika. Whether it's Jews in the Diaspora collecting to document the past, or Israelis wearing the symbol in a show of strength and rejection of victimhood, there is an underlying aim to transform something that was so harmful to Jews into something constructive for Jews. As for Siouxsie, I think she should have displayed a little more sensitivity.

'Sick' City Society?

Having been beyond lazy with my extra-curricular writing in the past year (save an article on my summer Israel trip, with a title I cannot and will not take responsibility for... see here if you are so inclined), I've been spurred into fingers-tapping-frantically-on-keyboard action by an article in the Guardian reporting on various research studies/ hypotheses about the link between city living and poorer mental health.

My initial reaction to the article was to be mildly disparaging. Journalists shouldn't give credence or column inches to research suggesting that "aircraft noise might inhibit children's learning" – and three-year-old me with Playmobil plane in hand (the airport set was a firm favourite) would vociferously disagree! Sight and sound stimuli are more commonly learning aids than inhibitors, I'm sure. And conversely, car noise helps?! Pet peeve as a researcher: when people focus in on the data too closely and suspend common sense.

It also omits the obvious. Us city folk tend to work longer hours, for money that doesn't stretch as far because it's so expensive to rent/ own a home. Very simple causes of stress, no?

Yet the Guardian article doesn't wholly err on the ridiculous; there's some interesting ideas to contemplate in there about how the urban habitat is not conducive to mental wellbeing. So I got to thinking about how social density cultivates social isolation. I’m surrounded by people on the packed District Line tube in the morning - the number of armpits I've been squeezed under like a piece of fruit waiting to be juiced is thoroughly depressing - and yet I establish no real connection with any of these people. We all plug into the Matrix (iPad, iPod, smart phone,Kindle) and try to zone out the relatively unpleasant commute. The only emotion I feel in response to a fellow traveller is typically disdain, when they attempt to read the Metro when there's barely an inch of space between my face and theirs, and I almost lose an eye. And it's not a real newspaper anyway.

London has a very special way of at times making one feel very alone, sure. I think another city-specific mind-fuck (not mentioned in the article) is an issue often discussed in the context of behavioural economics: the paradox of choice. The established wisdom was that choice is always a good thing - not so, say proponents of BE. Human beings have been proven to be pretty dire choosers when too many options are presented to them; they lack the capacity to evaluate these effectively. This is why best-buy shortlists and Amazon recommendation are so appealing to us - they dramatically simplify and therefore ameliorate the chore that choice can be. In a big city, we are bombarded with choice. Just open up TimeOut and see the myriad things you can do on any given evening. It's great, and at the same time anxiety-inducing.

It's difficult selecting the right Vietnamese BYOB restaurant on Kingsland Road, the right ‘critic’s choice’ kitchen sink drama in Soho – or even deciding at a more basic level what you feel like doing on a particular evening with friends or a partner. Whatever you finally pick entails a huge opportunity cost. OMG SO MUCH PRESSURE WHAT IF THE BURGER ISN’T AS GOOD AS AT MEAT LIQUOR OR DIRTY BURGER OR HONEST BURGER AND THE BURGERAC.ORG REVIEW WAS HORRIFICALLY MISGUIDED?! It’s a first-world problem, mind.
Sometimes the choices you have to make are more profound ones – and again, the city will supply options in abundance. There are 1,000s upon 1,000s of jobs out there in more obscure/ specialised fields than elsewhere in the country, in our predominant tertiary sector. Which career path to take? And then there's dating in the city. With the ease and convenience provided by the now near-ubiquitous Tinder, there’s enough people out there for you to dismiss at the swipe of a finger, and you’ll still have plenty left to have a pool of several on the go, unsure which – if any – is ultimately deserving of your precious time. I'm not against using technology to help meet someone per se - and that would be hypocritical, shhh - but the tools at our disposal can dilute relationships as well as facilitate them.
Further, greater choice engenders higher expectations and, as a result, we experience disappointment more frequently.

So that's my two cents, based on experience, of how city life can make you mental. It can also be challenging in a good way, and enriching, exhilarating, magical... But I guess there's no news story there, so lets hear more, Dr Pseudo Science, on how "our brains are not perfectly shaped for living in urban environments"...

Four Short Days in Berlin...

I’m pretty ashamed at how long it has taken me to write up my Berlin trip (8-11 July) – horrendously poor effort on my part! I’ve reached dizzying new heights of procrastination these past couple of months. Anyway, here it is…

My pre-trip impression of Berlin can be summarised as follows: it's a bit of a playground for the young and bohemian, with myriad café-bars, a vibrant contemporary art scene and crazy nightlife. My fellow travellers and I did have a number of experiences that supported this characterisation; however I have to stress that the city is so much more than that, with its diversity of neighbourhoods and its powerful sense of history - palpable when you walk through certain areas and past particular buildings. It is by no means a ‘pretty city’, having to a large extent been reduced to rubble during the Second World War and rapidly rebuilt, and moreover according to two divergent ideological designs (‘Westen’ vs. ‘Osten’). Yet this adds to, rather than detracts from, its character in many ways.

Another thing I appreciated about Berlin was how unpretentious its inhabitants are compared to say, Londoners, Parisiens or the Milanese. In bars and clubs there seemed to be no great impetus to dress or act a certain way; Berliners were far more preoccupied with having fun than posing – an admirable quality to possess!

But enough flattery – here’s my run-down of the trip.

On our first full day we started out at the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe: a concrete maze comprising over 2,700 slabs. Engulfed by cold, grey concrete and losing your sense of place – not to mention your friends, who may sneak off and try to scare the shit out of you! – can be quite a chilling and alienating experience. Strolling through the Tiergarten, which is a park that is to Berlin what Central Park is to NYC, we marvelled at an art installation that paid homage to the homosexual community: a tiny screen playing various man-on-man embraces on loop, encased by a comparably large concrete cube. Past the Brandenburg Gate, we paused in front of the Reichstag and took stock of this impressively imposing building. We continued on, tracing the River Spree for much of the way, until another great building gave us cause to stop and linger for a little while: the Berliner Dom.

Late afternoon found us at the somewhat elusively-located C/O Berlin, a modern art gallery housed in Berlin's former Royal Post Office. A poster for Larry Clark’s ‘Teenage Lust’ exhibition depicting a woman's 'lady garden' hung incongruously above the entrance of the grandiose, traditional-looking building. Still, we weren’t adequately prepared for the shock factor of Clark’s photography collection, which sought to capture and, in a sense, reinvigorate the spirit of teen exploit, with drug-fuelled youths indulging in sexual exploration while allowing a photographer to witness and consign their memory to future generations. Clark openly admitted that part of the raison d'etre of creating the collection was so that he could revive his own care-free teen days, vicariously living through his subjects.

A friend pointed out something to me that made her deeply uncomfortable about the entire exhibition, which I too found hard to swallow: were the girls high on narcotics consenting parties to the orgies captured so matter-of-factly on film, or was there something more sinister at play? Was Clark an impartial witness to borderline rape? The photos of youths shooting up on heroin were also disturbing, and pretty difficult to actually look at without turning quickly away (although this is partly due to my fear of needles…).

Moving swiftly on – without dwelling too much on the most unsavoury aspects of the 'Teenage Lust' exhibition – Rafal Milach's 'Seven Rooms' transported us to another ‘dark place’ – this time the suburbs of Moscow. The Polish photographer's series of intimate portraits showed the tension between the old Soviet mentality and the new ways of thinking engendered by Putin's Russia. Taken as a collective, the seven subjects of the exhibition appeared to be a microcosm of their conflicted nation: in video diaries, they revealed their fervour for their newly-found freedoms, their cynicism about how Russia is governed, their desire for the pre-'89 sense of comfort and community. One particularly poignant quote summed up the general sentiment of the exhibition for me: 'The difference is that once upon a time people knew what they had to say, but they couldn't say it. Now you can say anything, but no one knows what to say.'

After dinner, a few of us wound up in a bar where the clientelle sported a total disregard for the smoking ban - something I noticed a fair bit in Germany and was not all that surprised by, having learnt about the efficacy of the tobacco lobby there (one of the more interesting articles I had to read for a Public Policy class back at uni focused on the German tobacco industry's use of the Nazi past to equate anti-smoking legislation with fascism...).

Another day, another facet of Berlin to explore. With the mid-afternoon sun beating on us with considerable intensity, we explored the Topography of Terror outdoor exhibition. Annotated photos, newspaper clippings and signage from the 1933-145 period laid bare the Nazi-driven horrors of totalitarianism and extreme racialism, against the backdrop of a segment of the Berlin Wall. As a Jew I have heard so much already about the atrocities committed against those of the 'alien'/ 'intruder' religion, so it was particularly interesting to find out about humanitarian crimes committed against other minority groups, most notably homosexuals.

Being a travel nerd paid off when it came to deciding what to do for the Big Last Night Out: my online research had thrown up a couple of options, including a techno night at a club named Cookies. Tuesday night in Berlin is apparently as buzzing as Friday night in London, with the majority of the clubbers there partying until five or six in the morning. Without going into too much (incriminating) detail about the night/ morning, we arrived back at the hostel at 10.30am the next day a little dazed but in high spirits after a pretty surreal - but thoroughly enjoyable - 'last hurrah' in Berlin.

No rest for the wicked - after showering and a quick nap, we had to vacate our room, leaving us to wander round the Bauhaus Museum and then the Tiergarten in a state of delirium! Luckily the museum was compelling enough to keep me awake; the former Bauhaus school’s novel framework for approaching design and the progress its students made in diverse fields of design, from architecture to stage design, are truly inspiring. The museum also stood as a reminder of the liberal hotspot that Berlin was in the early twentieth century and how creativity thrived there, until Nazism extinguished it so brutally and systematically.

John F. Kennedy is famed (and shamed) for remarking, 'Ich bin ein Berliner' - translated as, 'I am a jelly doughnut.' Maybe that really was the sentiment he wished to express, and history has wrongly judged him. In any case, four short days in Germany's capital city left me feeling a little like a wannabe 'Berliner'. There are many great things I love about the sprawling metropolis that I call home, but I think Berlin could teach it a thing or two.

South East Coast for the Easter Weekend

I fear that the notion of visiting a place like Eastbourne snuck into my self-conscious gradually, from numerous Saturday afternoons spent in my grandparents' living room while they plumped me up with homemade macaroons and shortbread, and regaled me with tales of their latest East Sussex sojourn. Clearly these tales gained traction, as the boyfriend and I booked our train tickets to Eastbourne for the Easter weekend and reserved a room at a B&B - chosen primarily because of the website's promise of complimentary freshly-baked cookie upon arrival.

There are, I'm aware, worse criteria on which to base a 'which B&B?' decision, and the place happened to be charming despite a distinct lack of cookies (we forgave them after seeing the bow-tied bag of chocolate eggs on the dressing table in our room). Our bedroom was beautifully decorated, and the breakfast room delightfully chintzy and complete with a grandfather clock - a family heirloom, we were told.

The choice of destination, however, could've benefited from a re-think! Eastbourne is known to be one of 'God's waiting rooms', but I still anticipated there being more sights to see, and more entertainment on offer. The reality was hotel-with-restaurant next to hotel-with-restaurant lining the seafront - stalwarts of a gone era when expectations of holidaying in the UK were clearly much lower.

On a number of occasions during our stay, the boyfriend and I would question, 'What do young people do here?' We got an answer at nightfall, as teenagers - still a rarity relative to the older population - could be seen stalking the streets, bottles in hand. And who could blame them for this somewhat chavvy behaviour? There was the arcade on the pier, where we played air hockey like 14-year-olds on a first date, next to a couple of 14-year-olds probably on their first date, and allegedly a Curzon cinema, but otherwise nothing of interest for them. As the teens staggered about outside, older people on their hols were comfortably seated in hotel bars, enjoying their post-dinner entertainment - invariably a crooner singing Frank Sinatra/ Elvis/ etc. It's also worth mentioning that the initially packed Italian restaurant where we had dinner seemed to rapidly empty out after 8.30pm, as elderly folk and families with kids headed for bed.

I don't want to leave you with the impression that we didn't have fun in Eastbourne; these observations were a source of amusement, and didn't detract from the magical experience of walking along the beach at night, the tranquil lapping of the waters only disturbed by out footsteps upsetting the vast jigsaw of pebbles beneath us and the odd chatter of aforementioned teens (including some German tourists, bizarrely). Besides the main reason for our trip was to get away from our busy London lives for a couple of days, to somewhere comparatively unpopulated and close to the sea. In this respect, Eastbourne was no disappointed. We hiked in shoes with absolutely no grip (silly Londoners) up and down the coastline, daring some pretty steep ascents to take in the scenery.

Being England on an Easter bank holiday, we were lucky the weather held out as long as it did. As the looming clouds began to spit, we headed back to the B&B, having accomplished what was probably only a fraction of the walk to Beachy Head, but more than sufficient for us humble hikers.

We had planned to visit Lewes the next day and travel back to London from there - a smart move in retrospect, given the lack of distractions in Eastbourne. Unfortunately, the unforgiving cold weather and our tiredness (OK, my tiredness for the most part!) prevented us from exploring the town and its surroundings to their full extent. And there wasn't a whole lot to keep us occupied in Lewes, either! We'd seen the castle - the main attraction - in about half an hour; last year's trip to the epic Arundel Castle skewed our judgment of how time-consuming the castle visit would be, leaving us with several hours before our train home.

Anne of Cleeves' House provided some respite from the cold and did contain interesting historical artifacts from Lewes' considerable past. Still, we ended up sampling the culinary/ caffeinated offerings of three of the high street cafés to keep busy! If Lewes wasn't so painfully middle class and therefore home to coffee shops in abundance (relative to its size, that is), we really would've struggled to fill the time! After tea, cake, soup, salt beef sandwiches, teacakes and pretentious soft drinks (elderflower cordial and French pink lemonade), it was finally time for the train home. And, annoyingly, time for the sun to finally make an appearance.

The Genius of Illumination

British Library exhibitions rarely disappoint, so it was no great surprise that the latest, Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination was such an impressive tribute to the lost art of illuminating manuscripts.


I find the timing of the exhibition apt: it serves as a reminder to us e-reading, free paper-skimming Londoners of how much time and care once went into producing books. At the same time, it highlights how far we've come in democratising the written word; what was once reserved for royalty is now available readily to the masses, free or charge or at minimal cost, albeit in far less glorious forms. E-ink for the people is perhaps preferable to gold leafed texts for the very elite.

Anyway, I digress. The exhibition showcases over 150 elaborately-decorated manuscripts, primarily of a Biblical and/ or historical nature(there's a lot of overlap between the two, with religion being the main provider of historical discourse way back when). Illuminators would typically spend years - even a lifetime - on a single manuscript, adding illustrations and page borders and embellishing initial letters at the start of each chapter to create a unique masterpiece for a royal recipient. Personalising the manuscript for the owner was hugely important: illuminators commonly incorporated the former's royal coat of arms into patterns and borders.


From a contemporary point of view, the illuminations aren't just decoration. They give colour and context to our understanding of the historical periods in which they were produced (Medieval and Renaissance) - a point that the BL has emphasised: 'Together they are our most vivid source for understanding royal identity, moral and religious beliefs, learning, faith artistic trends and the international politics of the period.'

A Clash of Cultures in Seville

Recently I was in the south of Spain - Seville, to be more precise - wandering the postcard-perfect cobbled streets, chowing down on tapas, exploring opulent - erring on the side of vulgar - Catholic churches, and observing with affection the spirited locals. As I write this, my mind drifts to thoughts of the sound of the city, consisting of the music of street performers, the clip-clop of horses' hooves and the not-so-discreet conversations and laughter of convivial Spaniards sustained day and well into the night. I also think back to the taste of the heart attack-inducing fried meat that looked deceptively innocuous when served on those little plates.

We landed hungry and, on my part at least, pretty knackered, but the draw of unexplored and gloriously sunny Sevilla was too strong; hotel check-in complete and suitcase dumped in the room, we headed out and wandered in the surrounding areas of Santa Cruz and Centro. The Maria Luisa Park was the first major landmark we hit, which led on to Plaza de Espana, an impressive piece of neo-Mudéjar architecture (the revival of a Muslim-inspired Spanish style) apparently built for the Ibero-American Exposition World's Fair of 1929. This event actually governed the redevelopment of the entire southern art of the city at the time, which goes a long way to explaining why everything looked so lovely along the trail of that first-day stroll.

We finally succumbed to hunger, and sought out our first tapas bar of the trip. Word to the wise: ordering tapas when you speak no Spanish whatsoever and one of you doesn't eat pork is not something I would recommend trying without a guidebook to aid you. We were ill-equipped. It didn't help, either, that I don't eat much fish outside of the shellfish family. Yet somehow, with some decent guesswork, a little understanding of English on the part of the waiter, and much gesticulating from all parties involved (a running theme of the trip), we managed to successfully order lunch.

Next on the first-day agenda was Seville Cathedral - third largest in the world but with a great deal more to commend it than just size.

Once inside, we marvelled at the massive organ and eavesdropped on a tour group long enough to learn that about 15% of Christopher Columbus can be found in the cathedral's Tomb of Christopher Columbus. Also interesting was the permitted sit-in protest by jobless young teachers. We then climbed the many ramps spiralling up the tower for great views of Seville.

The following day we wandered, hoping to stumble upon the cultural hot spots without being chained to the map. We didn't find much of note until we crossed the river to an area clearly on the periphery, but well worth the journey: there was a random American botanical garden running parallel to the river, which was pretty much deserted. So we happily strolled past fountains and cacti, until we hit road (and civilisation). Luckily for us, the area had something more 'substantial' to offer us, in the form of the Andalusian Centre for Contemporary Arts. The epicentre of this compound of buildings and gardens was a monastery-cum-ceramic factory-cum-exhibition space. We spent the rest of the afternoon here, enjoying a variety of exhibitions on the urban landscape and lifestyle.

After an evening consisting of uber rich hot chocolate and my first ever orchestral experience - complete with Spanish guitar! - we retired to our room embarrassingly early in preparation for our big day out in Cordoba. The main draw of the little city an hour away by train was the Mosque Cathedral - truly one of the most spectacular buildings I've ever seen. As suggested by the name, the cathedral was formerly a mosque (for a potted history of Muslim rule in Spain, please look to Wikipedia, for I am lazy) and retains the original features. Most impressive was where mosque met cathedral, the white walls of the central chapel blending into the Muslim-style arches surrounding it.


Cordoba was very charming and I wish we could've spent longer there, not least because the synagogue and other sites in the Juderia (Jewish Quarter) were closed by the time we found them.


On our last full day, we visited the Alcazar, a royal palace exemplifying Mudejar architecture. We went from room to room, marvelling in each at the intricate detailing on the ceiling, walls and windows.

Being Londoners, we're not really accustomed to restrictive Sunday opening hours, and thus did not factor early closing into our planning for the last day; we arrived at the modern art gallery just as the staff were clearing people out. There seemed nothing left for us to do, except eat more tapas and cake (the burdens we have to bear sometimes...). The tapas bar of choice in our vicinity was what I can only describe as Seville's answer to the New York deli. It was manically busy, with locals barking orders for Cruzcampo beer, montaditos (mini sandwiches), and fried bread topped with pork or fish. It took me ten minutes, four guys behind the counter (two with the patience of saints) and record levels of gesticulating to order our food. For dessert, we picked up some kind of multi-layered cake from a cafe we went to on the first evening, and returned to the Plaza de Espana for eating accompanied by people watching. One final tapas dinner a few hours later brought the holiday to an end.

So that was our Seville trip: a voyage of discovery that I thoroughly enjoyed but still believe would have benefited from a guidebook listing food-related vocab.