Slate's Matthew Polly (of fighlinker fame as well) has an excellent article describing Russia, Sambo and Fedor Emelianenko. My favorite part is below, 

Fedor is also everything sportswriters say they want in their champions. While absolutely dominant, he's also humble, modest, and polite. He never trash-talks or gets into trouble with the law. He's a patriot who fights for the honor of his country. And his hobbies are watercolor painting and Dostoyevsky scholarship. America hasn't had a champion who would even know who Dostoyevsky was, let alone read him, since Gene Tunney. Fedor is a credit to his sport, his country-heck, the human race.  

But, of course, that's not what sportswriters really want in our athletes. We want quote-spewing narcissists who attend nightclubs packing loaded guns and shoot themselves in the leg. Writing nice things about good people doesn't sell as well as writing mean things about assholes. And from a sales perspective, Fedor is the worst of the nice guys-not only is he bland, he's almost Terminator blank. He enters the ring, destroys his opponents, and leaves as if he were simply picking the newspaper off the lawn. And in interviews, he is almost, if this is possible, more vacant-a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.   

I seriously suggest that everyone check out this article. It does a great job summarizing Russian history and the flavor of St. Petersburg. It is part of a larger tourism piece so that is why Polly is talking about architecture.