Russia has spent billions on roads, airports and stadiums for the World Cup - but now comes the hard part.
Thousands of volunteers and public transport officials are being taught to smile, be polite, and say key phrases in English.
BBC News reports organisations including Russian Railways, Fifa and the Moscow Metro are putting their staff through special training, teaching them how to be helpful to foreign visitors.
Fans during the official opening of the FIFA Fan Fest at Vorobyovy Gory (Sparrow Hills) on June 10, 2018 in Moscow, Russia. Source: FIFA
Elnara Mustafina, a psychologist who runs smiling classes, told the BBC in a televised report that “Russian people usually don’t smile.”
The footage from the report shows her teaching a class of around 20 people how to smile - a foreign act to many
“That’s why when other people come to Russia, they think Russians are not friendly. We need to teach them how to smile - we need to change their attitude,” she says.
Film director Yulia Melamed told the BBC that it was extremely strange for a person to walk on the street and smile in Russia because it looked “alien and suspicious.”
She says she once got questioned by police because she smiled at them in public.
“I got stopped by policeman and I was quite angry about it and he asked me to show my ID,” she says.
“Afterwards I asked him, why did he stop me, and he said to me, ‘because you were smiling.’ That’s what he said, literally.”
