For today's football game between Russia and Spain we prepared a useful phrasebook, which will allow you to express yourself to the full extent.

User's Manual:
Spanish (Russian transliteration) - Russian (English transliteration) - English

Hijo de puta (ихо де пута) - сукин сын (sukin syn) - son of a bitch

Cabron (каброн) - козел (kozel) - asshole

Maricon (марикон) - пидарас (pidaras) - faggot

Mierda (мьерда) - гавно (gavno) - shit

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Back in the Soviet union we used to have this popular TV program by Anatoly Kashpirovsky where he was hypnotizing the whole country through TV. You could see people falling into trance, sleepwalking, raising their hands when Kashpirowski told them to...

Kashpirovsky had this heavy gaze and used to count slowly and tell people that "everything is good", "your headache is gone", "you feel light and happy"... Imagine all this was happening at the end of 80s, when the Soviet union was collapsing and some people didn't have much to eat. The best of escapist TV ever!

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We've just had a major update for our Russian visa section. The new downloads section, FAQ, Russian visa troubleshooter, latest registration rules – check it out at Russian Visa online.

If you buy your train tickets through a travel agency or online, it will now be harder to get them refunded in case you decide to cancel or make any changes to your plans.

According to the new directive #787А issued by The Russian Railways on 29.10.2007 (which came into effect on the 1st December 2007), a passenger can only get a refund for their train tickets

1) in person, and
2) after a valid ID is presented.

In other words the agency where you bought your tickets cannot return them and get a refund -- now the passengers themselves have to do that.

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The 4th most popular blog site in the world, www.livejournal.com, has been acquired by a Russian media company SUP. LiveJournal is the most popular blog platform in Russia and is used mainly by intellectuals and young people. For many people it's become the only independent source of information in Russian.

SUP's CEO Andrew Polson is well known in Russia for establishing the most popular entertainment magazine, Afisha.

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There was an interesting article in The Moscow Times newspaper about a Chilean woman who is in jail because of old Russian souvenirs. She bought some old Soviet medals at a flea market in Voronezh and was detained when she tried to take her flight to Munich.

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Yesterday I registered a Russian visa for my friend from Germany at a Russian post office, so below is the first-hand step-by-step explanation of the whole process, which is quite new (fully working since this summer).

According to the new rules any Russian citizen with "propiska" (registration) can register a foreigner at his/her apartment at a local police station or any post office. The whole procedure takes about an hour (because of the forms you need to fill out and queues) and costs about €5.

Another alternative is to contact your travel agency and they will be able to do it for a fee (usually $20 to $50 US). If you're staying in a hotel, they'll usually do it for free.

If you don't have a registration, the border officials will not bother you anymore, as it's not their responsibility to check the registration -- they'd only need the migration card back. However, if you get stopped by police without registration you may be fined 2000 to 5000 Rubles ($75 to $200 US). They don't usually stop people often on the street (hasn't happened yet with my friend), but if you go to the main touristic spots the chances to be stopped for a routine check are quite high.

So here's what we did...

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Russian fashion
How much do you know about Russian Fashion?
Perhaps you envision fur
coats and hunting boots with a speck of Italian brand names here and
there?

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I often get asked about Russian art and places to go see some good galleries. Well, here is one. Vinzavod is an old factory which was converted into an art center recently. Its said to be the So-Ho of Moscow and although that might be an exaggeration, there is plenty of modern art, stores and soon even a cinema. Go check it out.

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