another use for a water bottle and other things I’ve learned in getting a Russian Visa

The last post talked about what a headache it’s been in getting our visas and work permits this past year. This post is about the more adventurous task of extending a visa into a work permit. It involves x-rays, a portly and rude doctor and an empty water bottle. I hope you enjoy it.

To get a work permit we must enter on a temporary three month visa then we extend it to a work permit. In order to do that you must go through a series of medical tests to prove that you are healthy enough to not be a medical risk to the people of Russia. You have never even seen red tape until you have entered the labyrinth that is the Russian health system. Thankfully, one of our colleagues braved this path for us a month earlier and gave us detailed directions on what to do.

What do you think comes first in getting a document saying you are healthy and legally allowed to work in Russia? Would you go to the doctor’s office? Would you go to the migration services? Where do you go? The bank. Yes, you go to the bank and pay them $50 in order to get a receipt that says you can start the procedure. Because...y’know...that makes sense.

Ok, now all we need to do is go to the doctor’s office that specializes in this medical document thing, right? They test stuff like your blood and your lungs and make sure you’re not crazy, all that stuff. It’s all in one conveniently located building, right? Oh wait, we live in Russia...wrong.

Dan and Chris, my teammates and friends (without whom I would not have made it this far) and I go to an obscure, barely marked building at 4 pm to give blood and get the paperwork started. What’s that? Come back tomorrow? It’s 4:10 and the office closes at 4. Awesome.

We go the next day at 10 and wait in line for thirty minutes to give the nice ladies our passports, bank receipts and everything else. These ladies were really nice to us and even joked around with us which was a nice little change of pace. They took blood and jokingly said it would cost us 15 rubles ($0.50). They said come back in four days from 10-4 for the results and paperwork. We came at 10 and it was actually ready. What do you think comes next? Well the next step is conveniently only open from 8-11 and it’s an hour’s walk away. Not next door, not on the same street, it’s an hour from here to there and closes in 30 minutes. Again...awesome.

So we skip to step three which is nearer and closes at 2. We walk around and look for building 10-A on a certain street. We find building 10 and look for an entrance. The builders apparently built it backwards because the main entrance was on the other side. We go in and find out it is building 10 not 10-A, a grade school not a medical building. We guess that building 10-A is that short, dilapidated building hidden behind decaying concrete walls with an unmanned guardrail a chimpanzee could operate. We bushwhack our way into the building and find more surprisingly pleasantly composed workers. They take our information and ask us to sit until the psychologists are ready. Psychologists?! What? Evidently this is the narcotics and psychology branch that signs for us. They make sure we’re not on drugs nor crazy. That’s comforting.

These ladies are really nice. They too joke with me and are very pleasant with me. It seems like they understand the hassle this can be and take pity on us, or maybe they are trying to lure me into a false sense of comfort to force a confession out of me. It turns out they weren’t and after a few questions sign my paper and send me on my way. All in all a pleasant experience.

The next step - step two, the 8 am one - will have to wait till tomorrow.

7:45 AM, we gather outside my door and walk towards the medical building for our last step. We know that we’ll need to give a urine sample and that this being Russia they probably don’t have any sanitary containers for us to use at the doctor’s office. (For those of you who have lived here you understand that sentence, for those of you who haven’t, as my friend says ‘don’t try to understand it, just give it a hug’). We see a sign for a 24 hour pharmacy and walk up to it. What’s that scribbled in black ink and taped to the door? Closed. Awesome. Time is running out and I have to leave for class soon so we take our chances and hope they have an option for us at the office.

We finally find the correct medical building, it’s located at the “Center for Finding Tuberculosis in Your Lungs” or some equally bizarrely named building. This is the logical place to have one’s work permit medical tests done, right?

So we go in and up to the doctor’s office. This next step is one where it is very useful to know the difference between the perfective and imperfective aspect of a verb. Imperfective means it is either a process or right now. Like the word “invite” I invite you in, or I am inviting you in sounds like “Pre-gla-shy-u” the Perfective is a one time event or result that either has happened or will happen. I will invite you sounds like “Pre-gla-shoe”. Hear the difference? Well we didn’t. We thought she said “I invite you in” and in we went. She was getting dressed. We were in trouble. “Pre-gla-SHOE” she yelled in near-naked furry as she shook her clothes at us. In embarrassment and shame we scurried out and tried to stifle our giggles. A minute later she muttered “pre-gla-shy-u” and we entered as penitent as Indiana Jones searching for the Grail. 

One by one she takes our documents and tells us where to go. First go downstairs to give blood (again) then to the lab to give urine. We chose not to ask about the latter for fear that her already discontented mood would send her into a firestorm of hitherto unheard Russian profanities and pontifications on the despairing state of the education of today’s lazy and stupid youth which would include us. Fortunately for us the kind lady taking our blood had the answer to our quandary. “Where do we get a sanitary container for the urine sample?”, we asked. “At a drink kiosk”, she replied. For those of you who have read this far just to find out what the other use for a water bottle is read no further and take a guess. 

That’s right, she told us to go buy a bottle of water, drink it then use it for the...um...next step. So we did.

After buying the bottles and drinking them we searched for a suitable bathroom where we could give the sample. We found the lab that analyzes the samples but no one was there. I saw a woman through the window and asked as best I could in my broken Russian “This place for to urine?” Her reply? “This is a window.” Thanks, I knew that. After finally finding a suitable place we came back to give our samples and again no one was there. It was now 9:05 and the sign said something about closing at 9:00. Great, we’ll have to come back and do this all again tomorrow? That’s when another very sweet nurse came through the door and said “Well done boys, give me your samples and your analysis papers.” With bare hands she unscrewed our homemade sanitary bottles and placed them in a flimsy metal box reminiscent of the toolbox you might have made out of spare sheet metal as a child. She then repeated “well done boys, you can go now.” and we walked out like proud schoolchildren having just memorized how to spell “sincerely”. Again, another very nice lady having pity on us.

From here we went back to the lady who reminded us of the importance of verb aspects and got the instructions for the last step. She had flipped through my passport and saw that I lived for a couple of years in southern Russian. Upon seeing this she asked why I spoke Russian so poorly and why I was such a bad student. I didn’t know the Russian equivalent for an equally insulting statement so instead I simply said “I’m still studying, thank you for the reminder that I need to study more.” And with that we finished the last step. 

The old Russian proverb states that the future belongs to those who know how to wait. I have a lot to learn about patience, about putting others first and about my character. The bright spot in all of this has been the surfacing of character flaws deep inside me that I can mask by humor or accomplishments. I’ve also met some very sweet, kind and hardworking Russians along the way accompanied by a few not so pleasant characters who suck people’s joy rather than give it. I hope that at the very least this saga has given you some laughter or some gratitude at the small mercies God gives us on the way of sanctification. Thanks for sticking with us and praying for us, it’s helping. 

Oh and by the way we got the work permits this week! That’s a reason to celebrate!