My time on VJ is over and I am grateful to VJ for months and months of good information and help when needed. Thank you VJ!

To the Russian forum, I can only say the user name "Man with a beard" can be taken literally...there is no secret code or sexual "subtext." Have we reached a new forum low?

I live in full authenticity...so I don't hide behind adolescent codes; I guess the new sexually confused generation and the San Francisco Maoists like to pull people down to their level. Subtle character assassination is a current popular technique, albeit, cowardly.

The name "man with a beard" comes from the fact that I look very much like Sean Connery looked maybe 10 years ago. Women come up to me all the time and say, "Has anyone every told you look that that movie star? You know...the older Scottish man with the beard. Oh, what's his name? Of yes, Sean Connery!" I was once briefly mistaken for Sean in a famous restaurant. So there you have it...straight as an arrow and handsome to boot. No brag...just fact.

So, for the very prolific king and queen of the Russian forum (you know who you are) sorry, but I have to own I'm a flaming heterosexual.

For a certain briefly AWOL poster, I'd simply say maybe you need to own your secret issues. I see a mysterious delay in your interview that tells me maybe you've stumbled again but can't admit it. I see you're unwilling to discuss it. I see you "hiding." I see you in your own "closet."

FYI for the forum...did you all know "Eekee" in Swahili means "silly girl with a bad attitude." Such an interesting poster...not just from her immature American feminist diatribes...but because she claims to be a DCF visa seeker, yet she's never posted once to the DCF forum. No time line. No data trail. Just endless postings here on his forum, plus a host of concocted dramas to entertain herself and stir up trouble. I understand her need to get a life and find better things to do than be the chief trouble-maker on the Russian forum. Leave that job to others...they're probably beyond help.

To Satellite...congrats on the success with the CA law bar! And thanks for being honest even while less honest and intelligent people attack you.

To the rest of the legitimate forum members...good luck with your visas and/or Russian wives and husbands!

Seanconneryii (straight eight "man with a beard") saying farewell.

Happy trails.

And don't forget to tell us how you really feel.

what i think of when i hear "sean connery."

bleh, someone who is entertaining has left.

Good luck to you and your bride, and may your futures be filled with happiness.

Z

Well it is too bad you are bidding us adieu as your comments were always good for some interesting responses. I am sure there are those who will say good riddance, but I for one will miss all the trash talk between yourself and the other posters, irritating sometimes, but as long as they weren't directed to yours truly, not a problem. Best of luck and God Bless on your future life and soon to be reunification with your wife, may your life be uncomplicated. No beard, no look-alike just an older than dirt Okie.

eh, to be honest i too will miss seanconnery's posts, even though most of them were directed at me. i enjoy debate and hearing points of views that differ from my own. i think he felt a lot more vitriol toward me than i toward him.

Ditto for me too. All of my battles have occured in Off Topic rather than in the Russian Forum. But I too get the impression that some I have disagreed with hold more of a grudge against me than I with them. Oh well. You can't control other people's feelings, thoughts, and emotions.

I think people often times lose sight of the fact that those we're "debating" here on VJ are people we've never met and don't even know. It's almost as if they're fictional.

Another thing that shouldn't be forgotten is once you're past the "how do I send in the I-130" line of questioning or other "official business" here, you're into the "entertainment" portion of posting and you're on here more for your own enjoyment (or time wasting) than anything.

Since there are real people on the other side of all those "tubes and wires" you do get some nice responses and it is fun and thought-provoking. However, when it gets to the point of causing stress..... it's time to bust out that playstation.

Yeah I joined a long time ago and when my wife got here and we got her 2 year green card I dropped off the radar until we ran the 10 year green card thing. Now with N-400 filed it seems that everything is on cruise control. As you go through the process you rely on VJ posts less, and I agree it does become a source of dubious entertainment. However, once in a while you will run across pearls of wisdom or can offer some assistance to someone else new to the process or give some advice what to expect when their Russian soon to be spouse arrives. I would dare say that anyone who is now married to our Russian spouses (Notice Eeekee I say spouse although most of us are bringing brides, only in deference to you!) will agree that it was one hell of an adjustment for both, and we see some personality traits that weren't apparent previously. Well I saw that in my first marriage and shouldn't have been surprised but I was. I attribute it to the cultural changes and shock that America is really not a country paved with streets of gold, and the homesickness effect. Although my wife has met a few Russian women that will not, absolutely not return to Russia for any reason, even to visit family members. This she atributes to their total embracement of American attitudes, chasing the almighty buck and striving to get ahead. Who knows.

All of the above, including everything ranging from "cultural adjustment" to "relationships" to "assimilation" is actually, "Official Business" here in the Russia Forum and elswhere on VJ. It's just as important to the VJ process as which forms to file. Most folks only use VJ as a resource to ascertain how to get the visa, but the support system for aftewards is here as well.

You could make a case that arguing the finer points of feminism vs. the finer points of bulls#it is also "official" because of it's relativity to traditional roles in both Russian and American relationships.

Either way, I think it's all fair!

My wife misses walking everywhere in her city and seeing everyone else walking around. She hates the driving every place. It's little things like that neither of us thought much about prior to her coming to the USA. It's also really hard for her not to worry about her relatives back home because they are experiencing hyper-inflation right now and the prices are ridiculous relative to their salaries.

whenever i debate on the internet, i always have the understanding that people are different on the internet than on real life. the masks are on and the gloves are off. it's pretty much just all in good fun for me. If the internet is stressing you out, not only do you have to play some playstation, but you also have to sit back and look at why you're letting the internet stress you out in the first place.

LvivLovers, I agree with your wife. it was hard for me to come back to the US and not be able to walk everywhere. it also was not good for my weight.

And this is why it's important to come back to VJ, back to the Russia Forum, and to share your experiences with others. There are a million things that could've been done better (or worse) in everyone's relationships, and with any luck, at least if we share our experiences here then maybe some of us will be able to use the info before it's too late!




That's why it's so fun! Not only can you debate with anyone, but you can be anyone! There's no dealing with the people afterward and the one thing I really like about it is there's no body language to read. Sure, there's tone and inflection (I'M SO MAD I'M USING ALL CAPS!!!) but it's not like when you're up in someone's grill catching spit from them as they drive their exhausted point home with no factual evidence. Here, everything is just a quick Google away and with Wikipedia proof, arguments are usually short and sweet, relegated to "my opinion is better than yours." And who doesn't love that debate?



I have to agree as well. Those two weeks I was in Moscow I was fit as a fiddle.

Strangely enough, before I met my wife I dated a lot of Russian women living in the US. Many arrived here on K1s and divorced, and were extremely bitter about Americans and American life in general. If I was a safe enough distance away I'd always follow up by asking, "if you aren't happy here, why don't you return home?" I never got a straight answer.

Dealing w/the USCIS and logistics of all this is cake compared with the actual marriage part. The accounts of others, particularly during the adjustment period, are ultimately more valuable than anything else you read here.

My wife and I sometimes play 1 on 1 in Call of Duty IV on our PS3. She's so funny, we'll be having dinner and she'll suddenly say (oh-so-innocently), "let's shoot each other tonight."

Yeah. My wife had me walking everywhere when I was in Lviv instead of taking a cab because the place we were going was "close". After a while I finally realized "close" meant around 30 minutes. hahaha

There are a few other things that I never knew would be such a big deal to her. When she first spotted a squirrel in our yard, you would think it was a rare siting of the Loch Ness monster. She couldn't believe that we had squirrels in OUR OWN YARD! Apparently, they were really rare in Lviv. She normally would have to sit in a certain park for 30 minutes to an hour to see one of the few that lived there. You can imagine the freak out that occurred when we were driving into the neighborhood late one night and one after another 4 or 5 deer crossed the road in front of us and then stood in a neighbor's yard looking at us. She said she felt like she was living inside a zoo.

my guy is obsessed with squirrels. he really wants to get them to eat out of his hand for some reason.

call of duty is really fun.

Yeah...I've seen this attitude in some of my wife's Russian friends and aquaintances here in the USA. What is my take on it? Some of these women are miserable and bitter people in general. They will continue to be bitter and unhappy no matter where they live. When they dropped in on the USA they just took the show on the road. Or as I'm fond of saying..."same ol' sh*t, different toilet."

Does your wife know mine?

Yeah, my toilet got taken away from me with the now toilet cover and everything, made it impossible to lift the lid, so I had a pee cup in what used to be "My" toilet.

Wow!

I like to think of that particular spot as the "throne" of my castle. If the new cover interfered in any way, it would be outta there.

I know the importance of that cover. It's almost a life and death issue and a major source of grief if messed with. My wife was about to start holding it had her cover not arrived. And thankfully now, we have two, so even on laundry days it's not an issue.

Once again, this is a case of something being cold that will "make sick" anyone coming in contact with it. How getting your rump and thighs cold makes you sick I'll never know.....

I'm usually good at doing my contemplation at work. On the brief chance of doing it at home, the towel remains. I don't think my wife has found seat covers yet. And yeah my wife plays on the cold making you sick, I like a fan in the summer, no wind, bad for health, no cold bad ofr health, but the AC goes on when it gets a little hot outside. During the winter I'm running around the house in shorts and a t-shirt, she has a sweater and long pants on, go figure. Well, nobody said it would be easy. And the meds from Russia a complete necessity. If the cat gets sick go online to the Moscow vet. Chocolates not good from here need that fix from Russia, bought some in a Russian store, they turned out to be clever counterfeits. I can see bootleg CDs, clothes etc. but chocolate?

I've found that even authentic things here in the U.S. "are not good like in Russia."

The toilet seat cover we had to import from Russia and that was imported from China. A quick Google search yields a Japanese site: http://www.jlifeinternational.com/Catalog/...ecor/A1306.html

This site must be new because a little over a year ago when I was searching for a "toilet ring made whis zis cot-ton or somesing" I couldn't find anything remotely resembling it. The one above looks dead on the one we have now.

i saw this on youtube and it reminded me of our fallen friend scii. slightly NSFW.

I would totally watch that show!

it's a movie, so you can rent it.

Oh I'm on it. I love those 60s/70s movies with the "women's lib" all throughout. Ususally, the most liberating part of the movie is the freedom with which they display their newly freed bosoms. Who am I to not support that?

"It's because I'm a movie buff."