There's a lot of hypothetical pride for it, but as far as financing and material support of museums etc, that's still lacking. The government mostly sees it at a propaganda investment, and so goes for more flashy stuff over more interesting or important.

Then there's the whole thing about suppressing the bits that are hard to whitewash. There are a bunch of laws currently in force that ban "denial of facts established by the ruling of the International Military Tribunal, approval of crimes, established by that ruling, as well as dissemination of knowingly false information about actions of the USSR in WW2 period". That last bit is the catch-all that can be used to censor pretty much any opinion not in line with official propaganda. Here's the law in question (in Russian):

http://www.zakonrf.info/uk/354.1/

For example, last year, a man was convicted and fined for sharing an article about Soviet occupation of Poland on his social media feed, because said article stated that USSR attacked Poland jointly with Germany, and therefore both countries bear equal responsibility for starting WW2. This was deemed as "contrary to the findings of the IMT" by the court (which is true, since any such questions related to Poland were effectively sidestepped under Soviet pressure). Here's the article in question (in Russian):

http://zapretno.info/statya-15-faktov-pro-banderovtsev-ili/

Like most places it varies depending on the person. I work in Russia and my colleagues range across from having very deep seated patriotism and believing in all things Russian to more moderate reviews of it. World War 2 is exceptionally relevant nearly 70 years out, with the major cities having monuments/statue after statue and so on.

Many of the major attractions in St. Petersburg and the surrounding areas are historical and were rebuilt after the siege of Leningrad, though at great pain due to difficulty in raising funds to do the restorations. The city thrives on the more world renown cultural heritage (ballets for example), and many of the old soviet performers are still draw huge crowds and fill arenas/auditoriums. Many older Russians I've met look very fondly back at the USSR; younger generations have a mixed attitude, many just echoing their parents' sentiments, others enjoying modern Russia.

As far as preservation goes, I think it depends on just how crappy it is. There's a few buildings downtown in St. Petersburg that are the last few that were directly involved in the Siege of Leningrad (remnants of former buildings) and there is discussion on what to do with them - knock'em down and replace or restore as a historical site. It's prime area and the buildings weren't of any importance, but at the same time, the history of WW2 is just really tightly woven into pretty much everything, so there is some deadlock on what to do. Much of SPB was rebuilt to "it's former glory" after the siege so there is interest in restoring what was lost. But it also hasn't stopped gigantic shopping malls from being installed downtown in these spaces, with the exterior of course matching the surrounding architecture.

    Many older Russians I've met look very fondly 
    back at the USSR; younger generations have a 
    mixed attitude, many just echoing their 
    parents' sentiments, others enjoying modern 
    Russia.

I have family in the Czech Republic and Slovakia and have often heard that sentiment - that things weren't too bad back then. Hard to say how much of it is due to viewing the past in rose tinted glasses or missing their youth though.

My partner's mother explains it like this; while she's happy with modern Russia, she misses when it was a super power. She recalls having enough month at the end of each month for new outfits, apartment paid for (owned), plenty of food, and a nice vacation every 3 months or so. She also says she likes having a focused and goal oriented leader, and that democracy makes her head spin since it seems like nothing ever gets done.

We (partner and I) haven't pressed much into how much she actually knows about what was happening politically, but that's the perspective that a lot of other older folk echo. The few older people I have seen pressed on it usually just get stubborn about the bad parts of the USSR and don't want to talk about it.

Czechoslovakia was never a super power, and communism was to an extent forced upon it by the soviet union, but still people miss the security of the old system: you would basically never get fired or worry about the basics like clothes and shelter as long as you didn't rock the boat.

This seems to be the main point rather than democracy being hard to comprehend or inefficient.

Someone from Yugoslavia described it to me as "back then, everyone had a little something; not much, but something. Now some people have lots more, and others have nothing."

> what's modern Russia's attitude towards its own history?

Looks like they're beginning to rewrite it. "Russian state is 1000-years old", "Russia singlehandedly won WW2" and so on.

Combined with "Westerners are evil" rhetoric it helps keep population under control.

Great wall is pretty much a bs produced by some Chinese billionaire together with the nationally treasured director Zhang Yimo, who pretty much has little idea of making good commercial movie.

> letting Westerners steal their cultural treasures

I cannot see where this comes from. Is there any stealing at all?... The movie Great Wall uses Great Wall in a way that is trade-mark hollywood, i.e., purely symbolic, none of cultural connection at all. The story of Great Wall can be made on almost any world famous building/artifact... If that counts a steal, then hollywood cannot make anything not stealing...

Ethbro used the definite article on Great Wall; I don't think they're talking about the film.

To flesh it out, I hiked a few portions around Beijing. Next to the entrance to the restored / touristy part there's a smallish musuem / cultural building.

I'd put it on par with a small town's local museum. Maybe the expectation was that people would go to the larger museums downtown, but it seemed surprisingly undersized and thrown together for a large tourist site on a pretty amazing object of historical significance.