Comments on: Swine Flu Lands in Moscow

By: Chris Von Doom

Chris Von Doom — Mon, 25 May 2009 17:49:14 +0000

I was zapped with some kind of temperature-reading gun.

By: Tim Newman

Tim Newman — Mon, 25 May 2009 11:33:38 +0000

I had to fill out a form printed on paper of a quality of Soviet-era bog roll when I came into Sakhalin from KL. It asked me where I had been the past 10 days, and I had to hand it to the woman who normally checks your luggage tags, and whose normal job was going undone.

I’m sure this is keeping everyone safe somehow.

By: Chris Von Doom

Chris Von Doom — Sun, 24 May 2009 20:47:20 +0000

In fact, Doom was examined when he was at the airport.

By: Maria

Maria — Sat, 23 May 2009 22:33:58 +0000

Where did you get this bs?
In Russia, particularly in Moscow, only this week there was found one man with this diagnosis. He is a professor in one of NYC universities and he got back to Russia being sick. He was hospitalized and so far is getting better with every passing day!
Today there was discovered another man with fever, who was on the flight from the US to Moscow, he was also hospitalized since they think he caught a swine flu. But the Ministry of Health strengthened the checking system in all airports and exemine all people traveling from abroad.

By: Cyrill

Cyrill — Sun, 10 May 2009 03:17:52 +0000

Good to be a translator, innit?
Interpreter, Candide, interpreter.

And yes it is good. It is a unique occupation that allows me to get into somebody else’s life, stay there for a short time and then get the hell out of it.

By: tess

tess — Fri, 08 May 2009 16:32:13 +0000

Thanks for all the advice provided on this thread. I’ve passed it all on to the PCV, but don’t yet know his plans. All he wants is a tourist visa; he’s learning Russian and just wants to visit Moscow for about a week. I haven’t heard back from him yet. His next problem will be finding lodging. He’s not going to find many cheap, but clean hotels. Even in the boom years, investors never really had any hopes for the Russian tourism industry did they?

By: candide

candide — Fri, 08 May 2009 05:47:56 +0000

Good to be a translator, innit?

By: Cyrill

Cyrill — Fri, 08 May 2009 03:17:52 +0000

Weren’t both Turks and Koreans working under two Italian companies? No matter, as for the involvement of the Tatarstan Govt… I would not comment other then recall that one of the requirements was that ALL 50,000 plus drawings were to be translated into Russian, including those of sub-sub contractors like the Mammoet.

By: Tim Newman

Tim Newman — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:07:54 +0000

Exactly. And before that I was with the Tatarstan group visiting showcase projects for all the bidders

I was bidding for work on that job back in late 2007. A lot of the Fluor guys from Sakhalin went over there once the Exxon projects here wrapped up. From what I hear it is a nightmare of a job, with the Tatar govt. demanding detailed meetings every week and their involvement in technical and logistical issues they know nothing about, and the main subcontractors being from Korea, Russia, and Turkey. If that job is finished on time or under budget, I’ll eat my rigger boots. Not that Fluor care, they got the job on a reimbursable basis at approx. $30bn.

By: Cyrill

Cyrill — Thu, 07 May 2009 19:06:23 +0000

Heh! Were you working for Fluor on the Nizhnekamsk refinery project, specifically on the Saipem subcontract?

Exactly. And before that I was with the Tatarstan group visiting showcase projects for all the bidders. Quite a trip. Interpreting Italian English was a challenge. I always thought that particular accent was a Hollywood fiction.

A new requirement since January is that all work permit applications must come with a translated, notarised copy of every page of your passport, including all visas and stamps therein … and the cost of doing business in Russia just went up another notch.

Good grief. On the other hand, it is not as senseless as one might think. The purpose of RF government regs is not to make Russia more foreign business friendly. The purpose is to provide the state and people that feed off these regulations with gainful employment. It is not too far off the ridiculous tax code in the US, which I am convinced, exists at least partially to make the state more intrusive and thus important, and to provide a large group of people (CPA et al) with very gainful employment.