Hello I'm relatively new here, but have recently started communication with a woman from Belarus. My question is are the women there trust worthy? And would it be out of the question to ask to meet her in the fsu or another "safe" country?
What a bizarre question. The sooner you can get to looking at your penpals as
people or
women, IMO, the closer you'll get to paying attention to what matters, and discarding what doesn't. Generalizations are a guide, or a relative chance of someone exhibiting some trait, not an absolute. I would not consider Belarus to be less safe in general than other parts of the FSU - in some cases, it may be safer, depending on the specific locale. You're going to find both trustworthy and non-trustworthy people anywhere/everywhere, just like at home. The difference in language and culture may make it slightly more difficult to separate the two, but that's where reading experiences of others can help, unless you'd prefer to learn it entirely by (possibly painful and/or $$) experience.
I wouldn't worry much about meeting your penpal in Minsk or elsewhere, the usual foreign city rules apply. Don't attract undue attention to yourself in the streets, certainly don't smile at the cops, and ideally don't speak English near police, taxi drivers (instant rate increase), or late at night in dark areas with locals hanging out drinking. Basically, don't do stupid.
Don't act like you expect or demand them to conform to whatever your idea of 'service' may imply. I came across far more decent people in Belarus, including a few times late at night where it became obvious that I wasn't a local (if it weren't already), than not. I never experienced the 'airport shakedowns' many describe elsewhere, nor the cab driver insanity and gouging at the airport, although I would recommend arranging for a driver in advance, as MSQ2 is a good 30-40 minutes outside of Minsk proper, where you'll need to go to stay or jump on a train, depending on your final destination.
Police are mixed, and range from actually decent to what you might expect to see in bad movies. In general, Luka has them scared out of most corruption, but I'm not so sure that would apply if you as a foreigner have a run-in with them without your local penpal around. Best to avoid entirely.
About going somewhere else...as mentioned, sure, some girls (anywhere) might be up for an all expenses paid vacation, but is that the best choice for a first meeting? Probably not. Not to mention the gentlemanly thing to do would be to ensure that you have separate rooms until such a time that
she may (or may not) become comfortable in sharing one. That should certainly be discussed before any trip, and never assumed. What would you do after a third location trip? Still be afraid to go to her home, so never see where she grew up, her family's apartment, places of interest or importance to her? Not meet her family or friends?
It's up to you, I just see little reason to avoid Belarus, especially in favor of a 'different FSU country' when your penpal is from Belarus. The only possible advantage I see is if you picked a more usual vacation spot and things didn't work out, you might be more comfortable, but there's plenty to see and do in most places. I did ask my (not yet) wife once (winter) if maybe we'd look at going somewhere else for an upcoming visit, and she said for much less money, I could stay with her for a much longer period, so no contest - more time together, less expensive, more time with her family, etc. Others may react differently, of course.
Oh - Luka also outlawed the MOB/agency business in Belarus. Personally, I think it's a net win, as you don't have traditional (hah?!) agencies there, which i see little benefit in besides possibly if everything goes south while there. That doesn't stop anyone from meeting on free personals sites, dating sites, Facebook/vkontacte, etc or those sites like Elenas and such, though. You will find some amount of pro-Belarus and anti-foreign propaganda on billboards, smiling kids with flowers (we love Bel/Luka), and some about working abroad is dangerous, but I did see either of those in most of the people I met, with the exception of someone trying to tell me he was sure it's 'illegal' to plant food in my own yard..
(More a question of knowledge than antagonism of any kind)
