m is for...

M is tough. Have you noticed how the coolest city in a lot of countries starts with M? Manchester, Mumbai, Milan - all great cities. Marseilles, Munich, Mexico City - it's getting embarrassing now. Moscow? How cool is Moscow? Real cool, but...

It's going to come down to Montreal and Melbourne. 

The case for Melbourne: So painfully cool: amazing coffee in amazing alleys with amazing street art. 

Montreal, though? Once you escape the poutine-filled old town, it's painfully cool. Everywhere looks like an art gallery. I saw Jazzy Jeff DJ a street party. That's cool right? Less penguins than Melbourne, but more croburgers. 

M is for Montreal

N is for...

New York. Obviously. 

N is for New York. 

I mean, New Orleans, you deserve a mention. But, you know...

So that's North America in the table. Who wants to look at the continent stats at the half way point? No one? Tough:

Europe: 5

Asia: 4

South America: 2

Africa: 1

North America: 1

O is for...

So some letters are easy because there is a real stand out city. Others are tough because there are several world class cities that you have to choose between (let's call it the RioRome dilemma). Other letters are tough because there's no standout city. O is one such letter. A case where the city doesn't so much win as not lose. 

I mean, Oslo: really pretty, but so eye-wateringly expensive that if I gave it the letter I would be sick in my mouth. Ottawa: really good museums and some half decent sights, but somehow manages to be entirely soulless. 

Which pretty much leaves Ouagadougou. Now, I really liked Burkina Faso, although that had next to nothing to do with the capital; Bobo, the second city, is far more charming. But when I got to Waga I was still on a Burkinabe high. Crocodiles, hyenas and a whole heap of takeaway yoghurt did just enough to keep me smiling, and get Africa its first city on the board. 

O is for Ouagadougou 

P is for...

So normally I talk about a city that it isn't (but by most best of city lists, it probably should be), then curveball at the end to spring in a city that has some personal meaning for me. 

So in this case, the obvious one is Paris; the curveball is probably gonna be Philadelphia, right? Philly cheese sandwiches trumping the Eiffel Tower? Nah. 

P is for Phnom Penh. I have a lot of time for Cambodia and whilst most Cambodia's tend to focus around Siem Reap, for me it was PP all the way. Insect eating, stray elephants and the most crazy introduction to any city so far (no offence Cologne, you came close). Yes, the sites in Paris are bigger and better. Yes, it's easier and you know what's happening. But the smell of Phnom Penh just makes me happier. 

P is for Phnom Penh. 

Q is for...

Have you ever been Quebec, loading timbers on the deck...

I know I rushed Quebec, so maybe I just didn't do it justice but, it just never, you know... 

Quito on the other hand. That's a city that grabs you. I guess it's forever tied up for me as the end of a big adventure, so I have a fondness that it's overgrown and slightly shady aura doesn't necessarily deserve. But still. Mountain tops, karaoke and one of the best meals I've eaten - even without a large dollop of sentiment it beats Quebec. 

Q is for Quito and South America has its second city on the list. 

R is for...

Well Rio de Janeiro, obviously, the biggest party in the world. Copacabana. Ipanema. Maracana. Christ the Redeemer. Sugarloaf Mountain. So many world renowned things in one city, plus who wouldn't want to be sipping Caipirhinas on the beach right in the city centre. 

Oh hello Rome. Whats that? Two thousand years of history? The Forum. The Colosseum. The Spanish Steps. The Trevi Fountain. The (never mentioned but utterly spectacular) Tomb for the Unknown Soldier. Yeah you may have a point. Plus you have a whole country inside you? Well that's just showing off. 

Rio or Rome? Rome or Rio? Two unarguably world class cities. Which will it be? R is for...

Riga? Really? 

Yes. This is my list. And I had an amazing time in Riga. I know I went before the stag do boom. I've heard it's hideous now. But when I went it was brilliant. It doesn't have the world class sites of Rio or Rome. But I preferred it. Don't know why, but I did. So there. 

R is for Riga. 

S is for...

So here's where it gets difficult. There are a lot of very cool cities beginning with S. 

Singapore, Seville, Santiago, Sydney, all cities that I would head - and indeed have headed - back to. And I really liked Skopje. And Shanghai. And St Petersburg. Plus I've never been to San Diego and a lot of people rave about that. What about Seoul? And Samarkand has been on my to do list for years...

But it's going to come down to two: 

San Francisco was one of my first city explores so would probably get a mention for fondness' sake even if it was, erm, Surabaya. It's not. It's ace. It has towers. It has neighbourhoods. It has Alcatraz. It has that bridge. It has sealions. I sort of wanted to dislike it (it was first US city at a time when I was rebelling against things rather than the cog in the capitalist wheel that I am nowadays) but it was great. 

Stockholm blew my mind. It's one city. On seventeen islands. How does that work? Who thought that would be a good idea? It makes it seem super airy - the airiest city I've been too. Maybe the one where water was the most dominant too. A proper wallet-busting capital city but completely in tune with nature. 

It's a tough call. But. S is for S... 

Hang on one cotton pickin' minute. Neither of those cities explode your world view in the way Sarajevo does. A city in a city in a bomb-ravaged carcass of a city. It's a place like nowhere else. That tunnel, those roses; and still it has heart. 

S is for Sarajevo and it's not even close.