My expectations of Cleveland were low, only because my ATL neighbour always ribbed our mutual neighbour about how bad it was and how much it smells.
Other than the heavy industry I can`t see any reason for any bad reputation.
I spent most of today in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a museum dedicated to the music and, moreover, to the list of famous musicians (and producers) who have been listed in the Hall of Fame. I spent 5 hours here, enjoying the exhibits of instruments and artifacts, as well as snippets of all the members of Hall. Annoyingly I could not take photos, otherwise I may well have filled-up my camera with snaps of endless guitars. I particularly liked the Les Paul exhibition, which detailed the young inventor`s works while making an electric guitar, including one made from a railway track section.
I could understand most of the inductees, as they were of course famous rock & roll musicians (or at least musicians in genres of music that were crucial to the invention of rock & roll, such as blues). There were others that I could not understand, specifically Madonna. I am not sure that her music could ever be described as rock & roll, and the Hall`s choice of Vogue (an 80s dance record!) as a typical piece. I also noted with my beady musical eye that one of the clips for The Jimi Hendrix Experience was from Woodstock in 1969.... when The Experience did not play. Jimi appeared with Gypsy Sun and Rainbows. Yeah.
After the museum I wandered around the city, all the way from Lake Erie to Public Square and the University. It seems a decent city, with what looked like a cool entertainment district.
In the evening I went to the local Hungarian restaurant with my Hungarian-speaking American host for some typical filling food. We then stayed up chatting about information technology til 3am. He`s very cool, and it was a pleasure to watch him as he glided around the insides of a bash$ prompt.