Omsk: Travel guide, prices and free housing · 2026

OOxanaoxan · Mar 11, 2010Read

09/02/2010 A winter vacation day... everything is calm and somehow even boring. Checking my mailbox out of habit, there's an email from IEC. I read the content.. So much for calm and boredom! Oh no, I have an interview at the consulate in a week! And I'm not even mentally prepared... plus, I'm 3,000 km away from Yekaterinburg!!! And I still need to stop by Omsk to finish my exams. It's 2 days to Omsk, then 12 hours from Omsk to Yekaterinburg... a total brain explosion... Frantic search for tickets, making arrangements with friends, and only by evening did I calm down a bit... but I still couldn't stop shaking... From 09/02/2010 to 13/02/2010, I digested a ton of information from all sorts of forums and websites. About English proficiency, sample questions, what to do and how... Why I was so worried, I still can't understand, since I had already gone through an interview at the embassy before... but I wasn't this nervous back then... 13/02/2010 I got on the train... and left... I haven't translated as much text into English in my whole life as I did during those two days... 14/02/2010 I'm in Astana... need to wait for the next train... and it's not exactly Valentine's Day when you're sitting at the station all day in a strange city... 15/02/2010 Finally, I'm in Omsk.. looking absolutely terrible (after 2 days on the train), I had to go to the university to finish my exams... good thing it went quickly. I also needed to meet a friend who bought tickets for me to Yekaterinburg. He also showed some originality - he decided to give me the tickets at a beer tasting. Maybe it wasn't so bad; the beer relaxed me a bit and tempered my fears and worries. So, 22:30 Omsk time.. entering the station, I hear here and there: Do you have an offer yet?/ Yes, yes, I'm going as a lifeguard too!/ My name is.../ Consul/Consulate, etc. Yes, there are many of us like that )))... or rather, 28 people were leaving from Omsk that day, although some of us left during the day, and the second part was leaving at night... After meeting the guys who were traveling alone (I was traveling with a friend), we all went to board. The evening was tense. Another reading of the pamphlet about our rights, repeating questions, English speech.. or rather, a broken parody of English speech throughout the carriage.. and a neighbor - a demobbed soldier... who denied the possibility of our trip with his whole being... yes, patriots haven't died out in Rus yet =))) We all agreed that it's much more convenient to speak English when you don't want those around you to understand... ))) With this thought, I fell asleep... 16/02/2010 Judgment Day When I woke up, I was glad that the neighbor was no longer there. There was a blizzard outside. The mood - not great... After having tea with the guys.. we talked about something again. And started getting ready. For me, this trip was also strange because I didn't take any things with me at all, except for documents. I had never traveled so light before. It turned out to be so great! Leaving the station, we got a little confused about how to get to the subway. But after figuring it out, we quickly got to the consulate. But we still had a lot of time before the interview, so we went to warm up in the nearest coffee shop. We went through another session of "group jitters" there and at 13:30 set off towards the consulate. (The interview was scheduled for 14:00) At the consulate, we met the second part of the Omsk group and found out our entry order. It was very cold to wait. I was so frozen that I didn't understand what I was shivering from, the cold or the excitement. All the guys left their bags on the street, and we (who hadn't gone in yet) watched them. I stood on the street from 13:30 to 14:50 in 10-degree frost. It's very long and cold. And finally, it was my turn. Because my hands were so frozen, my fingerprints wouldn't scan. And the young man at window #2 said that I should warm my hands and then the consul himself would take my fi

ФБФархат Байсадыковfarhat · Dec 20, 2009Read

FINANCIAL SUMMARY Initial Expenses -120 RUB photos for passport -1000 RUB passport processing in five days -40 RUB to certify passport application at the university -$300 1st program installment + $35 SEVIS + $15 transfer fee -1400 RUB agency fee -$350 2nd program installment + $20 transfer fee ___ -2520 RUB -$720 ___ ~ $805 total paid to date (20.12.2009) Upcoming Expenses $131 - visa fee 1600 RUB - Pony Express fee 2000 RUB - tickets to Yekaterinburg + expenses in Yekaterinburg 17000 - 23000 RUB - tickets Moscow - New York - Moscow 3000 RUB - tickets (plane) Omsk - Moscow __ 23600 RUB (min) - not certain 29600 RUB (max) - not certain $131 __ ~ $918 (min) ~ $1118 (max) ______ Preliminary Summary and Conclusion So, the trip will cost me a minimum of $1723 maximum - $1923. Conclusion: I probably should have taken the program with airfare included. Although let's calculate: Program cost: $1490 + $35 + $131 + $15 + $20 + 1400 RUB + 1600 RUB + 1000 RUB + 120 RUB + 40 RUB + 2000 RUB + 3000 RUB = $1691 + 9160 RUB. ~ $1996 Now I can compare - the program without tickets is cheaper after all (I was already afraid I had cheated myself). Everything depends on the tickets. I already missed out on the 20,000 RUB tickets, well, I'll look for others.

AAlexanderSpree · Oct 27, 2009Read

August 11, 2009 In the glorious city of Tomsk, there lived a student. He finished school, entered university, studied for three years, and then a thought crossed his mind: why not go to America for the summer? Why not? After all, that's exactly what the Work and Travel USA program was invented for! He asked his parents for 2000 dollars, finished his exams, and set off to conquer America. Arriving at the end of May with his job offer as a loader, he didn't end up working because loaders weren't needed. He called the agency, and they found him another job – selling ice cream in the wonderful state of Virginia. Things started off okay there, and for a few days, he rode his bike along the beaches of the resort town of Virginia Beach. But then he managed to fall and scrape his knee so badly that he couldn't even walk for the first few days. So, he preferred to lie in bed. He stayed there for 2 weeks, but when his leg healed, he decided he didn't want to sell ice cream anymore, so he set off to look for work in New York. But even there, things weren't as simple as he thought. What kind of work? He only managed to find housing on the third day. And it turned out that in Brooklyn, rent is usually paid monthly, not weekly. He even had to borrow a Benjamin Franklin from an acquaintance to pay, and he had very little money left in his pocket – enough for the subway and food for about 5 days, so he had to borrow another hundred from his parents. Things got even harder – it turned out that Manhattan didn't need J-1 Visa students. And then it became clear that in Brooklyn, the Bronx, and even Queens – nobody needed J-1 Visa students at all. The only option was to rent a bike and work as a rickshaw driver. But he didn't want the bike. Apparently, the incident in Virginia stayed in his memory for a long time. In the end, he wasn't hired anywhere, not even as a dishwasher. Although, it must be said, in a week, he only visited about 30 restaurants. The rest of the time he spent lying in bed or sitting in the library. Completely desperate, he decided he had to go home. But even there, a difficulty arose. After all, to change the ticket date, you have to pay a hundred dollars. He had to ask his parents for money again. And he had to pay back his debt to his acquaintance. The nearest possible flight was in a week. So he had to lie in bed again, sit in the library, and eat a pack of 99-cent pasta a day. And so, on August 7, he flew away. Bringing back only debts and a headache for his parents after two and a half months. He never swam in the ocean, didn't see the Statue of Liberty, and didn't go up the Empire State Building. He didn't bring a single gift for his friends or his girlfriend. Nothing but a stupid impression of his trip. #WorkAndTravelUSA #USA