Hello Russia
10:00 a.m. the plane landed in the Shermetyevo 2 and after some Spacibo (thanks) by the airhostesses, i got out without any clue of what was instore for me. None and i literally mean none of the airport staff spoke English, and to increase my worries not one sign board was in English. All i could understand from the radio announcements were words like Transit, Emmigration, Moscow, Canada and Brussels. As i was following the queue i ended on the platform where people with transit visas were getting their documents checked. And as it always happens with me (my friends from Jaipur would agree) Radhika Gupta was bound for a flight to Toronto, Canada :(
I knew that there was no point in asking the airport officials about where Emmigration was, so i decided to return back to the place from where i had started. The whole experience of Emmigration was a cool one in itself. After handing my passport, a girl took it inside an office and i was asked to wait. One by one i saw each one of my fellow passengers going out and there i was sitting without my passport alongwith (surprise surprise) another indian guy, who has been staying in Russia for more then 10 years now but has to go through the same process everytime he comes. One officer came to me and of course started talking in Russian, so this guy did the translation. This guy told me that he keeps about 50$ with him as generally these officials ask for money in these kind of situations. So waiting for about 45 minutes not knowing what is going to happen, the girl appeared and gave me my passport. Well, if you are thinking that this just happened on that day, then, you should get in touch with Shantanu and Saurabh and i am sure that they would have something to add to this story, so my guess is that it always happens.
For all those who have seen the IGI, the airport of Moscow was 1/4 of it, surprisingly the biggest country (at least in area) has such a small airport and specially the Emmigration area was smaller than my 1200 square feet flat in Jaipur.
Outside the airport, the second sigh of relief, i saw Sveta (MCP 2004-05) waiting for me. A few photographs for memory and we were all set to leave for home. One hour waiting for the bus and then travelling by bus, metro and bus again we were home at about 1:00. Throughout my travel from the airport to home, talking to sveta and checking out the cars on the streets and highways, whoooo..., BMW's and Mercedez's in all shapes and sizes were everywhere and one could see so many different varieties of cars that it was hard to remember when was the last time i saw this car. Some of the brands available in India are also seen here with the same names.
I knew that there was no point in asking the airport officials about where Emmigration was, so i decided to return back to the place from where i had started. The whole experience of Emmigration was a cool one in itself. After handing my passport, a girl took it inside an office and i was asked to wait. One by one i saw each one of my fellow passengers going out and there i was sitting without my passport alongwith (surprise surprise) another indian guy, who has been staying in Russia for more then 10 years now but has to go through the same process everytime he comes. One officer came to me and of course started talking in Russian, so this guy did the translation. This guy told me that he keeps about 50$ with him as generally these officials ask for money in these kind of situations. So waiting for about 45 minutes not knowing what is going to happen, the girl appeared and gave me my passport. Well, if you are thinking that this just happened on that day, then, you should get in touch with Shantanu and Saurabh and i am sure that they would have something to add to this story, so my guess is that it always happens.
For all those who have seen the IGI, the airport of Moscow was 1/4 of it, surprisingly the biggest country (at least in area) has such a small airport and specially the Emmigration area was smaller than my 1200 square feet flat in Jaipur.
Outside the airport, the second sigh of relief, i saw Sveta (MCP 2004-05) waiting for me. A few photographs for memory and we were all set to leave for home. One hour waiting for the bus and then travelling by bus, metro and bus again we were home at about 1:00. Throughout my travel from the airport to home, talking to sveta and checking out the cars on the streets and highways, whoooo..., BMW's and Mercedez's in all shapes and sizes were everywhere and one could see so many different varieties of cars that it was hard to remember when was the last time i saw this car. Some of the brands available in India are also seen here with the same names.
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