*I know we haven't heard much from Anna lately, but I'm still sitting here patiently waiting for the next spike-heel to drop.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,716119,00.html
"The Starlite is in a small park in downtown Moscow, a two-minute walk from the monument to legendary poet Vladimir Mayakovsky. (((When you hang out in Russia, you're always discovering awesome monuments to guys who did awful things to themselves and everybody who loved them.))) The restaurant serves steak and french fries, (((mmm, steak and fries))) and the wall is decorated with Life magazine covers from the 1960s and a license plate from the US state of Michigan. CNN flickers on a TV screen.
"Anna Chapman, the spy with the Bond-girl image, has selected a restaurant for lunch that reminds her of her former life, of the four exciting years she spent in the United States before the FBI arrested her in June and exchanged her for American spies in Russia.
The Starlite is a little bit of Americana in the middle of Moscow, and a popular meeting point for people who are at home in more than one world. A Syrian with an American passport is ordering a hamburger at one of the tables. Western intelligence agencies believe he is the right-hand man of Viktor Bout, a notorious arms dealer. The Starlite has the reputation, not unjustifiably, of having been thoroughly bugged by Russian intelligence.
"Hands Off Our Anna (((you'd think that a swift and permanent deportation would have been "hands-off" enough)))
"Chapman is sitting in the far corner of the terrace. She is wearing a tight-fitting dress, and her face looks pale in contrast to her red hair. She sits with her back to the room. "I wear sunglasses and a hat on the street," she says.
"And with good reason. Russia has been consumed by a Chapman cult since her return. The tabloids print page after page of love confessions by her previous boyfriends. In her hometown of Volgograd, known as the "City of Heroes" for its role in World War II, members of the city council have proposed making the 28-year-old an honorable citizen.
...
"My website will be up and running soon," she says. "The contact information for my PR people will be listed there. I am not permitted to talk about my time in America." Her handlers are probably the ones who issued the instructions.
"But they apparently did not bar her from capitalizing on her story. She has already posed for the celebrity gossip magazine Zhara ("Heat") in Moscow's Baltschug Kempinski Hotel.
"The publisher characterizes the photos as "revealing," and promises that "Anna's mysterious eyes will drive men to distraction. Next to Mata Hari, Anna is simply the spy with the greatest sex appeal."
"Zhara is owned by News Media Russia, the country's most successful tabloid publisher. An associate of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin holds the majority stake in the company.... (((Makes you wonder why they are suing her, then.)))
