Coming down off the Didge Festival I give a workshop in Herzelyya and spend a couple of days checking into the scene between Tel Aviv and Jaffa on the Mediterranean coast. Tel Aviv is a fast paced modern Western city and you largely feel you could almost be in any city in southern Europe [I was in Toulouse recently and, of course there is a significant Arabic presence in France....]

At night I ate veggie food in an Indian/Hippie restaurant where the clientele lounge smoking on couches and only pay what they feel like paying for their food - there is no defined price tag to the fare which, to be honest, was very average.

I waded through 2 markets on the Tuesday; one, a regular covered market, sold fresh produce and spices in an amazingly rich tapestry of colors. I bought mud from the Dead Sea and got a good deal on CD's from a stall that pumped a variety of Middle Eastern sounds to the upper reaches of the market place. The soundtrack to the working day. Since I read neither Arabic or Hebrew my choices have yet to be validated as good, or bad. I remain hopeful that I will happen upon reliably good quality music from jewish musicians. It's no good asking for "Israeli" music - it's such a diverse country no-one understands the question......yet. And, eager to sell to ANY tourist with a language problem, any music will do - "Yes, Israeli music, Yes! All Middle East music, Yes". Err OK. The second market was a Hand Craft market, with hundreds of chatchkas, jewelry and endless twee goodies of the type you can see at any New Age middle-aged craft fair the western world over. There was a security check point at either end of the walking street that it sprawled through, but you could enter unhindered by any side alley. At the top end of the market, against a backdrop of shredding posters, streaming traffic and a thousand cell phones ringing simultaneously sat a woman of a certain age, large-ish, platinum blonde and dressed in red, white and blue stripes. She was belting out hebrew pop songs over a pumping synth/drum machine backing track and seemed more concerned to ward off photographers - continually seizing a large 2 sided sign in hebrew and english, whilst singing, and waving it threateningly at potential paparazzi - than to actually gather a crowd. I fingered my camera longingly, but chose not to tempt her considerable ire.

It was swelteringly hot and I sought the solace of an iced passion fruit juice, goya tourist price only, before wandering lonely through the crowd, passing a traveler resting on his Kamale Ngoni (Malian hunters harp) half way through the market, and arriving at a trio of elderly jewish men - two violins and a cello - under a funky greying parasol turning the pages of their clothes-pin bound music with flagging energy. I dropped some shekels - the music, though tired, had a sweetness to it and these guys were at least authentic. Their instruments were chipped and beaten, their clothes unpretentious, worn. I was reminded of the cello I borrowed for a recording session in Austria some years ago. The owners father had carried on his back as he escaped over the mountains from East to West at the end of WW2. Myna birds squawked in attempted harmony and I left to walk to Jaffa, the old arabic town south of Tel Aviv.

I ate hummus and foul mudamas (better explain, hey? Foul is a dip made from mushed up fava beans) with pita bread in an arabic cafe, walked another market in the arabic quarter.

Then I visited with Yair Dalal in his wonderful studio on the wharf under the old city of Jaffa. Overlooking archeological diggings and the marina this cool cave in the wall of the ancient city is a journey into the past. Time stands still as Yair plays the Oud and teaches ancient songs to one of his students who arrives for a lesson. I drink mint tea and recline on a couch, dreaming, until the setting sun draws me outside to trek along the beach back to Tel Aviv.

Scattered images of the way: Whole families making their way to the beach for a sunset dip - the signs say "Swimming Prohibited" in 3 languages. A couple kissing in the glow of an orange lighted portal in the wall. An orthodox Jew brandishing a Shofar shakes and shouts prayers out to the sea. Then he blows - a thin trumpet sound, shrill and ancient, curling through the rams horn and into the dusk. The Mediterranean accepts. A young man rides a black horse, galloping past me into the gathering gloom, narrowly avoiding a yoga class stretched out and twitching on the grassy knoll. I reach for my camera too late. "FUCK YOU" shouts the writing in enormous letters on the back of his shirt as he disappears into the twilight. I drop in to a mosque for a pee. Date palms in the garden, a feeling of peace and quiet in the city. The men around are welcoming. (In England if you feel the call of nature in a public place the people are generally less accommodating - "I mean to say, the very IDEA of it, and a complete stranger too!!!"). The Mosque stands beautiful in the vast towering shadow of the squeaky clean David Intercontinental Hotel, where Madonna is staying on a flying visit to Israel to follow her Kabbalistic muse. More orthodox Jews have a stand on the promenade, pumping religious music through a portable sound system, shawls flapping in the coastal breeze. But they're only selling copies of the Torah and other religious pamphlets.

I meet a friend in a bar on the beach not so far from the 2 night clubs, also on the beach, north and south of where I dig my toes into the sand, that were targeted to devastating effect a couple of years back by Muslim extremists. Many young people died. My friend and I talk of the eternal conundrum of being in this place. Land, Love, Peace, Hatred, Fear. Fear Rules..............

At night Tel Aviv seems like a scene for the beautiful people. It's a young city, everyone reminds me. Beautiful women are everywhere, flaunting their freedom to dress as they like - a carefree impression in a carefree zone? Back on the bus to Herzelyya a young female soldier, maybe twenty one years old, 3 stripes on her arm, riding home with her mother, tired, fingers distractedly fiddling with her M16 as she foot juggles with me trying to find space. The hard black metal of the gun jars my leg. I am not comfortable being at such close proximity with these weapons. The Israelis - girls for 2 years, boys for 3 - are indoctrinated into army life as a matter of course when they turn 18, act like they are. For them the gun is like a part of their clothing. They are ready to jump into action, at any time. Here, for them, it's a condition of being.