Mail concerns for Russia

Most post delivery men can read roman script, especially in Moscow and St Petes. The best option is cyrillic (if you can do it) and the alternative is transliterated roman script. Make sure you transliterate and not translate: write "ulitsa" and not "street" for example.

Very few letters get opened now. Some fail to arrive, but that is incokmpetence not censorship.

If you aren't familiarl with Cyrillic, it's OK to write in the Latin alphabet. Everyone in the ex-USSR can read the Latin alphabet - they all learn it in school.
People whose languages are written in Cyrillic are masters as transliterating their languages into Latin scrip, so you will have no problems to write in Latin. Bad or incorrect Cyrillic should be avoided though as it would be better to write the address correctly in Latin script than to botch it in Cyrillic. Just to cover my bases, I usually write both on the address, with a line separating the Latin and Cyrillic parts from each other. The Cyrillic is a convenience for the Russian speaking postmen and the Latin script is for US postal workers who certainly won't be able to know where the letter is going if it's only written in Cyrillic.

Andrew is correct that few letters are opened now, but if someone thinks that your letter might have money in it, they'll open it. I doubt that postal workers care about the contents of an article critical of Putin. If the article is in English, they most likely won't understand it anyway.

Latin is OK.

The most important detail is to mention the address in this order: Russia, city, index, street, House number, appt. number. This order is more usual for our postmen. Your traditional one also is not a big problem though.

The article is out of danger, surely:)

The index is what we call the zip or postal code.

There may be a street number, a building or house number and an apartment number.

Ruth

Write both (English slash Russian).

Thanks all. The article in fact is the New Yorker's October 1 profile of Gary Kasparov and the "Russian opposition."

How about if I are travelling in Russia and want to send mail back home. Can I just write in my hometown language for the address but with my home country in english?

Best to write your home country name in Cyrillic too.

Appreciate if anybody can advise how to write 'Thailand' in Cyrillic?