On August 3rd, I reported that this Canadian family, Arend and Anneesa Feenstra and eight of their nine children — who had blithely (and blindly) emigrated to Russia in February of this year to find peace, prosperity, and freedom from “wokeness” — had apparently been on the verge of being ejected from their new, ultra-conservative Russian paradise because of visa problems. And then I lost track of them.

But thanks to the wonders of YouTube — which apparently still works in Russia, at least for the moment — they have not vanished from the face of the Earth. They have a vlog they call Countryside Acres, with an apparent 169,000-plus followers. I tried listening to one of Arend and Anneesa’s broadcasts, but gave up after about five minutes of watching them sit there, mutely waiting to get things working properly, and another five minutes of Arend fumbling through a description of a day in which they apparently did nothing, but were very grateful for the opportunity to live in Russia.

But I’m persistent, and I next found an online site called “Wonkette News,” which contained a recent article (June 8th) by one Marcie Jones, who has obviously been in touch with the Feenstras. What a relief! They’re all alive, still in Russia, and . . . well, let’s begin where we last left off.

*. *. *

For starters, two things went wrong. First, the Russian government lied. They always lie. They lied about their “special military operation” in Ukraine; they lied about the cause of Alexei Navalny’s death; hell, they even lie about their crop yields. So no one — other than the Feenstras themselves — should be surprised to learn that what had supposedly been promised them by the Russian government was just a pipe dream.

And second, the Feenstras are clearly not the brightest people; they didn’t do their homework before making the biggest decision of their — and their eight children’s — lives. But you can’t fix stupid.

Now they’re stuck, and they’re trying to make a go of it. They’ve learned that they needed to pass a Russian language proficiency test in order to emigrate; and they’ve also learned that as foreigners they couldn’t simply buy a farm but could only own a minority share of it.

Wait . . . WHAT??!!!

Are you telling me they didn’t know all this beforehand? Or that their “tourist” visas had an expiration date, and didn’t entitle them to stay indefinitely?

Well, they know it now. And so they’ve decided on another route: they’ve applied for asylum.

On what grounds? What were they being threatened by, back on the farm in Canada? Locusts? Liberals? Gay people? Yeah, that’ll get you asylum, I’m sure.

Meanwhile, the ten of them have been living in a one-room (probably communal) apartment . . . Well, that doesn’t even bear thinking about. I’ve seen those apartments. Besides being too small even for two people, they’re . . . Ugh! Don’t ask.

Reading on, I learned from Ms. Jones that the Feenstras have now become aware of further restrictions and legal requirements of their new homeland. Such as the fact that, as foreigners, in order to buy agricultural property they must first form a Russian company, and that company must have a Russian citizen (or citizens) as majority owner(s). So Arend says they’ve now done that, and found someone to take on the 51% ownership.

Well, there’s a big “oh-oh” right there. Who are these new partners of theirs? What do you know about them? Are they solvent? If so, where does their money come from? In short, can they be trusted? In Russia, you can’t just run a D&B on someone. Do you realize that the partner(s), and not you, actually control that business? And even if you’re lucky and find the right person, registration still takes forever, finding and buying the property is no easy feat, and . . .

Oh, hell! I could go on forever with the “ifs,” “ands,” and “buts.” The bottom line is: the Feenstras are royally screwed. And what do they say to this? Ms. Jones quotes Arend Feenstra on this:

“We live day-to-day, and so much of it is out of our control that we have really been learning to live in faith, and not by sight. And just taking each day as it comes, hoping we get one step closer every time. We believe God brought us here, we believe God is making a way, and we will just keep trusting in him.” [Marcie Jones, Wonkette, id.]

*. *. *

I envy you your faith, Mr. and Mrs. Feenstra . . . I really do. And I hope things work out for you soon. But another old saying keeps popping into my head as I think about your dilemma:

“Yes, I believe God answers all of our prayers; but sometimes the answer is simply . . . ‘No.’”

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
8/14/24