You can still get a visa if you don't have an invitation, I have been there 5 times and never had an invitation as I know of no one who would invite me.? I had to apply in person in NY at their office.? I had to explain why I wanted to go.? Then after I was issued a visa, I was phoned several days later by someone at the Washington embassy verifying again, why I wanted to go to Belarus.? I also would be very apprehensive being on the streets in the evening. -----Original Message----- From: James Mnichowicz <jimmnich@yahoo.com> To: polandbordersurnames@rootsweb.com Sent: Fri, 20 Jul 2007 9:21 pm Subject: Re: [PBS] Advice on Travel to Belarus Please Hi there Rose Four of us traveled to Belarus in 2006 looking for family. You have to be invited to visit the country before you can get a visa to visit the country. I beleive we got ours from the Belarus embassy here in the states before we went. The cost was 60 dollars for the visa. Make sure you have a health insurance policy while you are in that country. We got ours thru the tour company. We crossed the border and they tried to sell us health insurance but luckily we had papers that proved we had the insurance. They were very testy about this. We had a couple from Poland with us so they arranged a van for traveling ; thru a cousin who lives in Belarus. The people we talked to in the villages were very friendly. In the cities I wouldn't walk alone especially at night. The people are very serious in the cities and you never hear any spontainous laughter. They just tend to their business. They told us not to dress or act different to call attention to yourself when we went. We did search for our families and it was an uneventful trip there. James Jack and Rose <thankgod@optonline.net> wrote: Hi Has anyone in the group traveled to Belarus??? I would like to plan a trip there in the future.... Any advice would be helpful Thanks and God bless Rose Zydel Olson ThankGod@optonline.net ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to POLANDBORDERSURNAMES-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message --------------------------------- Get the Yahoo! toolbar and be alerted to new email wherever you're surfing. ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to POLANDBORDERSURNAMES-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message ________________________________________________________________________ AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com.