I have a quest: to view all the dead and stuffed socialist leaders. At time of writing I need only view Chairman Mao to complete the set, having seen Lenin in 1976 and Ho Chi Minh in 1998. I refer to my diary about Lenin which tells me:

17th April 1996

"...The corpse was reclining on a dais encased in a glass and bronze sarcophagus, as much as I could make out in the darkness of the interior. The bronze sculpture around the base was, I think, of rolled flags or some other patriotic symbol, and the glass enclosing him was so highly polished that it might not have been there at all. His hands were resting on the cloth in front of him, and spotlights illuminated -quite brightly- his hands and face. In direct contradiction to rumour this was no wax copy; this was a real man, a real person. It looks like Lenin too, although the baldness and distinctive moustache and beard lend more to that appearance than anything else. The cadaver has been touched up with powder and is I would say of some considerable age. But it is definitely a corpse; the nails were brown and ridged, the face slightly sunken, old and dry with discolouration about the cheeks and forehead. The skin appears dry but still looks supple; the ears have suffered and deteriorated badly, the lobe and main body of the ear almost rotted completely away. If this had been a wax effigy, then the authorities would have made it look a lot better than this; the minutiae of detail that would be required to make up a model to this degree of accuracy would be quite beyond even the most modern of film sculptors who excel in grisly props. So it's real; but is it really Lenin? We will never know for sure..."

and in Hanoi, on the 28th January 1998:

"...The mausoleum is bigger than Lenin's by about a factor of four externally, but to be fair Lenin's tomb does extend underground whilst Ho's is all above. They might have been designed by the same architect, in fact. Past another honour guard and in through the large wooden doors, we walked to our left, then right and upstairs to where we turned abruptly right and into the chamber, dimly lit and with Ho Chi Minh or the vessel he used to walk around in lying in a bronze and glass sarcophagus. Unlike Lenin he has four officers standing at the four corners of his gasket, staring ahead unblinking. Behind him in inlaid black and red marble is the hammer and sickle next to the red star of the republic, and he looks in better shape than Lenin which one would expect as he hasn't been dead nearly so long...."

I've also visited Marx's tomb (vulgar) in London and Trotsky's (timewarp) in Mexico city. The thing is, I'm not evenly remotely communist - the visits were only because I happen to be working there. The soviet thing was a sort of wheezing grand experiment that spectacularly failed. It didn't work, that was clear - but I still have a sort of sneaking admiration for anyone who comes up with a political/economical system that isn't based on financial gain and grinding the small guy.