The Scraper's Diary, Wednesday, March 19th, 1947, Osnabruck

Nothing about this place, except that it is less bombed, in places, than Dortmund. Also, that by another masterpiece of over-organisation, we arrived too late to give a show.

Went with B.S.M. Scott this morning to his house to inspect his piano, with an eye to its suitability for our use in the Officers' Mess. I approved of it and also of his wife, tea, cakes and son to whom I was introduced in that order. Needless to add, I also approved of B.S.M. Scott. I hope that this was reciprocated.

o-o-o-o-o

Walking delirium of Germany, the streets muddy, impersonal.

Carts rumbling over wet cobbles.

A Wagnerian vista of clouds round a watery sun. Pre-Raphaelite above.

The chatter of children in their clean fur coats or muddy rags.

Boots boots boots boots.

Eternal chemists and hairdressers.

Piles of weather beaten rubble.

People clinging to the front of crowded trams.

A ridiculous flurry of cloud, like a gaggle of distant geese.

The clinging smell of dark bread and rank cigarettes, like plaster and potato peelings.

"I wish I'd never come, straight I do."

Policemen in green overcoats.

Traffic on the right.

Forever thumbing.

A foreign tongue all round.

Clean barracks, good food.

"Naafi, chum?"

Military signs nailed to every tree.

Wide autobahn and temporary bridges.

"Spades it is."

Stone stairs and echoing corridors.

Gaunt shells of churches.

Old men burrowing in dustbins.

"I'm jarred off, straight I am."

Heavy kit and long journeys.

Selling cigarettes for marks, watches, irons.

No mail.

And the beauty of the country round.

"Bloody roll on, roll bloody on".