Searching for a quiet spot

---

Monday was a bank holiday and Hampstead Heath was more people than grass. Picknickers, dog-walkers, and a dozen kite flyers competed for space on Parliament Hill. This guy (pictured) was apparently having none of it, and had found his own quiet corner where he could read in peace. Of course so many kites in one place was bound to end badly. One green kite was making wild sweeps across the hillside to take out as much of the competition as possible, and another extremely patient pilot spent at least 20 minutes untangling a knot of red string.

Camden was also pumping but in a different (ie. alternative) way. How many goths can the world handle before it runs out of anti-depressants and safety pins?

So far my impressions of London are still a jumbled up mirror ball: creamy pavements, hip markets, spring buds on trees, "world's best" Indian restaurants, preening swans, transient graffiti appearing and mutating and disappearing, sunbaking Aussie backpackers and the Thames washing the city's rubbish back upstream with the tide.

Speaking of graffiti, I liked this stencil (pictured) near Brick Lane Market. Seemed appropriate in the present state of things. There is also, in Spitalfields, a guy who sells photos of such graffiti on wooden tiles. Some of it would look great on a wall, but I'm confused about the ethics of photographing then selling somebody else's work. Is it art, or just crafty?

---