Arrested in Red Square

The Kremlin
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Seeing Lenin's tomb ended up turning into an adventure in it's own right. The tomb itself was fine... we lined up for about an hour, and the procedures are very strict. No cameras or anything like that. You must keep quiet and keep your facial and body expressions neutral. Having your hands in your pockets is reason enough for them to disallow entry. I guess it's understandable... for many Russians it's almost a holy place. Lenin himself really could have been a masterpiece by Madam Tusauds... he looked like he could have been made out of wax. And yes... there are some people who debate whether his corpse is real.

Lenin's Tomb (in foreground)
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After seeing the corpse we had some free time where we walked around central Moscow for a while. On the way back to the bus we were stopped by two police (or Militia). They asked for our passports and visa's; except that we didn't have them. There is a catch 22 situation in Russia where having passports and visa's is mandatory, yet the (corrupt) police often steal them, as they're worth money on the black market for identity fraud. As a result, there was a deal done where the Russian govenment said that a hotel ID card is good enough, and should they need to see more, the hotel can hand over the passport.

She threw up shortly before seeing Lenin in front of 200 hundred Japanese tourists

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Unfortunately when we got pulled up, they would not accept the hotel card, and they were wanting to take us back to the police car. We explained our situation - and that we were only a few minutes walk from where our bus was (and tour manager and Russian guide). Money may have been a motivating factor for them; initially they picked on Graeme the most, and primarily wanted him to come with them, while letting the rest of us go. He did what the Russian guide recommended, and handed his wallet over to Lisa (a girl from the tour we were walking with). The idea is that they often try and scare tourists into bribing them, and when they can't get money, they usually let them go. Instead it backfired to a degree... they wouldn't let any of us leave. Eventually we managed to talk them into letting Lisa go and get our tour manager and Russian guide.

On the subway
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The police themselves were quite friendly. One of them even quipped while we were waiting for them to return, "So is she going back to the bus, or Australia?". There was never any physical intimidation - and our guide previously told us that militia would not touch us. After several minutes were up though, they became more pushy, and were becoming more insistant that we go back to their police car. We resisted explaining that they would be back at any second. Finally they did arrive, and by luck the tour manager had our passports (as we were leaving Moscow that day). After seeing our passports, they let us go. Our Russian guide after talking to them said that the Chechnian's (spelling?) had been recruiting Europeans into doing some of their dirty work for them, and that Hotel cards weren't good enough anymore. She said it was an example of their own beauocracy contradicting themselves, but due to the circumstances we had to look after our own passports from then on.

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Where Graeme is concerned, I guess trouble is never far away.

The rest of our group had a good day... except Stephanie who was that hung over that she threw up shortly before seeing Lenin in front of 200 hundred Japanese tourists. So much for respect.