In every park, on every street, in every restaurant and bar. They're supposed to be the bad guys. The okhrana is the security outfit, official or unofficial. They're supposed to be the good guys. Try telling the two apart.
Security is modern Moscow's obsession.
From the uniformed hooligans stalking you round a grocery to the licensed robbery of the ubiquitous traffic cops, there's no escape from the macho chaps bent on ensuring your safety. Take the Praga restaurant, a canary-yellow wedding cake of a building straddling the Novy Arbat,which sweeps down to the Kremlin. The Praga became a favoured haunt for upwardly mobile apparatchiks, visiting VIPs, and wedding parties. These days the car park full of Range Rovers, Pajeros, and Mercedes betrays a clientele of nouveau riche thugs and politicos. In Moscow the divide between the two is largely theoretical.