back on the trans-siberian

so leaving Mongolia wasn't too unpleasant. the heat, humidity, dust and general poverty meant that a week was enough. next time i'll probably go in colder weather and get out into the country a bit. still, getting back on the tran-sib was very exciting. the first problem was arriving at the station and finding numerous other westerners wandering about looking for 'Carriage 6'. there was a Carriage 5 and next to that was a Carriage 7 but inbetween - nothing, nada, zilch. i looked at my ticket: Berth 17, Carriage 6.

great.

so then in the blazing hot sun it was up and down the platform trying to find someone who could find the mysterious Carriage 6. it kind resembled Harry Potter trying to find the train to Hogwarts and in a similar fashion to poor Harry i kept running into walls. unlike Harry i didn't go through them. first of all up to the ticket office to ask the lovely officer behind if she could help: 'Excuse me but where is Carriage 6?' 'ASK ON TRAIN'. window slammed shut. i'm sure if she'd been allowed to spit in my eye then she would have done. if only i'd had a wand ...

next, search up and down train for an attendant. found one: 'Excuse me but where is Carriage 6?'. this resulted in an evil glare and the train door slamming shut. no help there then. i waved a stick i'd found. nothing happened. damn pretend wand. an evil eye peered through the smokey train door. better hide down the platform somewhere ...

so there we were: a little cluster of lost westerners with no Carriage and the trans-sib due to depart in 30 mins. it wasn't looking good. we had a little-min-conference & after numerous power-point presentations, an intensive brainstorming session & some data analysis we'd decided on a sneaky and brilliantly cunning plan. we'd sit and wait.

20 minutes to departure. nothing.

15 minutes to departure. nothing.

10 minutes to departure. Carriage number 5's sign was taken down and up went a sign saying 'Carriage Number 6'.

they can play mind-games well, the Russians.

of course with just 10 minutes to go there was yet another version of 'Bunnnndddlllleee' this time with the added incentive of missing the train. it was kind of like sumo wrestling but with rucksacks. needless to say i managed to get on first. elbows - i love 'um.

once ensconsed in my little compartment i waited to see who might be my companion for this leg of the journey. on the first part of the journey i'd thought that it was a skinny chinese guy who turned out to be escorting Mr Plutonium. we were very near departure time and then suddenly 2 skinny Mongolians arrived with 2 bags of luggage. jeez - 2 of them? they huffed and puffed and got the bags in and then turned around to face .... Mr Plutonium!!! yep, they were just putting his bags on for him and me & Mr P were travel companions once again ...

& little did we know that we would bond in adversity against the resident carriage attendant who became known as 'The Evil One' ...