How (not) to Move to Russia in a Week

Once we came back from Europe, the move-planning machine went into overdrive. We spent about a week waiting for the final approvals of our travel, and you’d think we would prepare ourselves better for it in the meantime. We didn’t. So, when the approvals finally came through, we were left with about 10 days or so to call the movers, sort out our possessions, buy plane tickets, figure out how to transport Son from Bulgaria (where he was still hanging out with Grandma) to Russia, rent our house, change our residency to Florida, and well, move to Russia. Suffice it to say, it did not all go super smoothly.

For starters, the move itself was a nightmare logistically. The Diplomat and Son were actually moving to Moscow so that Son can go to school there, and I was going to Yekaterinburg (about 2 hr plane ride further towards Siberia) because my assignment was there. That meant that we were going to be packed separately by two different companies on two separate days. In addition, all of our furniture had to go to deep storage (generally, the State Department provides us with furniture overseas and there is no place for our own stuff) and that was to be done by a third company. And then there was the car and the cat. So, on a Friday morning, I called the State Department Travel & Transportation coordinator and boldly scheduled the three consecutive packouts on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday the following week. And then we would fly out to Russia on the following Monday. We spent the weekend splitting up the household (“you get the circular colander, I get the rectangular; you get the fancy plates, I get the grater” and so on), sorting out clothing into air shipment (to arrive within 2 weeks) and ship shipment (to arrive… no one knows when), and showing the messy house to potential renters.

And just when you thought this was not complicated and exhausting enough, I got this idea that we needed to change our Virginia residence since we were not going to be VA residents anymore. Since we own a house in Florida, I decided that we can try and switch our residence there. As we had two days before the packout hell would begin, I figured that we might try our luck and go get driving licenses and establish domicile in the state of Mickey Mouse. We flew in very late on Sunday night, got up around 9 am, drove to the DMV at 9:30 am, and walked out of there at 10 am as proud owners of shiny new driving licenses and registered FL voters. From there we drove to the Courthouse, where we filed an official affidavit of domicile. That took 7 minutes. Everywhere we went, the customer service was courteous, jovial and efficient. Also, my license photo was amazing, which is always a plus. I know we chose the right state – in Virginia, this process would have taken 11 months and 3 days. Left with all this time on our hands (I had planned a whole two days to achieve this), we decided that it was wiser to try and fly earlier home on standby to continue to sort out through our life possessions. We were home by 10 am on Tuesday. All in all, I would say that were the 35 of the most efficient hours in my life.

And so, on Wednesday, the final madness began with a snappy crew of 5 Romanian movers who were fast, efficient and dead serious. In the meantime, the Diplomat took Fat Cat (who is still very much alive, thank you very much) to the vet. You see, in order to export a cat overseas, one needs to 1) take the cat to the vet to make sure it is healthy, 2) get said cat vaccinated for rabies (and probably some other useless stuff depending on the country), 3) get the vet to sign a health certificate, and then 4) either drive 2 hours to Richmond or spend a boatload of money Fedex-ing that certificate to the U.S. Department of Agriculture where it would get signed by some other certified someone and sent back to you with a pre-paid overnight Fedex for even more money ($75 per package to be precise). The whole process is utterly incomprehensible to me – how exactly is the USDA adding value here is beyond me but airlines refuse to board the cat as cargo without that piece of paper. The trick is that the cat has to leave the country within 5 days of its exam (hence the crazy expensive overnight mail). Despite the silly logistics, this could have been a fairly simple matter of just throwing money at everyone and getting it done, except that once the vet pocketed the $350 for the exam and the vaccine, she also produced an alternative Russia-specific form, which said that Russia requires the rabies vaccine to be one more than 20 days in advance of travel (SOMEONE, and I am not saying who but it wasn’t me, did not pay attention to the instructions we were sent way in advance). As you can figure out, we were about 5 days before travel. Uselessly, the next day I drove down to Richmond with my super friend M to try and convince the USDA to sign the form anyway. Which they did not despite my earnest pleading – the lady behind the counter literally looked at the form, then at me and curtly said, “No” and then disappeared not to be seen again. Crestfallen, we drove back. Fat Cat would not fly with us. Thankfully, Super M agreed to host Fat Cat for the following 2 weeks and coordinate with a cat shipper to send the portly animal to us in the end.

Then we hit the next snag, again due to a rookie oversight. Our recently purchased car could not be shipped without a copy of the title, which in the great state of VA is electronic. You’d think that means simply that you can go to the DMV and they would print you a copy. Such silly (logical) thoughts. No. What that means is that you make a request to get a copy, and then it takes an undisclosed time for the DMV to send it to you. And if this wasn’t enough, God help you if you bought the car through a lender. In that case, it is the LENDER who has to request the title. It took our lender a week, a WEEK to do that. So, the car would also not be traveling to Russia right away – our gracious neighbor S agreed to wait for the title to arrive and turn the car over to the movers once that happened. One more reason to be relieved not to be a VA resident anymore.

So, in the end, we left the United States with stuffed 3 suitcases but without Son, Fat Cat, and the car, relying on Grandma, Super M and Neighbor S to bring/send those to us. At least we found a lovely couple to rent the house and even managed to have a few goodbye gatherings.

In the following weeks, we slowly gathered the scattered family in Russia. Grandma brought Son a week later just in time for the school sleepover; Fat Cat flew on time and has been steadily spreading his hair all over our governmentally-provided furniture for the past month; and the ship carrying the car just docked in Antwerp (when it actually gets to us is anybody’s guess, of course). Now we wait for the rest of our belongings to join us – hopefully some time before next year.