The Red Square, St. Basil`s Cathedral, Tretyakov Gallery, the Bolshoi Theatre are amongst the “standard” must-see attractions in Moscow for a foreign traveller. However, there is a number of places in Moscow foreign tourists are rarely shown. One of them is restricted USSR military object – Secured Command Post «Taganskiy» (GO-42), located 65 meters underground.

Fitna the Movie directed and uploaded on the Internet by Dutch right-wing politician Geert Wilders at the end of March has caused a predictable reaction around the world – more affective in Islamic countries and reserved yet disapproving in Europe. Russia has not been left untouched by the film either, which is reflected in utterances of official and religious organizations with the most Fitna-Wilders-stigmatizing reaction noticed in the Jewish community.

In the end of November my colleague Irina Fomina and I suddenly realized how bitter our life was and decided to sweeten it a little bit by going to the 2nd Salon of Chocolate that took place in the framework of Food Show at Gostiny Dvor in Moscow. Here is a photo report.

It is high time to sum up our current poll results. Four answer options were available in our poll “Which of the following statements about Russia is closer to reality?” - You never know what to expect from Russia, Russia has all chances to regain the superpower status, without oil and weapons Russia is a third world country and Russia is a reliable political partner.

The recent poll “Russians seem to be” presented on our website has shown that the portrait of Russians, according to the poll participants, can be depicted as a nation of hard-working alcoholics.

Some of the Russian notions can surprise a westerner. Even Russians sometimes are surprised and laugh at these notions themselves. But the notions we're going to talk about are not occasional and take their roots in history and folklore.