“Do you know the word ‘deportation’!?”, said the director of the international students office in my university. I had walked into the room with my friend, having been in Moscow for a week, with a sheepish expression saying, ‘I am really sorry, but
I forgot to register my visa’. I handed him my papers fully expecting him to say, ‘oh that’s alright, just don’t let it happen again, tut tut’. So, when he threatened me with deportation and a $2,000 fine I was more than a little taken aback. He paced the room saying, ‘oh this is very bad, we warned you when you got here that the first thing you do on arrival is register your visa, this is Russia, not the European Union!’. So, he told me that the only way out would be to get a doctor’s cert for the week that I had been here stating that I was too sick to get out of bed to register the visa. It would have to be a Certificate 95 and it is only available for those that actually go to see the doctor before they are ill. I had only 24 hrs to find a doctor who would give me a cert, signed and stamped for the past week, otherwise I might be deported! I called all my friends, Russian and international, and asked them if they knew any doctors who could help me out. I called into a medical centre and tried to get the receprionist to play along, giving her a knowing look as I explained to her that I had been very ill for the past week and that I needed this particular certificate. She didn’t play along. A German friend who has been working here for 2 years said that he knew someone who had needed something similar before and that he would get back to me. A Greek banker I had only met once in my life was on the phone for half an hour asking doctors he knew if they could help me out. All of them got back to me with negative responses. Eventually a Russian friend called me saying that he had found some people who would sell me this particular certificate for 700 roubels. It would be stamped but not filled in. I would have to go the the metro station, ’Paveletskaya’, for half past three that afternoon. When there I would have to wait for a man with a white envelope. He would hand me the envelope and I would simultaniusly hand him the money. Easy-peasy. I went there and waited. At exactly half past three a young man with a hand full of white envelopes got off the metro train and walked to the centre of the station. About five people went up to him and took envelopes from him, apparently I wasn’t the only one. I handed him the money, he gave me the envelope and said ’good luck’. I walked away and that was that. Inside the envelope was a stamped doctor’s certificat 95. I then went to meet another Russian friend who filled it in for me, apparently I had Tonsilitis and had been very ill. Next I went back to the office and handed them the cert. They didn’t ask me any questions, the director just smiled and said ’you must have met a nice doctor’, I told him I had.
