Not intending to be harsh here, but the rather depressing city in which my parents live, Birmingham England, likes to compare itself to the ‘love capital’ of the world, Venice Italy. Don’t laugh; really.
They think they can compete.
- Venice: delightful if expensive city with beautiful canals, great art and a unique experience.
- Birmingham: bland, rather tired looking, wishful-thinking with cheerful inhabitants but nothing to make it stand out from the grey.
BBC Birmingham Compares Birmingham to Venice
Popularity: 1% [?]
Grubby Brum claims to have more miles of canals than Venice. Thinking back to our trip last year – I know which canals I would rather be sitting besides!! The No 1 vaporetto up the Grand Canal knocks spots off the ‘boat trips’ from Gas Street, and the desolate post industrial landscape is no competition for the shabby peeling splendour of the palaces…and the sun shines in Venice!
The sun is the main thing really isn’t it? I mean, Birmingham just about scrapes up to the level of being ‘ok’, but even on its best days, when it has sun, it’s not as good as Venice will ever be because Venice has the sun most of the year and as a result its character is built from the that sun-soaked lifestyle. That, and the imminent threat of the entire city sinking, though that didn’t feel all that pressing when we were there!