From Grozny to Lisbon: My Unbelievable Journey of Reinvention and the Power of Pure Luck!

I was born in Grozny (Chechnya, USSR by the way) and in the first year of my life, I was moved to the far north, where I lived until I was 12 years old. Then I was moved to the Volgograd region, where I lived until I was 24 years old.

After that, I moved to Moscow on my own. It was pure luck: I was traveling to perform at a gothic festival in Nizhny Novgorod and decided to visit a friend in Moscow for a couple of days. I liked it so much that I decided to stay for an indefinite period. After a month, I found a new job in technical support and rented half a room on Arbat for 8000 rubles!

Somewhere after the age of 30, I learned that the world is not limited to Moscow and that it is possible to move to another country! I first traveled outside the CIS at the age of 33. And I began to think more and more about the future.

At some point, I noticed that I had lived through two twelve-year cycles of moving and the thought occurred to me that the third cycle was coming to an end, which meant it was time to move again. In general, after putting in some effort, I improved my English, spent a year on interviews, and received one offer, which was canceled due to COVID-19.

In the end, I found a job through an acquaintance with whom I worked together. It was pure luck, I was given a good reference. After a year of work, I began to conduct interviews myself, so I know that the interview process was clearly easier, without tests and stupid questions. I was offered to move to Latvia, but since it’s COVID-19 now, I have to wait. And they made a one-year contract.

After a year of preparing documents, exactly one week before the embassy visit, I learned that we were opening a new office in Portugal. I quickly wrote to my lead and the next day we discussed a new contract and relocation conditions. Well, it was pure luck!

After six months of paperwork, we ended up in Lisbon. There were many more lucky moments there, but I’ll talk about that later.