38 hours on the trans-siberian

2.30 am, july 20th....Ravil, being ever helpful, accompanied me all the way to the train platform. My destination would be Novosibirsk, a 38 hour ride past Ekaterinaburg, through the Ural mountains and into the Asian continent. I 'checked in' with the carraige matron, carried my bags on board, then joined ravil outside for a final chat and goodbye. The train was coming from Moscow, and the stop in Kazan was for about 45 minutes, so many of the weary travellers came out onto the platform for their various reasons; to have a smoke, to get some fresh air, to pick up some fresh food or just to stretch their legs. Two of these, upon hearing my english, approached me with a friendly greeting. Their names were Eugene and Alex. They were from eastern Ukraine, and on their way to Siberia with two other friends (sleeping inside the train), to do some extreme hiking. Alex spoke very good english, and Eugene's was sufficient to carry a good conversation. Their beds were in the same carriage as mine, a few compartments down. As the train prepared to leave they invited me to join them for a chat and and a drink, not being very sleepy, I accepted. At around 4am, i headed to my bed assignment and bid them goodnight, agreeing to meet them again for breakfast.
I had had some mental images of the train-siberian railroad, i expected to see alot of old russian men, half drunk on vodka, painstakingly making a 5000 mile journey across a depressing landscape for god knows what reason. What I found, though, could not have been more different. First of all, all beds are assigned, and all passengers ticketed by name and passport numbers. This made it impossible for non ticketed people to board our carriage, as every person was allowed entry only after a screening by the matron. The matron is the (usually) woman who takes care of an individual carriage. She gives the sheets, opens and closes the bathrooms, gives tea mugs, snacks or whatever a passenger needs. She also protects the carriage from intruders (with the help of onboard police, if the situation warrants) and scolds ignorant foreigners when they don't understand what to do. They are often mean looking, and meaner sounding (but as i don´t speak much russian, how would i know what they are saying), unless you`re lucky enough to find a young one. All this makes for an extremely safe, somewhat comfortable setting.
I was travelling 3rd class, which meant each compartment was open (no door-no privacy) and contained 6 beds during the night, room for 6 seats during the day. But the train had a wonderful communal feeiling to it, and was filled mostly with families, older women, and young backpackers. Even the ones who knew no english, attempted to reach out to you, showing at least some interest in your life story, where you came from, and how you ended up sitting next to them. Being from New York helped, as it is a place everyone knows and seems to have great admiration and respect for.
My sleep was comfortable, and i woke up around 11am the next morning. I washed my face in the bathroom sink and went down to find the Ukrainians just preparing breakfast. There i met the others travelling with Eugene and Alex. There was Tatiana, who spoke no english, and Olga, who pretended not to, but i could tell she could understand almost everything i said. The other two people in their compartment were sisters Olga and Olona on their way home from Moscow to Omsk. They didn´t speak english either, but through Eugene I expressed how upset I was that Jaromir Jagr had left the NY Rangers to play hockey in Omsk, and they told me how he had become almost a god there. They shared with me a cucumber and tomato salad, some ukrainian meats and cheeses, and I offered some tatar cookies and fruit. Sharing seems to be an important theme when travelling the trans-siberian.
For the next 12 hours or so we ate, drank, chatted, listened to music (i had my ipod with small speakers to enjoy in the compartment) and they taught me a Russian card game called 'Durak' that helped pass the time. The train would stop at each major city along the way, alowing us to go down to the platform, where old russian ladies were selling fresh homemade delights, such as vereniki, pelmeni, meat cutlets, smoked fish, fruits veggies and drinks.
One of the the stops was Ekaterinaburg, the first big city after the Urals, which marked my arrival in Asia!! You can see a photo of me on the platform in my pics link.
That evening we dined together and passed around the cliche bottle of vodka, toasting things such as Russian cuisine, railroad travel, rain clouds and human beings. Around midnight I settled in to my second night´s sleep.
Early the next morning, we bid goodbye to Olga and Olona at Omsk, and greeted the new compartment mate, Yuri, of whom I will write in the next blog.
The train then passed through the endless green forest that is Siberia, until we stopped at a small siberian town called Barabinsk, where (ukrainian) Olga's grandmother lives. They had a short yet joyous reunion, and Olga was given a huge bag of homemade russian delicacies. We had a hearty lunch of meatballs and bliny (cheese filled crepes).
We played some more cards, shared some more stories, and shortly after 7 pm we arrived in Novosibirsk. We bid eachother goodbye, and because they had to keep the weight of their packs down, Olga packed me a large bag of her grandma's home cooking...lucky me!