This beautiful bouquet of flowers made my weekend! The best part is that Chris bought them for me without any reason. it was a nice surprise on a Friday night when he got home from work and the gym. It's so nice!
Today is Monday. The UK visa center starts processing my application today. Hopefully, everything will be fine and I get my visa this week. Once I get my passport back, I'll start preparing papers for Shengen visa for Netherlands. It should take about 4 working days according to their site. One of the huge pluses of living in Moscow is that I can apply for visas myself without trying to find an agency and convince them to help me, not to mention ridiculous prices they charge for their intermediate services. When C. and I met we lived in central Russia, Ural region, it's a 2.5 hr flight from Moscow. I used to pay about $300 to get a visa, when its real cost was about $30-$50.
Now I'm the visa expert. The main thing you have to prove when you apply for any visa is that you have enough money to pay for the trip, you have an agenda, reservations and that you will come back to your country. To prove the last you have to submit proofs that you have a job, bank account and property or car, not to mention family you will come back to. In other words, you have to prove that you are not going to stay in the country for more than your visa dates say. I was almost proud of the package I submitted to the UK visa center: copies of our marriage certificate, green card, my previous visas, bank statements, work statement about my salary, copies of tickets, hotel reservation, a letter from C. that he will be responsible for me while we are there :), copy of my insurance, my old travel passports. And then they also took my picture and finger prints. C and I always joke about Russians and Americans. This time he said: "Just make sure you tell them that you are married to the greatest people! Once they know that I'm an American they'll let you enter the country". :))
Speaking of Russia and England. The world is getting smaller. Today I talked to a lady working in a meat department of the grocery store I go to every day. It turns out that her daughter is married to an Englishman and they just had a baby girl. The lady went to visit them and see the granddaughter. It was interesting for her to ask me a few questions about me and my husband since he is also a foreigner. She says that she misses her daughter a lot. I totally understand her because I miss my parents and Chris misses his family. Luckily nowadays it's easier to stay in touch. We totally love Skype. I talk to my parents every week and we talk to C's Mom once a month. It's amazing that you can see each other and it seems that we are all in the same place not thousands of miles apart. Amazing!
I thought about another thing that we may do in London. In 2006 C and I came a cross a cool pub that we liked a lot. It's called THE HUNG, DRAWN AND QUARTERED. The name of the pub goes back to the thirteen century and means the harshest punishment the court could hand out. Horrible to even imagine!!!! We went there twice and even bought their T-shirts. C. loves his a lot but it got very old. I'm thinking about getting him a new one this time. Speaking of pubs in London, we were surprised to learn that you don't tip a bartender. At first we did until we read somewhere in a guide magazine that you don't. What you can do instead is just say: "Get yourself a drink on me", that's considered a nice way of "tipping". :) Interesting, right?
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