http://www.geocities.com/stoupak/Letters2/EN041231.TXT ----------------------------------------------------- Yuriy Stupak, 31dec2004, "T0 Wh0m It May C0ncern". ----------------------------------------------------- Back to nonUSSR: 2001-:-2004 1. January 12, 2001 I'd got my last paycheck from EdgeNet. The most of my colleagues left EdgeNet or was fired in those semi year (all H1B-s left it before September 11). After EdgeNet I had been working in Mentor Graphics. I ported PEG (embedded GUI package) to VRTX (Mentor's real-time OS) using VVE (Virtual VRTX Environment that is VC++ simulation of VRTX). It was a short term job. 2. Since that I looked for a job again. I haven't got any technical interviews in USA after that (I had a lot in 7 weeks between EdgeNet and Mentor Graphics but after Mentor it was conversations with job recruiters only). After I gave up job search in USA I've got a lot of similar "conversations without job" in Russia with local kind of cunty=sissy pseudo HR (I name them in Russian "PIZDENYSHI"). I don't trust job search in Web anymore. 3. From 2001 beginning to April 26, 2002 I'd been living in the same HAMLET apartments, working with the same "Dice" on the same home computer. I didn't drive a lot (commuting to Mentor Graphics was the biggest part of my driving experience after my Edgenet commuting finished). The summer 2001 I've spent near the pool again. I started to swim it 50-times-to-each-side-both (1250 meters I guess). I'm also trying to get suntanned while reading C++ book or science fiction paperbacks in English. New "Century" cinema was built across my apartment's fence in April 2001. I used to go there 5-6 times in month. 4. Since Summer 2001 my wife and Canadian Immigration service played soccer with my head. My wife refused to give me papers or data I should put in application for Canada immigration - Canadian Consulate in Buffalo insisted that I should supply them with these papers. The result milestones of my Canadian emigration application are: (1) I sent my papers for Canada immigration in December 2001 only, (2) divorced my wife in October 2002 after return to Russia and (3) sent to Buffalo my translated and notarized divorce papers in February 2003 without counting on them. 5. I returned to Russia on April 27, 2002. After that I spent more than 2 months in my Russian "home, sweat home" on cleaning some part of the dirt my mom accumulated here in 5 years without me :(plus 15 prior years with me): After that (while my mom were in a breast cancer surgery) I worked in "Corbina Telecom" with guys wearing at work skull-caps. In the Autumn 2002 I was unemployed again and went to track driving courses that were made for me and 20 other guys as disgusting as it was managed there. 6. I started to work in Foratec AT in November 2002 and was taken to Germany in December 2002 to discuss hardware and software that should be ordered. My dad died while I was abroad - not in USA but in Germany. Foratec got hardware and software from Germany and I was grateful to Italian Telesoft Spa that trained me to work with documentation that is neither English nor Russian. 7. Russian-American cooperation got a wonderful success in 2003 - it made Yuriy Stupak capable not to use extra night and weekend hours for doing his job - including the job he really liked and wanted to do. From the beginning my work in Foratec my head was overloaded with ideas "how to solve their entire problem" and I made more than 3000 C++ lines in January on voluntary base for it. But after I was reprimanded that I'm going in a non-ordered way I answered that henceforth I wouldn't implement any "bright insight from my mind" until verbally or written ordered to do it. That's the first time in my working life I guess! 8. Since September 2003 I returned to my Karate studies that I broke off when I got married. Before it and later I've got some problems with my roof, my volunteer work in yard plus conflicts with strange people nearby. And I also felt sort of "train sickness" in autumn-winter 2003. I've returned to these notes on October the 4th, 2004. I started to work 28 years ago in R.S.C.E. (4-oct-1976). BTW, "1st sputnik" was launched 47 years ago: 4-oct-1957. 9. Russian Web job engines promised programmer's salary in $400 - $1500 per month interval. I keep on calculating my expenses and got about $320 per month as for 1.5 year in Russia ( Jul/02 -:- Dec/03 ). While unemployed I had about $20 welfare per month - in Shchelkovo town I live. Local job offers looked like mockery: either $150 - $250 per month or "need 1C" or "less than 30 years old" e.t.c. It made me eager to drop to $250 per month but get this money in Shchelkovo - without 2-3 hours Moscow commuting. 10. I resigned from Foratec in January 2004. My Foratec saving plus resignation payments were more than 100000 rubles. I put them on saving and ATM checking accounts and desided that I would live on them until January 2005 - either I found job in Shchelkovo in 20004 or I didn't. And if I found the job I would deposit all my salary for the year 2004 to different accounts for using in 2005. (:And I've REALLY spent less then 84000 rubles in 2004:) 11. Since February 2004 I've been working in Shchelkovo - in "Russian Standard" (one can see "wwww.std.ru" I am improving but my Visual Basic scripts with ADO and Pervasive SQL are for company's Intranet usage only). My deposited wages in 2004 were more than 164000 rubles (plus interests, plus 25000 non-used rubles from 2004). Nevertheless I plan yet to spend on my life in 2005 less than 100000 rubles (8000 monthly instead of 7000 in 2004).