We had breakfast
this morning in the hostel – some really nice cherry dumplings made
by a friend of Kate's. We then went out and bought some supplies for
today's train journey and then got a lift with Anton to the station,
where we bought some burgers for lunch.
Now, remember I
wrote earlier that the lower the train number, the newer and more
modern the train? Not true. This was the Number 12 train, but it was
an older style like we were on a few days ago. This one had more
effective air-conditioning, however, and was more than comfortable
enough for us. The tenants who lived in our house while we undertook
the European leg of the journey had left behind a big packet of
anti-bacterial wipes, which we brought along on this leg mainly
because they were there. And because we have them, we've been wiping
down the seats and head rests in these older trains (and the toilet
seats, too...). In this case they came away distinctly brown, so we
gave everything a double wipe.
Our carriage
attendant on this train was a cheerful young and very chatty Bashkir,
who spoke decent English. When he discovered that we were from
England, he asked whereabouts. Although he hadn't heard of
Winchester, when we said it was near Southampton he reeled off an
impressive list of past and present Saints footballers.
After we had been on
the train for a few hours, the attendant came to the compartment with
a big bag full off random merchandise (stuffed toys, a pocket watch,
USB sticks shaped like trains and so on). He plonked himself on one
of the seats and proceeded to pull bits and pieces out and show them
to us, presumably so that we could buy them, although when he got to
the end of his presentation he made no attempt to actually sell
anything to us. He also made no attempt to leave the compartment –
staying for ages, chatting away in broken English about football, the
seasons, his job...
When he eventually
left, the girls did a bit of schoolwork, I read the New Yorker
and we watched the scenery go by. We're back into mixed pine and
birch, and the little settlements look much the same. The dominant
colour out here is definitely brown – dry grass, dead trees, the
wood of the houses – with a bit of green and some brighter colours
from the fading paint on some of the buildings. The one primary
exception to all of this comes from the cemeteries, which are a riot
of colour. I'm not sure exactly where it's all coming from –
certainly some is from real and plastic flowers left on the graves –
but that doesn't early explain the prevalence of lurid fluorescent
pinks and oranges.
On this leg, we've
also noticed a rise in the amount of litter scattered around the
countryside. It appears that the locals haven't really embraced the
idea of landfill, and just dump their rubbish wherever it can't be
easily seen. The wind then picks it up and disperses it far and wide,
much to the detriment of the scenery.
In the afternoon,
the train made a lengthy stop at a station and we all got out to
stretch our legs and buy some water and sweets. An enormous coal
train was parked on the opposite side of the platform and there was
quite a lot of spilled coal down around the tracks, which offered me
a chance to give the girls an impromptu geology lesson.
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