1st October 2022

I was just completing check-in at the hotel when he arrived. Like me, Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, was in Prague to attend the Summit of Cities. But, ...

And finally, a shout out to the folks at Camp. What’s impressive is how these civic figures are doing so much – helping Ukraine in material ways (Prague has donated buses and trams) and with open-armed solidarity, developing nimble climate and energy strategies, and promoting co-operation as never before (though we’ll skim over the deputy mayor who lectured the audience on participatory urbanism and the menace of the motor vehicle, before leaving the stage without taking questions as she had a plane to catch). [The Urbanist](https://monocle.com/radio/shows/the-urbanist/)’s Carlota and I went for a quick beer with the team from Camp, who took us to a bar that was about the length of a subway station. I also learned that you can look manly yet barely drink by ordering a beer that comes in a vast glass but is mostly just foam (deeper cultural insights can be gleaned if you visit yourself – but do have the cheese). The centre of the city remained largely undamaged after the Second World War and so is full of early-20th-century apartment buildings and old palaces embellished with numerous architectural flourishes and a ridiculous quantity of statuary; a man with a big chisel is never short of a Czech koruna, as I am sure they must have once said in Prague. Like me, Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, was in Prague to attend the Summit of Cities.