Jimsky;
              A  friend of ours who is not on this list is Steve Kelly
(WJE) Chicago...as a frequent lecturer to the Soviet Republic regarding
preservation  Steve has helped me considerably getting past bureaucratic
closed doors right to the guy mixing the mortar .
I would be more than happy to put the two of you together on the same page
before your trip..( contact me ).In the mean time here is an old joke from
the cold war days when I worked on our embassys.
Question: How do you make Russian  mortar ?
Answer: 16 sands 1 part  lime 1 part portland 2 parts microphone
Now with the passing of the "old" communism I am concerned we will loose the
shoddy "heroic " statues of Stalinistic themes....
 This actually happened to me ; I was working on the Polish embassy in the
early 80's when we removed a granite pannel and discovered wires to listening
devices planted long ago..the whole job stopped and we had to wait for men in
black to fly out from Washington to de-bug it ....which was ok with the crew
as the whores were as thick as flys and you could eat and drink all night for
a few miserable dollars at the hotel bar with the dancing bear and arm
wrestle besotten soldiers and sailors for their naval belts.... and army
wristwatches ...
proving the old adage of..." idleness is the Devil' s workshop...Best Michael