Car Registration Part II, Never Ending Story

Today the car dealer called us and said we need new parking certificate. Häääääääääääää what why,... Because he need to much time to prepare the car and doing the registration the car parking certificate is not valid anymore, it is only valid for one month. These stuff drives me crazy, it is unbelievable. I mean if I am on the journey I know I have to be patient and I can be since then we have a time. But now there is no time at all, we could not do any preparation especially perparing inside the car ans so on. From my journeys together with my parents to africa and... I know that all the small stuff takes so much time and now this guy from the company is aksking us if it is ok if we get the car in the middle of April ?!?!? Hääääääääää Incredible!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Furthermore I asked them to change from aluminium rims to steel rims. If aluminium cracks you have no chance of repair, but steel rims you just use a big hammer and can reach the next city. Anyway last time they told me they ordered and now they tell me for the current tire size there are no rims that fit and it will be ok to use aluminium rims. I think they just know Tokyo cowboys which drive a landcruiser in the city to pose and not to use in reall offroad. I can understand a little Japanese it is enough for very easy conversation but for such discussions it is really hard and epecially with Japanese since they never change there opinion, sometimes their minds are really fixed.

Maybe we should start next year (:), just kidding.

Good News Visa and Open Stuff

Yes we have it our 12 month russian bussiness Visa. Last week I started early in the morning with my bicycle and my GPS and going through Tokyo to go to Roppongi to pick up the Visa at the russian embassy having a suit in my bacckpack. Arriving at McDonalds which is a good place to change to "bussiness" man and just picking up the Visa everything is fine and would like to drink a beer (:). After that got my bicycle and go another 40 min to my working place the Tokyo Institute of technology in Ookayama. It is always nice to take the bicycle and just cross the city not knowing before which way you will take, seeing new things and being most of the time faster or same time than the totally crowded trains with all the people with there tired eyes without a sign of live inside the eyes. Of course it is not everybody but I think 80% of the people at least.

Anyway with this 12 month Russian Visa we are save now and can return everytime we want by just driving home just in case something goes wrong. We do not hope but nobody knows. The other Visa we will try to arrange during the journey as we do not know now our exact schedule.

The Visa stuff is solved but new stuff is waiting to be solved. As the Yen is so strong and the Russians increased the import tax for foreign cars they do not buy that many cars. Consequently the ferries are empty and the one we wanted to go with may not opperate. The agent from the company will tell us one week in advance if the ferry will go or not. But fortunately I found another ferry for the car the Fesco company and hope this will work out. The strange thing is always, that the shipping agents respond quite fast to the first e-mail but if you have more questions and ask where to book they need long time to answer or do not answer at all. The estimated departure date for the car will be around 23th or 24th or ... of April.

Actually we still do not have the car in Tokyo now since the registration of the car is another long story. The car is a Diesel therefore it is not allowed to register and to drive in Tokyo. That means Kotomi need to move to another place almost at the West coast of Japan (Niigata) . Then she needed to get the parking license for the car which took us again almost 4 weeks just because she could not do at the same day she went there to change her address. Now we have actually everything but the car dealer decided he still need to change some parts, that is nice for us but I am asking myself why they start so late since I bought the car already in december so they had almost 2 months to do something. Anyway finally we hope that we can get the car to Tokyo (do not tell anybody (:)) in the end of March. That means I will have only a little time to prepare the car for the journey, but that is live and I can not change.

Next is how to come to Vladivostok since we can not go on the ship with the car. Now we are thinking to go by ferry from Shimonoseki (Japan) to Busan in Korea and then take the train to Seoul and visit our friend Yung Sun. From there we can take the plane or another ferry to Vladivostok. For now this is just an idea but let see if it is working out.

Größere Kartenansicht

Where should we go?

This is not just a phrase. It is not that we do not know where to go! But I think maybe some of you have places in mind they really would not miss doing such a journey. It is just interesting to know what other people know about the countries we want to travel. I am waiting for your comments and places you are dreaming of in this countries (:)!

Traveling trough Russia, Mongolia, Kasachstan, Kirgistan, Taschikistan, Usbekistan ........ Germany

1. In Taschikistan I really want to go to the Pamir Highway See here: Pamir Highway Documentary.
2. ........
   

Getting the most important Visa

From all you read in the WEB it seems that applying for russian Visa has to be done really carefully. Any mistake allows the embassy to decline your Visa request. Like if the names of the city which are written in your invitation are not exactly the same as in the application they can decline, if you have a miserable handwriting (as I have (:))) they can decline.....That made me a lot of head age since you do not know what else they are looking for. Furthermore applying in Japan for Russian Visa having German nationality is normally not possible only if you have a permanent address here. This is actually related to the regulations of Germany when Russians apply for German Visa. They also can only apply in Russia for German Visa even if they are in Africa rigth now. That means they have to go back to russia if they want to have the German Visa. It is understandable that the Russians do the same with the Germans, its like if you Germans are assholes we can do the same. However, that means I had to get a permanent address registering me here, which is only possible if I am here longer than 3 months, which is fortunately the case (:).

Furthermore you can find everywhere different information of which documents you need, actually for multiple entry 12 months business Visa a HIV test is required, but when asking in the embassy they we do not need. Calling there is rather difficult too, if you finally managed that
they pick up, then they tell you in perfect Englisch I am sorry I do not speek englisch, and just put you in the waiting queue with the nice music for 10 minutes. Finally I went to the embassy two time and at 27th of February I submitted our applications where I have to pay 6500 Yen since I am stupid German and Kotomi nothing. Anyway I just hope everything will be fine. In one week I will know.

Just to avoid any question and trouble I wear a suit (:).