Cates and Qureshi Set Eyes on Portugal
When Canada won’t have you, pick another country. That’s what we’re learning from Daniel “jungleman12” Cates and his posse as they plan to relocate– this time to Portugal, after Cates found out the hard way that telling immigration officers that he wants to enter a foreign country to make money by playing poker online (i.e., to work) would require a work visa. Has Cates found a loophole in Portuguese law that will allow him into the EU without a work visa, or does he plan to make his widely-publicized transition under the radar?
Since Black Friday, more and more Americans have been looking for new ways to play the game that they love. With the ejection of Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars, and Absolute Poker, there haven’t been many options left for American players. Add to that the fact that other online poker powerhouses (like Bodog Poker) are voluntarily withdrawing themselves from the US market, and it’s no wonder that some US citizens are tired of waiting for changes in gambling law (to be honest, the US government has bigger legislative fish to fry right now, and gambling law isn’t even showing up on the radar) and are taking matters into their own hands.
Cates said in an interview with PokerStrategy.com that he plans on staying in Portugal “a few months” and then either going somewhere else, or, if he likes it, staying longer. Since there’s no way that Cates has had the time to summon a EU visa, he has a 90 day limit in the Schengen countries (which Portugal is part of) and up to a total of 6 months in the EU (in a non-Schengen country, such as the UK or Ireland) before he’ll have to head, if not back home, somewhere else. Unfortunately, Cates isn’t really known for his knowledge of other cultures and their rules and regulations (hence the Canada debacle)– he posted on his Twitter, “I’m taking a flight from Los Angeles to Madrid, Spain… didn’t know such flights existed.” Jungleman has already declared his intention to play in the World Series of Poker Europe and European Poker Tour’s Barcelona stop, but states that his long-term plan is in the works and will depend on how the next few months play out.
Cates will be staying with Jose “Girah” Macedo (whose name he wasn’t sure how to pronounce in the same interview) and Haseeb Qureshi in Lisbon, who is following Cates out of the country– Macedo is already in Portugal. As Qureshi said in his blog at Cardrunners, “Now our plans have reverted back to going to Portugal after all – most likely Lisbon. Jungle and I will be living with Jose ‘Girah’ Macedo and will be flying out there sometime in the coming week. I have no doubt that it’s going to be an interesting excursion.”
Here’s to interesting excursions– and to United States legislation that pushes more players out of their comfort zones and into the open arms of live poker tournaments around the world. As predicted earlier this year, the lack of online poker in the US seems to be feeding the live tournaments around the world.