16 Passports and a Funeral

Recently I paid a visit to New York City for the purpose of getting our visas processed. This had been held up for over a month because the Russian state, it seems, maintains a unique view of international travel. I have been to many countries that require visas for entry, but none which actually demand an invitation. To me the notion seems quaint, like a mother who insists that her son wear a tie to Thanksgiving dinner, even though for most families the tradition long preceded Norman Rockwell to the grave. Yet I have the vaguely disturbing sense that this is not some harmless quirk, but instead, given Russia's history, represents something far deeper. It was my first indication that this trip is going to be quite different from anything we have done before.

Once the necessary papers were issued from Moscow, I caught a train to New York, bringing with me a bevy of passports and completed visa applications. The applications contained questions relating to, inter alia, what knowledge we might have of matters nuclear, chemical or biological. Whether that would be a help or hindrance, I wasn't sure.

The Consulate General of the Russian Federation in New York opens for visa processing at 9:30AM. It was a beautiful morning, warm and sunny. I enjoyed a splendid walk through Central Park, arriving right on time at the elegant East 91st Street address. I stopped to snap the photo you see above. As I approached the building, I could not but be impressed by the Italianate-style mansion, built in 1903-05 by a granddaughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt. A green awning extended from the main entrance to the street, as if to say "Welcome, Keith!"

The place would have seemed even more impressive had I not just passed its neighbor across the street, the stately mansion of steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie. As far as I can tell, Carnegie's walled compound is the only home in Manhattan with a decent yard for the kids, a deprivation for which I pity the 1,634,794 Manhattanites who are not named Carnegie. If there is a Ground Zero of the Gilded Age, maybe this block could claim the title.

As I look back at it now, this moment was the high point of my visit. A final fleeting instant of tranquility was granted to me when my eyes gazed under the green awning, and saw no line of persons waiting to enter. "This will be a quick trip!" I thought to myself.

It was not to be...

My vision was distracted by a rather forlorn assemblage of individuals on the steps of the building next door, looking quite out of place in this enclave of wealth. At first I thought they might be overnight custodians waiting for a bus ride home and to bed. Then I read the sign of the building on whose steps the motley group were standing:

RUSSIAN CONSULATE GENERAL, VISA SECTION
At this moment I realized that the stately green awning was not for my benefit, that I would not be treading up the plush carpet into any chandelier-festooned Rococo palace. No, we common folk were to be herded into the less pretentious building next door. With much lowered expectations, I now steeled myself to join the fray.

Just as I drew near, a heavy wooden door opened from within, and a short man appeared. He sputtered some sentences in Russian, and proceeded to hang a clipboard on the door. It was also in Russian, and appeared to be some kind of signup sheet. Someone attempted to ask the doorman something, but he did not appear to be in a talking mood. Before I knew it, he had retreated within, shutting and locking the great door behind him. Some excited sentences were uttered, again in Russian, but nobody moved. "What is going on?", I wondered as I felt the strange sensation that I was becoming a character in a novel by Kafka.

I appeared to be the only non-Russian speaker here. I asked what had just happened, and what the clipboard signified. A kind woman then explained to me that they were here for Russian passports, and that visas were handled in a different manner. To obtain a visa, in theory, one was not required to wait to enter. A spontaneous discussion arose as to whether I, the lone visa seeker here, should ring the doorbell, knock, or just wait until Ivan returned again. The doorbell might incur his anger, but there was no telling how long a wait might last. Perhaps a knock was the best compromise. While I was weighing my options the door creaked open once more; "Visa," I said quickly, and gained admittance.

Directly off the foyer I discovered the door marked "Visa Section." The doorman having already vanished, I admitted myself, and was greeted by a plain cheerless chamber lit by fluorescent tubes. From the point of view of international law I was now on Russian soil, and my surroundings certainly volunteered nothing to contradict this opinion. One large south window faced the sunny street, but it was obscured behind heavy draperies so that absolutely no natural light was allowed in. Nobody but a Puritan vampire could feel at home here. Four numbered stalls were encased behind plate glass windows as thick as those at a drive-in bank, and a four-foot high counter extended the length of three sides of the room. Inside the stalls I observed three people, a man and two women, whose job it was to decide the fates of any New Yorkers who had the audacity to wish to visit Russia.

A young woman was my designated interrogator. She was pretty, but her no-nonsense glasses indicated to me that she was all business. I began the task of pushing our passports and applications one by one through the slot underneath the plate glass barrier of stall number two. Before I was even halfway through this process, the door through which I had entered burst open and an older couple strode inside, elegantly dressed as if they had just exited a 1940s-era movie set. My jaw dropped. I thought Victor Laszlo and a plumper version of Ilsa Lund had just arrived seeking letters of transit. In fact, this was not far off. Why else would anybody be here if not for a visa?

"I must see the Consul General right away," the gentleman announced in an unidentifiable accent, which sounded like a cross between Miro Zayonc and Fred Rogers. Without hesitation I willingly ceded to him my place at the window. Perhaps delicate matters of state were at state, with who knows what consequences if the Consul General did appear forthwith.

With growing voyeuristic interest I eavesdropped on their personal crisis. "He is expecting me. May I please see him? I don't have much time." The kindly-spoken but clearly agitated gentleman frequently pulled back a sleeve with jeweled cufflinks to glance nervously at his watch.

"Ze Consul General is not here at ze moment. He is at meeeeting. Please wait."

"I don't have time to wait. Please call him to say that I am here. He is expecting me." He gave his name, which I surreptitiously wrote down on a notepad for a future Google search, fully expecting that hundreds of citations and a lengthy article in Wikipedia would appear. Unfortunately, I have since lost this paper.

I became so intrigued that my own concerns seemed inconsequential. Who were this man and his silent companion? CIA, perhaps? Or maybe running from the CIA? Time in the drab room seemed to stop, except for Mr. X, for whom it was clearly advancing too rapidly.

"Ze Consul General vill be here in 10 minutes," she said after putting down the phone.

"I don't have 10 minutes. I was told there is some problem with my visa application, and that I must sign some papers. I thought that because of my public position you could help me."

Just what he meant by "my public position" was left unstated. Somehow I had the feeling that everyone but me knew what he implied, but that it was confidential information not to be revealed to those who lacked the necessary level of clearance. I was now more certain than ever that further delay was a matter of life and death.

This was, in truth, only half correct.

"I came here early to get this matter resolved, but if it takes any minute longer I will be late for a funeral, for which I am officiating."

Scales fell from my eyes, as the meaning of his words sunk in. This was no case of CIA intern-ment, just an ordinary inter-ment... a burial. The irony amused me to no end. "Why the rush?" I thought. The dead have all the time in the world, and certainly can't complain!

Time resumed its normal flow at that instant. I will spare you the uninteresting details, other than to say that my processing continued to drag on, as some fault or other was continually found with most of the papers I had brought with me. Many phone calls and corrections later, I was finally finished. After being relieved of thousands of dollars, I was instructed to return a day later to pick up those documents which we needed most urgently. 12 days later in Lake Placid, the last passport, my own, has finally been sent back, and each one contains the proper visa.

Then this week, I underwent an eerily similar ordeal (without the funeral) for the paperwork required to allow our sled boxes to enter Russia.

Whatever else happens, the encounters I have had so far lead me to believe that what lies ahead of us in Russia will be no ordinary journey.