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Comment by _xnmw | Hacker News Reader

Moscow or Saint Petersburg. I'm ethnically Sri Lankan, born and educated in Toronto and I've spent quite a bit of time in the Bay Area, but I've become disillusioned with the West. It just amazes my friends that you can live a comfortable middle-class life in Russia on $800 per month. But aside from being cheap, I just feel like it's a place of great opportunity and future power. There's that immense energy of Russian patriotism, determined to "stick it" to a world that has sanctioned them. The vibe I get in Russia now is what I imagine it must've been like to strike it out in America in the 60s. There's definitely a place for the young, broke, lonely and bold. And unlike China or other rising Asian economies, it has that strictly European lifestyle that I love - a baroque Old World appreciation of the fine arts that is now lost on the West.

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You should spend some time in Russia before you determine that Russia is a place for “young, broke, lonely and bold.”

Granted. However I've spent the last 8 months living in Ukraine, including the war-torn areas close to the Russian border, and I absolutely loved it. Found it easier to make friends, build a life, and move up in society than I ever did in the West.

You can live well for that cheap in Moscow or St. Petersburg? I'm surprised, I figured they were a bit more expensive. How is it for speaking English (or do you speak Russian?), making friends, etc.?

Learning Russian is a must. Yes you can live for that cheap, if you like the older Soviet-era grungy apartments further from the metro (I love them). It's hard to make any kind of meaningful connections if you don't speak Russian. And there are gangsters who can be openly hostile to non-Russian speaking people - but if you speak Russian and know how to carry yourself like a native you'll be fine, no matter the colour of your skin. Few people speak more than a few words of English, though there is a small native-English-speaking expat community in Moscow. I've been studying Russian for 6 months part-time, and I speak enough to make friends, though I definitely plan to dedicate another year of full-time studies to become fluent.

This is exactly the image that Putin's power wants to project to foreigners - did you travel to russia or know people actually living there? The country is still extremely corrupt and opportunities might be more scarce than you think. A lot of people would move out of there if they could.

No doubt that as a tech worker you can make a decent living pretty much anywhere, and I guess you are lucky enough to not be a woman or fall under the LGBT umbrella to be able to see the uprising of "family values" as a good thing.

This is exactly the image that the West wants to project about Russia - did you travel to Russia or know people actually living there? The West is extremely corrupt and opportunities are only for the rich, well-connected or tech workers. A lot of people would move out of the West if they knew an alternative existed.

I am russian and grew up there, this is why I genuinely wonder. Of course my experience in the West might be wildly different than yours. In the same way, maybe your experience in russia will be wildly different than mine, because starting as an expat right away instead of navigating russian society from the inside might be extremely different. I am curious to know and interested to hear your side of things.

Russia has changed a lot. The Soviet collapse and the subsequent 20 years were not easy, for sure, I can understand why you left. But now I'm reading a lot of reports and historical analysis written from inside Russia, like by Bill Browder, Gilbert Doctorow, Dominic Levien, and other Westerners with deep knowledge of Russia. There is a very different energy now since 2014 (the Crimea situation). And I've spent last 8 months living in Ukraine, including Mariupol and other areas close to the Russian border. I loved it.

And as a person with the same "family values" and traditional Orthodox Christian mindset as Russians, I have an immediate affinity with them. I can understand why you wouldn't like Russia if you didn't have similar values.

There are some Russians who look at Russia through Western eyes, and therefore they only see the bad. And indeed most of the world looks through Western eyes because of Hollywood, and that's why they see Russia as a pariah.

I see your point. For sure, the country's situation changed a lot since the 90s. It is also very common to dismiss any russians who are critical of power to have "western eyes", as if you couldn't be russian and have issues with your government. This mentality was already present in soviet times.

You seem to say that you gain immediate affinity with russians for having the same "orthodox" mindset, yet you are ready to dismiss any russian that doesnt think like you expect them to as "not really russian". People in russia are varied, just like everywhere else, there is just one voice which overpowers all the discourse.

Edit : I don't think people who criticise their country see "only the bad". They criticise because they care, so they probably see the good as well, what do you think?

I just meant to say that the majority of the world is tuned into the Western media machine, including Russians, so they have a tendency to evaluate every country based on Western metrics such as GDP-per-capita and LGBTQ-friendliness. I think these statistics are misleading because they fail to capture a lot of the nuance and quality of life that is found in Eastern Europe and elsewhere in the world. But sure, there is a lot of rah-rah Russian patriotism, just like there is a lot of rah-rah American patriotism.

But there are also blatant lies in the Western media narrative about Russia. For example, the West claims that Putin's "regime" suppresses all alternative viewpoints. However, from spending a lot of time watching Russian media, including official TV channels like Russiya-1, and YouTube standup comedians like Данила Поперечный [1], and seeing memes on Russian social media, I see a lot of diverse anti-government voices in the Russian landscape, which are NOT suppressed. Actually, I find the Western landscape to be more suppressed. Try to be pro-Russian, for example, and see what happens in America.

I find the Russian political landscape, including social media, to be more educated, informed, reasonable, diverse, and intellectual compared to the Trumpian world of American politics.

I personally evaluate Russia using metrics that they value, such as family values. I am not even Christian, I am Muslim, but I have very similar values. But I find that even Russians who are not Christian are still more understanding of my family values than Westerners who look at me like a backwards idiot. In that sense I actually find greater tolerance in Eastern Europe.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=387&v=IfTlqfHq1d...

This is interesting, I can definitely see how being muslim in the West can lead to being judged negatively, and the parallel whith how eastern europe tends to be perceived sometimes.

I have been myself quite surprised by how Americans or Europeans seem to think that eastern europe is backwards on every level based on how they judge russian government.

One stupid example is : someone believed that all soviet made devices were bad quality, when actually a lot were manifactured without the idea of planned obsolescence built-in, which made them very durable. But they had a bias for everything russian being shitty because it is supposed to be a backwards country, and didnt consider different metrics to evaluate things.

I largely agree that there is a huge amount of caricature being made about russia, but I would also argue that the government is partly at fault for that because of the monolithic image they try to project. They erase all nuance about russian people and life in the country on purpose.

Moscow is a great place to live/base, but $800/month for a comfortable middle-class life here is definitely an underestimate. I'm from the US - lived in NYC, Boston, and LA - and have been based in Moscow for the past year; it's hard to overstate what an amazing city this is, though it's important to note that there is a massive difference between Moscow (or St Petersburg) and the rest of Russia. I've traveled to many places within Russia and they might as well be different countries when compared to this mega-city. Speaking of Moscow specifically: it's incredibly beautiful, it has the best metro system I've seen in the world (to the point that some metro stations are actually tourist spots), world-class international food, plenty of museums, shows, theaters, active nightlife, plus all the conveniences you'd find in the West. And of course there's the comfort of a European feel to the city, with the excitement that comes with learning about the Russian/Soviet culture and mindset of some people (esp. the older crowd, whereas the younger educated muscovites are basically European). Flights to the main European, US, and Asian cities are cheap and frequent: a roundtrip nonstop flight Moscow-NY is usually ~$300, London can be as cheap as $15 (yes, that's fifteen dollars), and I've even booked a flight to Hong Kong the day before flying for like $200 direct. The people are super friendly, and although the majority do not speak English, it's fairly easy to find English-speaking Russians or expats if you hang out in the center or know the spots (I have many expats friends who've been here for 2-3 years and don't speak a word of Russian beyond saying "thank you", yet manage to live very active social lives).

Having said all of this, however, I am also very aware that my experience here is very different from the average Russian. Being an expat, from the US, speaking English, and being able to afford a comfortable lifestyle in the center give me a much rosier perspective than if I were a low-income worker having to commute 1+ hours to get to work. I'm ethnically Latino and look obviously not-Russian, so people here are curious about me and act extra nice - especially when they find out I'm American. It's not uncommon for someone to approach me on the street, a park, or a bar just because they heard me speaking in English. On the other hand, however, immigrants from ex-Soviet countries (particularly Central Asia) face discrimination and racism, as do non-European Russians (eg: Russians from the Caucasus region, or the east of Russia), and it's not uncommon when looking to rent an apartment to see the words "FOR SLAVS [white Russians] OR FOREIGNERS ONLY", something that would be completely illegal in the US. Don't get me wrong, as an expat from the West I find Moscow to be just about the perfect place to live, but I totally understand the perspective of many Russians or some immigrants that criticize it harshly. I love this city, and I think loving it means also being aware of its shortcomings.

My wife and I want to visit Moscow sometime - but how do you get a visa to visit as a US citizen?

Also interestingly she is half-Mexican and I speak Spanish fluently so we have some things in common with you.

You can get a 3 year multi-entry tourist visa to Russia which allows you to stay for up to 6 months, leave the country for a day, and then re-enter for another 6 months, etc, for the entirety of the 3 years (yes, legally). Funny enough, the US is the only country for which such a permissive visa is allowed, Russian tourist visas for other countries are usually restricted to a single-entry, one month maximum, not sure why we get such good treatment (just like the multi-entry 10 year tourist visa for China, which I think only US and Canadian citizens can get).

I don't think they're issuing visas rn due to the pandemic, but I imagine they will resume consular services this year, and then you can just apply through your local embassy/consulate, just look up the required documents and submit them, it's fairly straight-forward and does not require an interview, proof of income, etc.

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