The most shocking statistic is male life expectancy = 65. Outside of the big cities it is a lot lower than that. There is no country in the world where white man die younger. I've been to rural Romania, and rural Russia is an awful lot poorer than that. I've spent a lot of time in India and I would rather live in a poor village in rural India than in rural Russia. Dirt, poverty and massive alcoholism. Desperation. The poorest state in the US has a GDP/capita 300% of Russia, when you visit rural Russia it is a lot higher.

St Petersburg is nice, but noticeably poorer and scruffier than Budapest, or even Zhagreb, probably on a par with Bucharest.Much worse than Llubliana. Moscow was a huge shock- it's not at all like a Western City. , real 3rd world city. Last time I was there I stayed in a lovely communist era flat - wood paneling and a grand piano in the living room - gorgeous - the problem was that outside the apartment block the sidewalk had crumbled into mud, and drains were overflowing and to get from the flat to the metro you had to wade through a mixture of mud and shit. Worse than a Mumbai slum. When I say a shit hole, I mean literal shit, and mud in the streets.

I travel a lot and I am always surprised when people on here post comments about Russia, or Spain or the UK, countries I visit a lot. I'm in the UK right now, flying to Spain tomorrow, Berlin and Belgrade in March. Hopefully visit Albania for the first time later this year. I get the feeling that a lot of posters on here don't travel much, which makes it easier to believe mad stuff

`People are pinning their hopes on someone who is going to let them down badly