Russia foots huge bill to host World Cup, but what you see might not be what you get
MOSCOW - The capital of the world's first communist country has become a study in contradictions on the eve of Eastern Europe's first World Cup.
In Theatre Square, across the street from the Bolshoi Ballet, a granite statue of a stern-faced Karl Marx is now flanked by bright red, white and blue banners greeting visitors in two languages.
A few miles away, in a courtyard fronting Luzhniki Stadium - site of both the tournament's opening game and the final - a massive likeness of Vladimir Lenin in a winter overcoat rises from behind a souvenir venue, ostensibly standing watch over the kind of consumerism the real-life Lenin led a revolution to repel.
Neither Marx nor Lenin lived long enough to see the first World Cup in 1930 but they've become part of the welcoming ceremony for the latest one, which kicks off Thursday with Russia playing
