The strange beauty

From today we're starting the new TAG - the most beautiful city in the world.I guess you all have ever been wondering: what's the most beautiful city in the world?Lately I asked this question myself. The answer was clear! Two Russian pearls - Norilsk and Murmansk.



Norilsk (Russian: Нори́льск) is a large city in Taymyria. Because od its strategic importance Norilsk is a closed city and special permission is needed for travel (which will likely be denied unless you have a really good reason). Norilsk is the second largest city above the Artcic Circle, Murmansk is the first


Murmansk (Russian: Му́рманск) is a port city located in the extreme northwest part of Russia on the Kola Bay, 12 kilometers from the Barents Sea, not far from Russia's borders with Norway and Finland


Now nearly every reader is going "was is she thinking?" or "what's beautiful in these obscure cities?"

I'm here to defend myself and to show you their uniqeness.

pic found on tumblr/it's not my property

Welcome to the place where the snow is black.

Okay, you can call me a weirdo but I think that even that smog above Norilsk has something that makes me wanna say "wow". The sad thing is that pollution level is one of the highest in the whole world (kinda scary, isn't it?). Nearby the city there's treeless tundra.

Norilsk. photo found on the internet/it's not my property

The city looks like a giant labirynth. Every building has their own place. It's fascinating how the whole space was arranged (despite the fact that city was founded in 1915!)

photo was found on the web/ I don't own it

Look at these chimneys. They look dangerous, like a ticking bom. Entering the city must be scary for strangers but how the inabitants feel about living there? We can only wondr. Despite the fact that the city is "closed" I would go there if I could, obviosly for a 1-day journey

Murmansk/I do not own this photo

Murmansk looks so peaceful on this photo! Number of cranes is quite impressive to be honest. It's really easy to remark that this is the port city. However it's much more friendly then Norilsk.

one of Murmansk's block of flats/I do not own this photo

So simple. So gloomy and dirty. It's not hard to guess that smoke made this so called ombre on its walls. Why I chose this photo? They don't really care how it look from the outside and to be honest it's much better then all these polish block of flats covered with 5 different coulours which are often quite jarring
I hope that you feel inspired by now!