I was disappointed by...
THIS IS actually a comment to the person who complained about the Dresden Cathedral.
People have to stop and think about where they are and what happened prior to their arrival before they start complaining. Take Dresden - it was little more than a huge pile of burned out rubble in 1945. To make matters worse it suffered under the totalitarian East German Communist Party regime until the fall of the Berlin Wall and German re-unification.
Were they supposed to tear down the Cathedral and rebuild it for the herds of tourists that would soon take the country by storm? Dresden is lucky the Cathedral was rebuilt at all!
It was disappointing because...
I've traveled former East Germany, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Hungary and Croatia. I found much in all those places to be different, and very wanting to match my life-style. However, in every place, locals tried to please and I had no problem in accepting all that I encountered as I knew my history. My wife felt exactly the same.
So, disappointments? A few, but not worth dwelling on or even complaining about. I get really upset over shoddyness in 1st world countries like the US, UK, France. Our favorite visits in all Germany involve staying in Gasthauses. The sometimes kitschy ambience is very pleasant, the food often outstanding, even if menus are written in German with no translation. The experience is priceless!
What I'd Do Differently
- I highly recommend doing a little homework on countries to be visited, especially recent history, and especially when going into former iron-curtain countries. Remember, they got the short end of the stick several times - WWI, dictators between the wars, WWII, Warsaw Pact underlings, no modern infrastructure. These countries didn't have the luxury of a US-styled Marshall Plan. They got the Joe Stalin Grand Marshall plan, like it or not!
