Moscow - Djengie Yes...

I'm playing catch up a bit here seeing as we're already in China waiting for a train to Beijing....

Moscow is very different in character to St Petersburg. It's less European in it's architecture which is deliberate as the Communists moved their capital from St Petersburg to Moscow after the revolution to break with the past, which was symbolised by the Tsarist luxury of St. Petersburg. As a consequence, Moscow has a more severe atmosphere with huge tower blocks and imposing, functional government buildings. The police presence in Moscow is also quite intimidating and a number of people we met were hassled for ID while staying here. Luckily we avoided it.

Having said all that I get the impression that Moscow does have quite a lot to offer in terms of culture and night life. It's hard to take advantage of these when you're mute non-Russian speaking tourists.

We visited Red Square, The Kremlin and St Basil's Cathedral which are the big tourist attractions in Moscow. These were all very impressive, especially St Basil's. We managed to miss Lenin's tomb which is in Red Square. We didn't know before we read the guide book but this is not a regular tomb because it actually contains Lenin's embalmed corpse. You can pay to go in but I have to say we were ambivalent about this. Luckily the decision was made for us and the tomb was closed. Later on in our trip we were told that if it's closed you can still get in the back door by bribing the guards :-) Possibly and urban myth or a joke at the foreigners' expense. Although it would fit in with other reports of the corrupt Russian police. In the Moscow Times I read a report which said that traffic offences have reduced hugely since New Year due to a five-fold increase in traffic fines. This improvement is not due to the fact that motorist are worried about the bigger fines but that it is now worthwhile for the police to stop motorists because the level of the bribe to let the person off is proportionate to the fine itself. So, the system works...

I think the best thing about our day and night in Moscow for Karen was that the hostel we stayed in had a cat which liked to jump on my head with its claws...

Moscow photos can be found here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ianwhitfield/sets/72157603708050268/