Quote Originally Posted by bad manners
I would not recommend going there for a "Russian immersion". It might be compared with going to India to learn English, only it is much worse in Latvia: the Indians got rid of the English long time ago and English is the international language; the Latvians got rid of the Russian big brother just a few years ago, and Russian is not all that important in that region (as they trying to integrate with the EU, not Russia).
Yes, I heard as much. Actually I was recently considering a job in Georgia. Amongst other reasons (insecurity), I decided against it because it might not be much fun trying to learn Russian there. They have a rather incredible language of their own, and whilst there is a lot of Russian spoken there, they might not be keen on teaching you about what they consider as their 'past'.
Could we make a list of how much Russian is spoken, and how it's perceived, in each of the ex-Soviet states?
Clearly it's still important, massively so, in all of those countries (consider TV for example). But which would be good for a Russian learner?

I'd guess Belarus would be the best one from the point of view of Russian language. Ukraine might not be too bad. Clearly Latvia is not a good one.