Not as Scary as it Looks

This was the view out our hotel room window. As I said before, this wasn't the loveliest neighborhood I'd ever been to, but it was safe. This was where I first got a sense of just how depressing life in the old East Berlin might have been. The architecture of the Soviet-era buildings was completely devoid of personality and were simply functional. Perhaps the overwhelming drabness is what inspired so many graffitti artists to deface them,