Balmy weather brings city to the street

THE weather has been unseasonably warm. Temperatures are hitting the mid to high 20s and Russians are taking to the streets. They are, in fact, taking to one street in particular.

The Old Arbat runs from the huge Stalinesque skyscraper of the Foreign Ministry at Smolensk Square to the old Tsarist style Praga Restaurant. Its one mile pedestrianised stretch has always been one of the busiest parts of Moscow.

During the four years I lived here it became the heart of Glasnost. Political tracts were distributed, cartoons mocking the soviet leadership were displayed on the walls and for a while, until the activity was banned by the current mayor street traders touted Matryoshka dolls bearing the images of Russian leaders from Boris Yeltsin through Mikhail Gorbachev and Leon id Brezhnev, back in time to Vladimir Lenin and Nicholas II.

The street has undergone a remarkable change in a span of just a couple of months. It is now dominated by sidewalk cafes and restaurants, more than 60 of them at the last count.

In daytime at the Mziuri, a swarthy group of sabre nosed Georgians are the permanent occupants of a long table, at which, from time to time, plates of green and red Lobio lentils, flat Lavash bread, succulent Shashlik, salty Suluguni cheese and chicken Satsivi, are deposited to be washed down with black, sweet Khinzmariuli wine.

From time to time, one of the Georgians, all of them men by the way, whips out his mobile phone in order to conduct a business which is obviously profitable enough to allow him to spend the entire day at Mziuri.

Next door at Mishanka the food is Russian and in this weather there is a run on cold Okroshka soup and on the Kvas, a lightly alcoholic and highly refreshing "beer", from which the soup is made.

Across the road at the Pizzeria Italia, Western tourists smile as the management relieves them of their savings at prices far higher than at Guilbaud's in Dublin for fare similar to that found at Pizza Hut, not far away on Tverskaya Street.

For the kids, street photographers oblige with holiday snap shots of the little ones with live pythons draped around their shoulders. There are dancing bears and an entire menagerie of little monkeys and baboons in suits and dresses. For the more adventurous, pony rides along the cobble stoned route have provided entertainment for the children who return to school today after the long summer holidays.

Occasionally, a platoon of raw faced young soldiers on leave from the provinces strolls by, eyes roaming in wonder at the marvellous activity and, of course, at the sophisticated Moscow girls in their $1,000 outfits.

At night time, the musicians and the clowns and fire eaters start their performances, and large circles of people form to watch the free shows. It is well into the early hours before the bustle dies down. In a couple of months all this will disappear into the harsh ice and snow of the Russian winter.

The street, as I said, is pedestrianised, but occasionally the throngs part to make way for battered grey blue jeeps carrying men in grey blue uniforms with weather beaten faces. Moscow's finest are on patrol, the "fight against crime" is in progress.

One of the more open aspects of this heroic struggle against criminality is the arrival of smiling "Militsionery" at a restaurant or a bar, where they at once head for the back room where the takings are kept, and emerge some time later with even broader grins.

The "fight against crime" has given the cops increased powers and they are using them swingeingly. If the above description of the Arbat tempts some of you to consider a Moscow holiday, and there is no reason why it should not, here is some very important advice. Carry your passport and visa with you at all times.

If you don't, your trip could be turned into a nightmare, for behind the great attractions of the new Westernised Russia lurks a deadly menace in the form of the men in the grey blue uniforms.

In general, they concentrate on people of dark complexion, such as the sabre nosed Georgians or the Azeri traders. If they are really lucky they might even net a Chechen who doesn't have a permit under Moscow's apartheid style residence regulations.

In theory, the Moscow Propiska has been abolished with Russia's entry to the Council of Europe, but in practice, particularly for people from the Caucasus region, it still exists. Those apprehended are held in a less than salubrious lock up for a day or two.

But Caucasians are not the only victims. Spot checks are done and Westerners are netted. Some of them have been Irish and their descriptions of the inside of a Moscow cop shop have not been nice.

One Irishman, who had gone out without his documents, was held for several hours in a cell containing men and women. Permission to go to the toilet was refused. People were forced to relieve themselves where they stood. Another was told he was being taken in because "The Irish are the same as the Chechens". Fortunately, he was an old hand and the palming of a bribe ensured his freedom.

I am now about to stroll down the Arbat without my passport, which has been lodged for registration with the proper authorities. Wish me luck.