Anchor investment

Ilya Zhegulev tells why and how much Russians give birth to children in America. By personal example

Despite the deterioration of relations between the United States and Russia, the fall of the ruble exchange rate and the feedback of American diplomats, because of which the receipt of visas has become much more time, the Russians continue to come to America to give birth to children there, and, according to the local media,there are only more of them. The Special Corps of Medusa Ilya Zhegulev became one of these Russians-and tells why he and his wife decided to give birth to a son in Los Angeles and how much it costs.

- Dad, it seems to me that you are nervous. For some reason you blushed, ”said ten-year-old Semyon Zhegulev. - Is it always the case on the border with America?

My son and I were sitting at the Minneapolis airport in a special pen for potential visa violators - and I did not understand what would happen next. The devil pulled me to say when I went through the border that I was going with a child in the USA to take care of my beloved wife, safely in Los Angeles at the last period of pregnancy and gathering to give birth right there. An employee of passport control immediately changed in the person and asked to present the entire package of documents. Which I did - but the documents were not reassured, we were sent to a special room until all the circumstances are clarified.

Most of all, this premises resembled our “monkeys” - preliminary imprisonment rooms in police departments, which often get the participants in unauthorized rallies. Time passed, there was 40 minutes left before the aircraft departure. I tried to write a message to my wife, but the policeman called me.

“Didn't I tell you that you can’t use the phone?” Go and give it to me.

“Could you deal with me as soon as possible?” We have a plane in half an hour, ”I asked, finally losing self -confidence.

- You can no longer worry about your plane. And in general - you are not in the United States.

From Florida to California

A few months before these alarming events, Katya and I thought: why not turn the birth of a child into an adventure - and not survive him in warmth (the son was supposed to be born in November - not the festive time in Russia). The United States seemed the best warm place-since there is not only an excellent climate and a good healthcare system for those who are ready to pay for this, but also the constitution, in which there is a 14th amendment on the “soil law” from July 27, 1868. And according to this amendment, any child born in the United States can receive American citizenship.

Since I do not really understand why the boundaries are needed, the ability to open them for future generations seemed attractive to me. As it turned out, we are far from the only family to whom this idea came to mind: while the Americans themselves have been already less willing to have children in recent years (the number of newborns has reached a historical minimum), the demand for “away” birthis growing confidently - including at the expense of Russians. Former wife of Roman Abramovich Daria Zhukova, Olympic champion, member of United Russia and Colonel Svetlana Khorkina, singer Anna Sedokova, Christina Orbakaite and Alsou, actress Anastasia Zavorotyuk - the rich and famous for a long time are accustomed to traveling to American hospitals, but now many people are followed by the same way.

A superficial study showed: Russian -speaking companies engaged in childbirth, dozens in various cities of America. For example, in New York, the recent emigrant Yuri Mosha and his Russian America agency help to determine the doctor, consult throughout their stay in the country and, if necessary, provide a translator; For all this you will have to pay $ 3,000 (not counting the payment of the medical services themselves). The main attraction for pregnant Russians - Miami: here the birth business is put on a wide foot - there are even several price list of different levels, from $ 6,900 for a minimum package of services up to 49 thousand for their full list. However, even this amount does not include the cost of flights and other transport, housing, car rental (without it, in most large American cities - especially pregnant women) and the money necessary for life. At the same time, you need to spend at least two and a half months in America-fly in five to six weeks before childbirth (otherwise, doctors and airlines simply will not let the woman on the plane), but fly away after receiving documents, which will take another month more.

Our financial limit amounted to 20 thousand dollars proceeds from the sale of two cars. At first it seemed that it was really easier to go to Miami: the infrastructure was established, they got used to the Russians, and even housing is not so expensive - if you don’t live in Trump’s towers, then the apartment could cost $ 2500 a month. In this case, the birth itself would be worth if you use the prices of the most popular Russian-speaking obstetrician-gynecologist Svetlana Maslyak, eight and a half thousand: 5 thousand-a doctor and 3500-a hospital (the amount increases if anesthesia or cesarean section is needed). However, I still did not want to Florida: too simple, too many compatriots, and indeed Miami is not quite America; One of my American colleagues, having learned about our thoughts about this city, said that English would not work there - rather Spanish. As for Los Angeles, to go there for a long time our dream, and when it turned out that there was a Russian-speaking doctor, we did not think for a minute.

Sofya Tsyganovskaya moved to America from Odessa in 1998, and seven years later, confirming her medical diploma in the United States, moved with her family in Los Angeles. Now she is already talking in Russian with a little accent, often getting down into English words. In 2017, she took 160 births; 25 of them - with mothers who specially came to give birth from Russia. The inhabitants of the former USSR reached out to her after the Russian -speaking clients accidentally turned out to be by the clients of Tsyganovskaya. Now, according to her, from Russia to Los Angeles of pregnant women, there are most of all, but there are Ukrainians, and Kazakh women, and Uzbeks. “Russia is a rich country, therefore, probably, they come from there more,” the doctor argues and adds: “Now it is harder to get a visa, people have less money, there are fewer visitors.”

Like the rest, we learned about Tsyganovskaya through the word of mouth - the doctor took birth with the wife of the Ukrainian millionaire from the Forbes list, with the family of which my wife Katya was familiar. It turned out that the millionaire saved: childbirth in Los Angeles was cheaper than in Miami, and Tsyganovskaya works without intermediaries. And if in Florida the agency requires $ 500 only for a letter-imprisonment for the embassy, ​​then here we were given such a document for free.

True, we did not use it. In vain.

Trump against newborns

“We are the only ones in the world who is so stupid is so stupid,” Donald Trump said at one of his election rallies in September 2015, breaking the public's applause. It was about the fact that the United States give citizenship even children who were born in America from parents who illegally hit the country. Two and a few years later, when Trump became the president, one of his first orders was to deal with this problem.

The main subject of the excitement of the billionaire, who has become a politician, is illegal immigrants, which with the help of children become full citizens. According to the Pew Research Center, in recent years the number of children appearing in America among illegal migrants has been falling - but still in 2014 there were about 275 thousand, which amounted to 7% of all newborn in the country. Parents of the American children are rarely deported, and after the child is 21 years old, they have the right to “reunite”, after which the child can arrange a green card to their parents. Therefore, such children are called Anchor - “anchor”, with the help of which people cling to American land.

Trump stated that he was ready to go to extreme measures to stop this vicious, in his opinion, practice, and even told reporters that it was necessary to change the norm to provide citizenship by birth right. However, for this he will have to change the constitution, and it is extremely difficult to do it - especially in current political circumstances.

Even if parents are not going to hide from the authorities to adulthood of the child, American citizenship gives many advantages. Firstly, you can almost forget about visas. Secondly, with the US passport you can apply for educational programs and grants inaccessible to Russians-and the cost of paid training (including in Europe) will be much lower. Some agencies indicate the lack of military duty as a possible advantage, but this is not so-if the son remains to live in Russia and does not pass the monthly military training course in the United States, he must register and may be called up in the same manner as the other 18-year-old Russians.

The gift in the form of American citizenship has disadvantages. Even if your child remains to live in Russia, he still will have to report to the US tax service once a year. True, something will have to be paid only if he earns more than $ 8,500 per month, and you can draw up all the documents via the Internet. In addition, Russian legislation obliges to notify the FMS about the presence of two citizenships within 60 days-and the American or European passport may prevent leading positions in state-owned companies from occupying: despite the fact that there is no official ban, my interlocutors say that this is often the reason for the dismissal of top managers. According to sources in Rosneft, even Pavel Fedosov, vice president of the largest oil company, had serious problems because of the British passport, and the head of the corporation Igor Sechin could hardly recapture it. However, if the inconvenience outweighs the advantages, you can always refuse an American passport - it costs $ 2350.

Trump's anxiety can be associated with another circumstance: often migrants give birth to a public expense. Under American laws, the clinic is obliged to take birth, even if the family has no insurance. According to the head of the Russian America agency, Yuri Moshi, some inventive people even come in the early stages and draw up the state insurance of Medicaid, claiming that they are now drawing up as refugees. Subsequently, this may become the basis for a lifelong ban on entry into the United States - or may not become. “I know the girl from Rostov, who did so,” says Mosha. - I gave birth - and she returned with the child back. Then a year later she came to apply for a visa, and she was given a word without saying a word about the child, although, in theory, they had to ask documents for payment of childbirth. Lucky. "

We did everything as expected. The birth in the hospital in Los Angeles was supposed to cost us $ 3,600 (now this amount has already increased to $ 4,800), we paid Tsyganovskaya for more than three thousand for pregnancy and childbirth and another thousand for the necessary tests and anesthesia. Thus, the total amount was not much higher than the cost of childbirth in a private clinic in Moscow (in the perinatal center “Mother and Child”, for example, average birth will cost 500-600 thousand rubles).

So that no one suspects you in an attempt to deceive the state, it is better to include documents from the hospital and the doctor in a package of documents for a visa. But this is in theory. In practice, Katya made a visa a few months before giving birth, when we had not yet decided and thought about whether to go to Miami just relax, and indicated the purpose of the trip “Tourism” without mentioning the birth. I, together with my son, made documents later - when, after a diplomatic conflict, the number of employees of the American embassy was sharply reduced, and the queues of those who want to receive documents giving the right to be in the United States stretched for several months. There was only one thing left: to apply for a visa somewhere not in Russia (the benefit of any Russian can do this in any country in the world). The choice was obvious - Riga, where the Medusa editors were located. Everything went there calmly - except that my son had to urgently organize an excursion to Latvia: the rules allow you to submit documents for children under 14 years of age without their presence in the interview - but only if this happens at the place of residence; To receive a visa in another state, all applicants must come to the embassy personally.

Katya flew to the United States a month before us - and on the border she was passed to the country, without asking anything. When we flew with Semyon, in response to the officer’s question about the purpose of the visit, I decided not to lie and said: they say, my wife was going to give birth - we are going to support her.

Here the most interesting began. I was asked to show all the documents related to childbirth that I had, including a contract with a doctor. They were not enough: the border guards needed a paid check from the clinic, which I did not find with me. Then one of them asked Senya if he was going to study in America at school. "Jes!" - answered Semyon, although he had a tourist visa and did not imply any education. He really did not know anything about any school, but just in case, “Yes” answered everywhere.

After that, we got into the corral for violators.

Having selected my phone, an employee in uniform after a while began to ask questions. “Tell us, please, why is your wife, when she made a visa, said that the goal is tourism? He asked. “She was already pregnant.” As it turned out, while we were waiting for the development of events, the border guards managed to break through their wife at their databases and even see what she said at the interview.

“So we wanted to relax in Miami in September,” I answered, smiling broadly. - And then the boss did not let me go. The birth was already approaching, but I still really wanted to at sea. Therefore, we decided to combine. They say that you have good medicine.

- And what is the son?

- And the son is just going to rest and help dad with the brother.

- And why did you not say at the first meeting with the consul in Riga that you were going to give birth, but they said only to the second?!

“It would be good for your consuls to be more closely and better work,” I was indignant. - I said this both times and showed the documents the same!

The employee sighed, thought, selyed our return tickets and set the deadline for exactly before departure. We were told the cherished “Welcome to the United States”-and Semen and I even managed to jump on the plane in Los Angeles at the last minute, where the mother of the future American was already waiting for us.

According to the owner of the California Translation Bureau Advanced Translation Services, Marina now, in essence, was lucky for us. It could have been otherwise - if an employee of passport control had a different mood. Now he recalls the story of a married couple, who came to the United States with a tourist visa five months before giving birth - and who was discharged on the border for two weeks. In a good way, of course, it was necessary to be safe and make a medical visa-all the more, in the category it does not differ from the tourist.

Childbirth in Hollywood

The most difficult thing in Los Angeles is to find inexpensive housing for two to three months. We decided to take care of this already in America-in the first two weeks, Katya, having enlisted the doctor’s resolution, rode with a friend in Arizona and California, and the hotels cost average cheaper than a whole apartment in Los Angeles. At some point, there was still a need to settle-and it turned out that it was not so simple.

To rent an apartment through the Craigslist website or real estate agency, an American credit history is needed - in addition, they usually give up without furniture. Katya tried to place an announcement about the search for an apartment in specialized groups in social networks - but in response to this, calls from strange people began to come to this. One potential landlord introduced himself as a porn actor; The other asked to urgently transfer money to the card, telling the sad story that he was in the hospital and, if he does not list the pledge now, the apartment would leave.

As a result, the most reliable option was the same Airbnb, which is customary to use for short -term rental. Our beautiful two-room apartment near Beverly Hills with a courtyard and their own parking cost $ 1,500 a month-all local friends said that we were very lucky, since it was very difficult to find something very, very difficult to find something (now it has risen in price $ 1,000). Given the average air temperature in November - 20 degrees of heat - all our free time we warmed up in the sun in this very courtyard, and Ivan, when born, received his first tan there.

The rental of a car cost another one and a half thousand dollars for two months (without insurance) - and we went to look at the hospital. Sofia Tsyganovskaya works in a suburbs of Hollywood Bourbank (as they wrote in a birth certificate, although it is pronounced as Berbank), in the Clinic ST. Joseph, which belongs to the large network of Providence hospitals. In the neighborhood with the State Pedagita - Walt Disney studio, a five -minute drive - Warner Brothers and the Eniversal Entertainment Park. However, the stars still prefer to give birth not here, but in the center of Cedars Sinai-it was there that the children of Madonna, Kim Kardashian, Britney Spears, Alsu, Svetlana Khorkina and many others were born. The proximity to them is expensive. «Был клиент, так называемый красный пиджак, который, как узнал, что [в свидетельстве о рождении] будет записано „Бурбанк“, отказался от нашего госпиталя, — рассказывает Цыгановский, муж Софии Цыгановской, который в последние годы помогает ей с бизнесом. — Сказал, мол, нет, хочу, чтобы было написано „Беверли-Хиллс“. Роды вышли ровно в пять раз дороже». Зато, как рассказывала еще одна клиентка Cedars Sinai — певица Анна Седокова, тамошние врачи «поют песни, танцуют и превращают процесс появления ребенка на свет в праздник».

Нас в Бурбанке тоже спросили, под какую музыку мы хотим рожать и нужно ли создать в номере какой-то специальный аромат. Мы решили обойтись без излишеств — куда важнее было то, что больница оборудована по последнему слову техники, а в каждой палате есть ванна, душ и даже диванчик, на котором может остаться ночевать муж. Нам повезло — мы поехали в роддом утром (больше двух ночей в Америке находиться в роддомах не положено; если приезжаешь туда вечером, это может создавать определенные неудобства).

Сам процесс родов описывать не буду. Скажу только, что врач была по-иезуитски спокойна, пришла в последний момент, кажется, пила кофе, наблюдая за сотрудниками, которые помогали Кате, — однако в нужный момент молниеносно приняла решение, которое, возможно, спасло жизнь Ивану.

Конечно, мы страшно рисковали. Любые сложности с родами в Америке могут обойтись в огромные деньги. Моя жена согласилась на эту авантюру, только когда узнала, что в случае чего для оплаты незапланированных операций можно продать имеющуюся в запасе недвижимость. Но в итоге мы обошлись без кесарева, ребенок — без реанимации, а София Цыгановская спокойно пошла допивать кофе и поздравила меня с рождением сына.

Покрасневший Иван (соотечественники сразу стали называть его Айван), прищурившись, смотрел на окружавшую его стерильную действительность, к которой ему еще надо было привыкнуть. На него надели специальный браслет безопасности, который не позволяет вынести ребенка из палаты, — при попытке пересечь желтую линию в больнице срабатывает сигнализация. А к Кате потянулась череда посетителей — за ночь ее посетили, кажется, около десяти специалистов, от помощника по грудному вскармливанию малышей до специалиста по кормлению мам (специальная девушка, которая спрашивала, какую еду Катя предпочитает).

Американец едет в Россию

На родах приключение не закончилось. Дальше был этап, который казался одним из самых страшных, — оформление гражданства. От попыток сделать это самостоятельно мы отказались — все советчики говорили, что без знания подводных камней с американской бюрократией не совладать.

Одесситка Марина Тепер организовала первое бюро переводов для помощи русским еще в 1985 году, когда пришла размещать объявление о своих услугах в крупнейшем русскоязычном еженедельнике Америки «Панорама», занимавшем второй этаж неприметного офисного здания в Западном Голливуде. Тепер, как она сейчас вспоминает, встретили как родную — ее услуги оказались настолько востребованы читателями, что ей сразу предложили снять комнату напротив кабинета главного редактора. Тепер работает в этом офисе до сих пор. Основной ее бизнес — это переводы, но теперь Тепер помогает с документами и рожающим россиянам.

Процедура примерно такова. В больнице выписывается справка о рождении, которую нужно перевести на русский и легализовать в США (275 долларов). Затем нужно сделать американский паспорт (в нашем случае — 140 долларов за ускоренное оформление плюс 125 долларов за сбор документов) и поставить туда российскую визу. Нам снова повезло: моя жена — гражданка Украины; если бы мы оба были россиянами, без оформления российского гражданства на территории США сына просто не пустили бы в Россию, а оформление это может занимать до трех месяцев (особенно теперь, когда закрыли консульство в Сан-Франциско). Обойти это долгосрочное препятствие можно так: отец летит в Москву, оформляет в загсе свидетельство о рождении на основании справки из госпиталя и переправляет его в Америку, где в консульстве оформляют документ на выезд.

Нам не пришлось делать и этого — хватило туристической визы для Ивана. Это тоже процесс непростой — он занимает больше времени, чем получение американского паспорта, и стоит сильно дороже. Виза оформляется около 10 дней и стоит целых 295 долларов — в эту сумму входит приглашение от туристической компании (так быстрее всего) и специальный ваучер из гостиницы (никакие распечатки с Booking.com в российских посольствах не принимают); еще 33 доллара берет за свои услуги специальный визовый центр.

Последний этап — покупка билета для младенца в «Аэрофлоте»: он стоил 30 тысяч рублей. В итоге весь вояж — с родами, разъездами, путешествиями в Cirque du Soleil и Лас-Вегас, Большой Каньон и Кремниевую долину, экскурсией в Universal City и Диснейленд и так далее — уложился в исходный запланированный бюджет, 20 тысяч долларов. Вечером 24 декабря я с огромным воздушным шаром встречал в Шереметьево любимую жену с юным американцем. На улице был дикий холод. Для гражданина США Ivan Zhegulev началась новая российская жизнь. О ней «Медуза» и так пишет ежедневно.

Илья Жегулев , Лос-Анджелес — Москва