Things that have to know before visiting Russia, Instructions for travelling Russia.

 the absolute worst thing about living in russia is that everything you eat has like sour cream or   some other kind of dairy in it and then you get really fat and you fart a lot so that's it for   this video thank you for watching just kidding i actually really fell in love with russian   milk products and tvorog while i was here i don't actually think i can live without tvorog after   this but and this is a very big but, if you're thinking about living here or even just spending   a longer holiday then there is one very important negative aspect to life here that you need to know and this is it the absolute worst horrible thing about life in russia here is the system itself   the official bureaucracy the administration and why do i suddenly have such fantastic   epiphanies about political russia you asked well folks it's because recently as a result   of this system i accidentally became an illegal immigrant in russia yes folks you heard right but we have some bad hombres here and we're going to get him out this is a very big thing   for me by the way you know i've always been on the very right side of life i i believe in doing   you know the correct things heck i even used to be a lawyer myself this is what happened to me   i've been living here thinking that my stay was completely legal until 15th of june about a week   or 10 days before 15th of june we started digging around for information on whether my legal stay   here in russia can be extended because you know we're married we like each other we want to stay   together nobody could give me a very clear answer not the policeman in the migration department who   registered me in my neighborhood neither could the singapore embassy but they all said that it's okay   you can stay until 15th of june but try to get an extension as soon as possible and definitely   before 15th of june but the question was how do i do that so i finally found myself at the   federal migration service bureau in the center of moscow the main directorate of migration issues   for the ministry of internal affairs of russia the lady at the window counter dealing with all   these migration queries simply hastily dismissed us saying that what are you worried about she's   from singapore she can stay it's probably going to be extended this you know visa expiry suspension   just as we were about to leave by chance Vitaly spoke to another chap who was there at this office   he turned out to be a corporate visa agent. When he heard that i was from singapore he immediately   told us this: apparently in russia there is a list of countries that are deemed open or closed   singapore airlines ever so efficient started flying a direct route between moscow to singapore   since early february. When that happened the russian government placed singapore from the list   of close countries to the list of open countries. When that happened people like me who were staying   on under this whole suspension of visa expiry scheme had about 90 days to get out of russia   without any consequence. Those 90 days already finished sometime in early may. So technically   i had already been an overstayer for like a month plus and the only way to resolve this now was to   go to court and be charged and face the music. oh my god. i was like, hang on, is this guy on drugs   what is this open countries list that nobody seems to know of?   even the staff at the singapore embassy believe that i was covered by the visa expiry suspension   scheme until the 15th of june. Even they didn't know about this open countries list   i was so sure that this was a mistake so Vitaly went back to the lady in the counter window and   asked her to double confirm at which point she finally checked the list of documents on her desk   instead of just shooting her mouth off and then she actually said, oh yeah, actually you're right   singapore is on the open countries list. oh, so your wife's an overstayer. She's gonna have to   go to court now to resolve this. I'm like, hello?! can you imagine the shock that we felt at this point   we regularly checked in every month at the migration department of the neighborhood that we   lived in, you know. We went to the police guy and we asked him every month, you know, what's going on? any   updates? you know, we scoured the news for updates about this visa expiry suspension scheme thinking   that i was nicely covered by it. At this point you're like, how did this happen? Why is there a   secret list of countries opened or closed that nobody seems to know about, not even the people   handling immigration issues? and why have we been repeatedly told the wrong thing by officers   handling immigration? and the worst thing was, you know, each time they told me the wrong thing   when i think back now, each time they told me the wrong thing they didn't check they just said   like, oh singapore, no problem, stay, stay, no problem! there's no official record of what we've been told   and by whom. We had no way to like, double check or confirm what these people were saying to us   and as it turns out actually there is a very big problem indeed   and now no one else is accountable except for me! i'm the sad little illegal immigrant   and i was going to court. We later found out that this list of open and closed countries,   it's on a public access website belonging to the ministry of interior affairs but it's so   obscure that even the policemen handling my case to go to court had to do a lot of digging around   online before he found it. And oh apparently there are a lot of other people in similar cases to me   all accidental illegal immigrants. We should start a club! so then at this point i was like   okay we're really sorry, we honestly didn't know, i didn't know, i'm very sorry, what can i do to   you know, repair things? and then every officer of the regime starts telling you, 'yes yes it's not   your fault you didn't know. I believe you but in the russian legal system ignorance is no excuse,   you are still guilty, we still have to charge you.' From that point onwards in a nutshell i had to   voluntarily present myself at a police station get arrested confess to overstaying get a court   appointment appear before the judge confess to overstaying say sorry agree to pay a fine   and pray that the judge doesn't sentence me to outright deportation or ban me from returning   to russia for five years then i have to go get my court order use that apply to get a transit visa   and finally get my ass out of russia so at this point you would think that the whole story is   horrible enough right? but no it gets worse. It's like a really horrible opera aria that you keep   thinking is coming to an end, it must be, and then the singer just launches into an even shriller   crescendo. So between me and the singapore embassy we figured out that all those things are the exact   procedures and steps that needed to happen so that i can exit russia legally. What we didn't factor in   was officers of the bureaucracy, of the regime, here who didn't want to cooperate. Like the   police officer in the migration department in my neighborhood who registered me as legally staying   there. He's the guy who has to arrange for my court appearance. And guess what? he didn't want to do it!   he kept telling me that according to the "database" i was still legal and i should just, you know, solve   my problem by buying an air ticket and trying to fly out unilaterally by myself. Which, in case   you're wondering, is a really dumb idea. i was assured by the singapore embassy who checked with   the airports that the customs officers there would ask me to u-turn and go back to the courtroom.   it took two days to get this guy to do his job and finally arrange and set up my court appearance apparently he was reluctant because he should have known about me and my illegal overstay   and i was a blight on his statistics, ergo: not good for the performance bonus. Needless to say i was   not impressed. Anyway finally everything happened the way it should and it took quite a few days   a lot of pain and it cost us quite a lot of money to resolve. In the end i got off with a fine no ban   no immediate deportation it's considered the best outcome in the circumstances but but the ill logic   of the whole situation and you know just all these weird practical obstacles that just pop up so   unexpectedly like, geez they just really caught me off guard about what a system can be like   i mean you know i come from singapore right? it's, it's a really different type of system   there. Anyway coming back to the original point of this video so the system that i've just described   to you - that is the flip side of the russian coin. this is an absolutely awesome place to live in if   you're just looking at the daily life you know, the affordable cost of living, how great you know the   food and everything is. you know, with a little bit of money life in the ex USSR gets uh pretty   cool actually but if for whatever reason you have to encounter the system then really it's not so   great. Is living in such a system something that you are willing to accept and deal with? everyone   will have a different answer to this question i believe there isn't a right or wrong answer   but i hope that my story today will help to illustrate to you what the flip side of   the russian coin can be, just like how our other video vlogs on this youtube channel have showed   you just how amazing how awesome life in moscow is.  Vitaly has proven to be a really solid rock   throughout all of these things i could tell that he was also completely *___ his pants when we   first found out that i had accidentally overstayed but you know he literally did everything that was   possible to try to help me and end the situation and i was really upset and really scared and you   know he just completely comforted me throughout the whole thing and he knows that i'm afraid   to fly alone because of this worldwide pandemic situation now it just makes me nervous to be going   alone so we've decided to try to leave moscow together i'm very lucky to have a good husband   so for now yes we are leaving russia i won't tell you guys the next destination just for   now yet because i'm really nervous that i will accidentally jinx it or something   but we will definitely update even when we make it there so please fingers crossed pray for us i   just want to get out in peace now smoothly without any more new surprises i'm just so glad i waited   two weeks before i filmed this to share this update with you guys because at least now i can   tell the story with a little bit of a lighter tone at the time when it was just happening   every day all i wanted to do was sit in a corner and cry not a very grown-up response i know but   it was honestly just what i felt subscribe if you are interested and you want to stay up to   date on what happens next thank you for staying with me today till next post bye