I remember my father telling me once about one of his fond memories as a kid traveling through Europe with his family by train. He had that look in his eyes as he smiled, retelling his feelings as the train slowly rocked him back and forth to sleep, the quiet but steady noise of the wheels on the tracks. A lullaby of sorts. This is what I imagined when I first decided to travel by train - a relaxing, scenic way to appreciate the vast Russia without really doing much of anything except being lulled to sleep in my cozy bunk. What could be a better way to avoid the hectic life in Moscow than to sit on a train for 28 hours at a time? As usual I should have known better!
Life on the train(s) had its ups and its downs, its quiet moments, and its happy moments, but most of all, the one thing I noticed more than anything else, was how chaotic life could be when you put 80 people in a compartment for who knows how many hours? Just when you think you can silently observe what is going on from a distance, you soon find out that you are swept into what becomes your new life in a new community.
Although my Russian was awful, from the first hour I sat down on the train, I instantly cracked out my textbooks, dictionary, and notepad and pen. Soon I found that what was entertaining for my neighbors became my free Russian lessons, taught by native speakers who...didn't speak any English. My first evening became an adventure running through a town with some guys from Azerbaijan looking for crystal before the train took off again, and I could already tell that my vacation wasn't going to be so boring after all.
The best part of riding third class is that it is a great equalizer. No matter whether someone was from Mongolia or a college student heading off to university for the first time, everyone seemed to work together. If someone had something funny to say, everyone was allowed to be in on the joke. People spoke freely to their neighbors, who joined in on conversations which could last for 10 hours. Everyone agreed on when it was time to go to bed, time to eat lunch, and time to take a nap. If someone needed help putting their luggage up, everyone helped. And when I cut my foot on a piece of glass, to my embarrassment and surprise immediately I was hoisted up to my bunk, with my foot sticking out into the aisle as it was inspected and argued over by 4 of my neighbors as the woman in charge of our car poured alcohol over it. I guess there are benefits to being a single girl traveling alone after all, everyone worries about you.
Each time the train stopped I managed to jump off and try to imagine what the cities looked like on the other side of the train station. People kept getting on and off of the train at different stops, so sometimes your friends would disappear as you slept, leaving you in the middle of the night. Sometimes passengers would get off at a stopover for 20 minutes to visit with family or friends that lived there. One of my older neighbors stepped off the train for the first time at Novosibirsk late at night which surprised me, almost as much as when I saw her talking to a young guy, much younger than her. I was pretty confused until she later explained that it had been her son who had met her at the train station for those precious 20 minutes to visit. As we left she smiled wistfully out the window and then went to sleep.
Although there were crazy times on the train, and plenty of improvement on my Russian conversation skills, I did get an opportunity to watch the scenery go by. There were some moments during the day where I stared for hours out at the vast countryside which turned to glorious mountains, and then to plains. I could really appreciate the change in scenery even with the huge cover of snow over everything. At least it was sunny and just a little below freezing, and we were plenty cozy on the train. Sometimes I couldn't help but keep my eyes wide open at night, as the moon shone over the forest, reflecting off of the pristine snow. I watched until I was lulled to sleep by the quiet chugging of the wheels on the tracks, and the gentle swaying of the train back and forth, as I kept moving further and further away from what I knew, to something completely new and exciting.
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