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Bloody 'ell, lost me ages ago!!! lol

There's a line in a P. J. O'Rourke book, commenting on a method of system building used in Czechoslovakia (I think), but not allowed in Britain - "A building method which even the British reject is an awful thing." or something like that, quoting from memory, and apologies to Mart for quoting a Republican .

In reality about 50% of buildings in the UK need bulldozing - there's nothing worse than driving thru a run down part of a UK town on a cold and wet day, sometimes you think a nuclear bomb would maybe improve the scenery. What a sight flying into the UK for visitors to get a glimpse of some parts of the UK from the air, they look disgusting.

Marx invented 'communism' as a political philisophy. He's the father of communism. Neither does it apply to 'communes', it's about an economic way of living. I've studied it among the best, whereas sorry but you sir don;t have the first clue what your talking about. Come back when you do, and I'll hear you out.

Thats OK Alec. I was reminded of that other Republican, George Orwell, regretting that the Nationalist attacks on Barcelona had unfortunately left Gaudi's monstrosity untouched.

Mart

Its got a lot more to do with the time that the buildings were put up rather than commies = bad architects.

After WWII, only 25% of Budapest's housing was habitable. So a massive rebuilding programme was required in a very poor country.

In Britain, the destruction was comparatively minor, we had rationing of buillding materials well into the 1950's, a lot of buildings needed to be built - so a lot of very poor buildings were built. Marry that to the worldwide brutalist architectural style of the post war years and you've got the rubbish that still blights our cities.

In Hungary with far, far greater devastation and fewer resources, the post war buildings would have been rubbish whoever was in charge. The communist system won't have helped matters but to claim that poor architecture in Budapest is down to the Commies is simplistic at best.

But they managed to still blight the city throughout the sixties, seventies and eighties, decades after the war.

If you want to see some nasty sights try Brno in Czech Republic or Bratislava in Slovakia ... but you can't complain at the price of the beer at between 30p and 60p a pint, or about 10p in a supermarket for 500ml bottle.