It's the people. Mainly that there's too many of them. Although the quality often leaves much to be desired as well. I remember once reading that the "far-sighted" metro planners made the platforms twice as long as the original trains because they knew that one day there would be many more people using the system. Well, it was a shame they weren't a little more far-sighted because the Moscow metro has reached capacity. As an example, centre bound trains on the south green line in the mornings are almost impossible to board from Kantemirovskaya onwards, even though they come as often as every 30 seconds. You literally have to put your shoulder into the people and push to force your way on. The 'people's palaces' are now no better than overcrowded farmyards running stinking, stuffy cattle trains.

And the question is, where do they go from here? The frequency definitely can't be increased. The only option would be to extend the platforms and who knows if that would even be possible with many of the existing stations or how long it would take to do it. How would the system have coped if Moscow had won the Olympics? This post might upset a few travelers who have marveled at the pretty decorations and been surprised by the efficiency of the system. But ride the metro every day and then see how wonderful you think the little statues at Ploshchad Revolutsii are.

I did an interview with Igor Kurinnoy recently. Kurinnoy (pictured below) is a three time world champion in the Russian martial art of sambo. I have to admit that I had no real idea what sambo was until just before the interview. As he explained it, sambo is a mix of all the martial arts that were practised by the different nationalities of the Soviet Union. It was created as a way to make a universal style of fighting so that all people in the Soviet Union could compete against each other. So it incorporates elements, for example, of kurash from Uzbekistan, chidaoba from Georgia, barilda from the Far East and trinta from Moldova among other styles. According to Kurinnoy, this mixture of styles and the fact that sambo takes its basis more from the modern world than other forms of martial arts makes it the most useful and realistic form of fighting.

Kurinnoy himself was an affable chap, but sitting opposite him made me wonder about all the different ways he could beat the shit out of me. An irrational desire to start a fight just to see what would happen entered the back of my mind. In addition to being a sambo guru he also holds a black belt in judo and is a three time European champion in sumo wrestling, believe it or not. For anyone interested in learning sambo, his multimedia CDs would probably be a good place to start. You can order them here. He also does regular seminars in the US and Europe so you could always check him out if he's in your area.

I was also surprised to find out that the 'o' in sambo isn't stressed, making the martial art indistinguishable in pronunciation from the Brazilian form of music. Kind of takes some of the hardness out of the sport.