Western Berlin is often referred to, reasonably enough, as an
island. But I have noticed before that, whereas true islands breed in their inhabitants a certain insouciance towards the surrounding sea, these figurative, land-bound enclaves produce a contrary and claustrophobic effect. This is very natural, for, %%Areas it is the islanders and not the sea who have the initiative, it is generally the other way round when the isolating agent is made up of human beings in very large numbers. Thus the small foreign communities in the "Treaty Ports" in China were apt to entertain, behind stout- hearted exteriors, a slightly morbid apprehension for the circum- ambient Chinese ; and the same psychological attitude is, very understandably, discernible in Berlin. The border of the Russian Zone (as distinct from the boundaries of the Russian Sector) is demarcated only by notice-boards ; but although there is nothing to be seen in the beechwoods and the rye-fields beyond it, although you can (if you want to) spit through the Iron Curtain, although everybody makes jokes about the arbitrary, artificial situation, you cannot resist the impression that the border, apparently undefended, is fairly strongly manned by bogeys.
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