(Not) the most beautiful city in the world

Today I saw a little of what's not the most beautiful city in the world. Since my trip to Russia four years ago I've spoken to many people about travel in Europe, fully intending to return in the not-too-distant future. From the dribs and drabs that I heard, Prague was recommended by many, some as the most beautiful city they'd seen. Admittedly I'm in Prague at a bad time (Good Friday), and it rained for most of the day, but... anything out of the inner city itself is most probably ugly, (Got interrupted here - I'm now writing from Berlin so everything is now in retrospect) the ground is dirty and it's a bit of a shock after the impeccably maintained German cities. It was not particularly pleasant though to wade through swamps of people thick as mud to see over-rated attractions in the rain. In fact, the only thing that lightened my mood and kept me interested in Prague on this Good Friday were the similarities I found there with Moscow. Prague, like Moscow, has yet to develop to the level of a western European city and this is always evident, especially outside of the city-centre. I drank in the rough-and-ready Soviet-style functionality of the city - so many things built cheap out of necessity but also practical - ugly buildings - but which house many people, out-dated buses and stations but better public transport services than you would find in most western cities, an old-style cafe with simple dishes at simple prices. Then of course there were the linguistic similarities between Czech and Russian...

In spite of these things however I returned to the hostel on Good Friday evening with a bit of a sour taste in my mouth.