If it is gay, ribald and lascivious night-life you are after, Israel is not the place for you. The night clubs you do find are nearer in spirit to a YMCA than to dens of iniquity.

The trouble with tea is that originally it was quite a good drink. So a group of the most eminent British scientists put their heads together and made complicated biological experiments to find a way of spoiling it. To the eternal glory of British science, their labour bore fruit.

Japan suffered terribly from the atomic bomb but never adopted a pose of moral superiority, implying: 'We would never have done it!' The Japanese know perfectly well they would have used it had they had it. They accept the idea that war is war; they give no quarter and accept none. Total war, they recognize, knows no Queensberry Rules. If you develop a devastating new weapon during a total war, you use it; you do not put it into the War Museum.

On the Continent stray cats are judged individually on their merit-some are loved, some are only respected; in England they are universally worshipped as in ancient Egypt.

Prices in Italy are only slightly lower than in France, which means that Italy is a very expensive country for everyone, natives, visitors and tourists.

In Moscow they do not pay much attention to the living but keep their cemeteries in a splendid state.

Tel-Aviv airport is still the only airport in the world where each passenger is met by ten relatives.