We visited Moscow on a flight layover to Yerevan in '19. Moscow seemed quite well-kept, and the people we met were polite. The area around Red Square was impressively festive, the restaurant we ate at had great food and the server was friendly. I felt at the time like I was visiting any other kindly European country (no idea that the Russians were capable of this extent of brutality).

I guess its like enjoying oneself with a giant beer stein/oompa music at the Munich Hofbrauhaus, then realizing this was also the background setting for the planners of the Third Reich...