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Everyone knows, that vacation has to be planned in advance. Moreover, a trip to foreign country has to be planned in advance at all. In the winter we have decided to visit Europe this summer. There was a question: which type of rest to choose. There were some variants: have a bus trip as my friend Ilya had last year (interesting report about it you can find  here); have a rest on the sea or visit one of European countries. We have chosen last variant and decided to visit Germany.  Firstly, my girlfriend Ira learns german and language practise was good help for her; two years ago she has travelled to this country. Secondly, I wished to visit Berlin too: to see historical places and simply admire with beauty of this European city. We also decided not to address for the help to touristic agencies, because they hadn’t suitable tours, moreover we didn’t want to pay for doubtful service of agencies.

Now we had to buy tickets on airplane, book an hotel, and then get visa in German embassy in Moscow. First two procedures were not difficult, but the last one gets a lot of time.

We have found a place for halidays in april, so we bought airplane tickets in advance. From some companies: Air Berlin, Lufthansa and Aeroflot we have chosen german Lufthansa. We liked low price of tickets. As we recognize in future, comfort during the flight is at the same level with the price.  At the web-site of company we entered all data and payed for electronic tickets by plastic card. My card was not suitable, so Ira did it herself. The price of Moscow-Berlin-Moscow flight was 8300 rubles (207 €) for person. It was very suitable cost, considering on prices, which our Russian carriers offer for flights to the Far East. But there are some nuances:  it is impossible to return this ticket or change the date of departure, there is no way to get bak money for tickets indepednent of embassy decision.

Also in the Internet we found not expensive hotel in Tegel area, just about 3 km from the airoport. Former visitor’s responses didn’t content very negative marks. We booked a room for 8 nights. Econom calss room costs 37 € /per night, that is approximately 12 000 rubles for whole stay (two persons). We paid for hotel by plastic card too, and it is very important for embassy, that payment was done completely

The simplest tasks were done and from end of april we have started preparing documents for applying for visa in german embassy. There is very good described procedure of getting visa at the embassy web-site. But I am going to tell a little about it. One, who wants to visit Germany with touristic purpose, needs to collect lots of documents besides basics. Basics documents are: foreign passport, national passport, filled questionnary and application, medical insurance.
Additional documents are:

• Bank confirmation about presence of money for trip (minimum 50 € per day of stay in Germany)
• Return ticket
• Hotel confirmation about booking and paying for room

Also there is such an item – our return to Russia confirmation. It is very important point, because embassy employees should believe, that you are going to return home and not to stay in Germany as the illegal immigrant. We decided to give such documents in order to confirm this:

• information about family memberships
• referense from work about legal vacation and 2-НДФЛ taxes certificate,
  
• information about our property in Russia.

Collecting of all documents took some weeks. The biggest difficulty was with getting a fax from german hotel. Documents didn’t want to come to Russia. I had to call hotel owner and he said that he has tried to send documents 10 times and in Russia nothing works properly. Fortunately, telephone station at my work has gotten documents. It was great! We were very happy.

There were also difficulties with registration on interview in german embasssy. As we have to go yourselves to be interviewed, we decided to go to Moscow in June. There is an accredited company, which register people for interview. The call is paid, minimum is 230 rubles for 2 minutes of talk (in 2011 year). You can pay for it by electronic QIWI-purse, I recommend you to register it in advance. You should just tell your mobile telephone number to call-center operator and then you will get an electronic bill. We had tried to call many times, line was always ocuppied. Only two days later in early morning we cantacted call-center and registered on interview at June, 27. We planned to register early, but possible dates were not available because of great number of people, who want to get visa.

We left Volgograd June, 25 and in Sunday, June 26 have arrived in capital of Russia – Moscow. Next day, in early morning we went to embassy. One should pass security check in order to enter embassy territory. Security employees check if you have things that are forbidden. You can take mobile phones and even use them, but not in embassy building. We hadn’t difficulties: in special automat we got receipt with number in queue and were waiting. In 20 minutes operator called us and call-center specialist took our documents. Hi asked several questions about our trip. After that we payed visa charge (35 € for a person) and were free. As operator said, we were able to get back our passports in Thursday (3 days later). But we were not going to stay in Moscow and wrote a letter of attorney. Ira’s uncle took our passports with this document. This day we left Moscow and went to Volzhsky.

Several days after we had gotten home, we knew about visas from telephone call. We got it! This meaned, that we are going to capital of Germany – Berlin approximately in 3 weeks.

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