on the trans-siberian there are certain attendants who have a certain 'reputation' as being fire-breathing babooshkas but after we'd eventually managed to wrestle our way onto the train Mr P and I were delighted to find that our attendant was a blonde-haired quiet lady called Carla. she was very helpful as we left the station, coming and delivering our linen without throwing it at my head and storming out as Nash had done on the previous leg. what a relief. she returned 5 minutes after brininging the linen with 2 forms that we had to fill out for customs. after working out what 'Patronomyic' meant we settled down into watching the view go by. Carla then appeared again with another form that we had to fill out. on this occasion she'd changed out of her uniform and was in a low-cut skimpy top with no bra. i thought Mr P would have a coronary the way his eyes popped out of his head. still, Carla was very professional and she even helped us with the translation of the new forms we had to complete as there was no English translation at all. she left and Mr P sighed - either from relief or angina, who knew? 10 minutes later Carla was back with ANOTHER bloody form. i was annoyed but the skimpy top & no bra won Mr P over. he'd have been happy with another 10 forms from what i could see. i my mind i went over CPR techniques that i'd recently witnessed being done on a Mongolian horse - you never know. Carla, having successfully gotten all our forms out of us, jumped up and her boobs carried on bouncing around for another few minutes after that. i'd never seen eyeballs popping out on stalks before. Mr P's did then.
and so we were off. this was the trans-siberian proper: 5 days on a train to Moscow. we'd left about 2pm and so Mr P and myself caught up with each other (his real name was Wad from an unusual anglo-saxon word Wadavern) and unpacked all our stuff. there didn't appear to be a restaurant car on the train at this point so the realisation hit that we'd be eating noodles for a little while longer. our carriage was quite full with 2 backpackers next door and a whole heap of older Aussies up the end of the carriage. they'd started drinking before we'd even left the station and then started running up and down the carriage having 'little chats' with each other whilst running to the toilet and then running back to get more beer. that's what you do in Australia when you get older: get pissed and talk to anyone who'll listen about anything at all.
the scenery leaving Mongolia was the same dry dusty sandy landscape we'd already been through before and it was the same again. we did pass through a few soviet-inspired towns with a 'concrete-block' style of architecture before hitting the steppes and some much greener grassland. there were a few gers scattered across the wide, wide plains but they were few and far between, just nestled in the valleys of ragged hills, or clustered together like little villages. as the train rumbled on we passed groups of wild horses running together, some having foals,and then even a group of camels slowly plodding their way across the landscape. that was pretty special. the light was superb: the sun lighting up mountains on the far horizon with the electric green steppes contrasting with huge hilly clouds that clustered thick and white under a bright blue sky. the landscape rumbled by and then the sun started to die and sunset slowly emerged from the brightness of the day. it got dark late in these regions: night seems half-hearted and almost welcomes the light.
i went and stood in the corridor window, looking out at the sunset as 4 or 5 older Aussies staggered by clinking and pissed. soon the train ground to a slow halt and skimpy Maria got changed back into her uniform as Mongolian border guards got on and started inspecting our documentation. this took an hour and it was near midnight by now. we were all knackered and tired aside from the Aussies who seemed to have a karaoke machine going down their end of the corridor. i half expected a disco ball to come down and start spinning around with all the Aussie women coming out with golden knickers on.
after the Mongolian side of the border had finished with us the train slowly started up again and then another hour later, full of dozy sleep, we were at the Russian border. more guards came on, much more serious this time and with hardly a smile between them. i tried to hand out some friendly koalas but one of them looked at me with a look that siad' sit down or i'll shoot.' you don't argue with a look like that. after another hour and half we were done and the train started up for the final time that night and then we crossed the border and were in Russia. i went to ask Carla if she could unlock the toilets (they were locked at every major stop) only to find that she wasn't in her carriage. in her place had appeared a tall Russian lady with a sour face, model looks, hair dyed bright-red, a tight mini-skirt and stilettoes.
this was The Evil One. she glowered at me, darkly ...
No comments:
Post a Comment