Tourism Gets Less Friendly

New visa rules for potential visitors to the U.S. are being implemented all over Central Europe. According to this Prague Post article, the regulations in the Czech Republic include mandatory interviews on a paid telephone line that costs the applicant 38 crowns per minute (about $1.40), a non-refundable $100 application fee, faxed-in documents, and much more. The paper found a Czech IT director who won a trip to the States on a TV show, but eventually cancelled his tickets after weeks of bureaucracy and expensive phone calls that rarely got through. "It was horrible," he said. Czech Senator Petr Smutny (whose name means "Peter Sad") remarked that "This goes too far." And the head of the Czech Parliament's Foreign Committee, Vladimir Lastuvka, is calling for reciprocal visa requirements to be imposed on Americans. Enjoy that cheap beer while you still can.

Link via PragueBlog.