For all my forum friends who love all things Russian including the language, here's a language related problem to ponder.

To prepare for her ultimate embassy interview, my wife got new passports with her married last name, so when she went to her interview her passport name would match the name on all her immigration documents. Simple right?

NOT!!!!

The Russian passport process translates names from Russian to English using some mickey mouse software and it did not translate her last name accurately...so her translated last name is nothing like the real name.

I am concerned so I suggested she go to the passport office to get it fixed but they told her it was no problem and won't fix it. I guess they just don't really care about the English translation so long as it's "correct" in Russian.

You know...this is what drives me crazy about countries like Russia. It's never their fault or wrong...it's YOUR problem and they don't care. Anyway, I have a bad feeling about this passport, either for her interview or when she tries to enter the USA. If nothing else, she'll have to use a bogus last name until we find some way to correct it down the road. i see many forms to fill out and many dollars to spend to make this right.

I really love that Russian language.

If you think that's bad, get a load of this. It's not only a gendered language, it has THREE FRICKIN genders!!!!

(sorry sc, not making fun of your situation [which sucks], just injecting some levity. Post whatever the solution turns out to be please in case it happens to one of us.)

This has nothing to do with the Russian language... just Russian bureaucracy.

Did your wife try yelling at them?

Three genders? Like the Spanish neuter gender? An "it?"

No sweat mate. I'll post the outcome as things unfold. I decided to write to the Moscow US Embassy to find out if this is a problem or not. i may have to bribe somebody to fix it. A "good thing" about Russia!

yep, exactly like in spanish.

you can bribe them, but i think that general problem in the russian bureaucracy is that they want to do as little work as possible, so unless you put up a fuss they won't do anything they don't absolutely have to. a lot of people seem to have this problem, and i don't recall anyone getting this fixed on the russian side.

No, she chose not to use the "nuclear option."

Well, there is no "correct" transliteration. What you were expecting was the method the Library of Congress uses. As it happens, that's not how the Russian Government transliterates words.

It isn't a big deal, this happens from every alphabet. The US knows this.

And also, foreign names of places and people are a pain in Russian anyway. Many of them don't decline properly, so they are difficult to use in speech. Places aren't a big deal, they are mostly used in only one case. Proper names are trickier, since they end up being used in all cases. I notice that Russian speakers often "Russify" American names, especially female ones, to make them decline correctly.

It's not so much that they're only being used in one case, it's just that they don't decline and are the same in every case.

As far as russifying girls' names, I've never seen this before--the closest approximation i can think of is an affectionate nickname, like turning "emily" into Emilochka. that doesn't have to do with making it declinable, just showing friendship/love/closeness.

Yep, that's about right. Get it translated correctly yourself, and then submit the translation of the passport ID page with the passport to NVC and/or at the interview. Russian government English translation is not certified to be accurate by the Russian government like your translation will be by the translator.


No, it is not like Spanish neuter. It does not consistently use the neuter gender. In other words, many inanimate objects have a male or female gender. However, some inexplicably use the neuter gender instead. Neuter gender is actually used less frequently than the neuter gender.

Gender isn't such a difficult language issue, however, as you point out. It is the 6 cases used (like in French) in the language that make it grammar particular difficult to master.

Huh? Not all inanimate objects in spanish are neuter. I don't see how gender works different in russian in regard to nouns.

This would drive me crazy. Hopefully it won't be too much of a headache. I'm curious to know how it turns out though.