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"Why do you want to leave Russia, and where do you aspire to relocate?"

Please note that my opinions on other countries are formed from an outsider's perspective and might drastically differ from the real state of affairs. If you see that's the case, please do tell me. I'd also like to warn you that when writing this, I realized how hard is explaining Russian problems in English to a foreign audience; this fact has left a very bad taste in my mouth as some might think I'm being unfair, biased and brainwashed. I'm always open to discussion though if you want to point something out.

In an earlier post, I mentioned "evacuating" from Russia. Sorry, dear Russian patriots who might be reading this (I wonder how you found this page in the first place -- please let me know!), but leaving Russia is just this -- an evacuation. I don't know about you, but I don't want to live in a country where:

1. Hatred, heavy militarism and slow but stedy isolation from the world are basically the national ideology

2. Cities look like that:

   

   This is miserable. When you see this every day, you get suicidal thoughts whether you want it or not. These are more or less civilized places; most of the country looks even worse. Russian cities are not livable. These views from Google Street View might be old, but you can be sure that the only thing that has changed is that there are more fences in those places now. We have an inside joke of calling Russia "The Fenceland" with a friend, and this is awfully close to the truth.

3. News headlines look like this:
   • An activist from Arkhangelsk got sentenced for 2.5 years for reposting a Rammstein music video.
   • "Just fucking die": nurses in a Moscow hospital beat an elderly patient.
4. Constitution is amended with:
   • Legitimizing annexion of territories
   • Resetting the current president's terms, basically allowing him to serve however long he wants
   • Limiting local self-government
5. Manipulating historical events is illegal, but not for the government
6. Goverment boasts with huge "geopolitical victories", while doing nothing for the country and it's people
7. The police sells hard drugs to the youth, framing anyone who dares to go against them
8. The government threatens to restrict access to the Internet due to the "Western threat"
9. Neighbouring countries are regularly attacked
10. I can't safely walk on the streets at night
11. There's zero hope for the future

This list could be much, much longer, but I got tired of writing it. When making this list; I realized something; a lot of my reasons for wanting to leave are very hard to explain in English to someone who hasn't lived in Russia; therefore this list is largely incomplete as lots of important stuff is missing. The list might seem awfully inconvincing to some -- unlickily I don't think I can do much about it.

Now you could (reasonably so) say "but every country has exactly the same problems!". Maybe so; I haven't lived in other countries. What matters is the severity of such problems. Of course, every country has it's own problems, many of which are the same for a lot of countries; however, for many countries they're not as severe, and these countries generally offer much higher standarts of living; wages; more livable cities etc.

I want to run away. The futher away the better. Perhaps that's one of the reasons I don't really want to move to the EU. Long story short, there are two countries that I seriously consider as the countries I aspire to move to -- Canada and Japan. There are pros and cons to both.

Canada

Pros:

1. My good friend David lives there. (bonjour mon ami)
2. Sane, unagressive country with mostly reasonable policies.
3. Relatively easy to move to for a skilled worker. (not that I'm skilled, but I work in a job that's recognised as "skilled" by the Canadian government)
4. Cities that look much better than Russian cities
5. English-speaking -- easier to adapt
6. Has Quebec
7. Safe
8. Welcoming towards immigrants

Cons:

1. At risk of complete cultural and political assimilation with the US
2. Possibly underdeveloped public transport systems making cities harder to live in if you don't have a car - I should investigate this point further.

Japan

Pros:

1. Good-looking and safe cities, sometimes with nicely developed public transport
2. Attractive culture that, while affected by the globalized American culture, has so far managed to retain it's uniqueness and appeal
3. A good part of Japan's generally assumed cultural values reflect my own worldviews (there's a possibility of it being just a stereotype -- to be taken with a grain of salt)
4. A certain degree of physical isolation from the world (important for me as I myself grew up and am living in an isolated territory, and I think it gives me some kind of psychological comfort)

Cons:

1. Hard to move to
2. Exhausting work culture
3. Might be hard to adapt to

I think I'll need to work here for at least 3-4 more years before any foreign company decides that it would be viable to hire me. I also need to somehow graduate from a university and get a formal higher education, otherwise the whole idea of emigrating is pointless as it's barely possible without a degree. I also have to decide whether I really deserve such improvements in my life or it's better to stay here and suffer.

Also I've just reread this and realized how pityful and dumb this whole post sounds, lol. I would've erased it and forgot about it, but it took a long time to write, so whatever. Please disregard everything said above.

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