Still rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I stumbled out onto the platform of the Ulaanbaatar station. It was between 6 and 7 AM. I searched all up and down the platform, but I couldn't find anyone from Projects Abroad. Lucky for me, Ola had gotten in touch with her teacher, and I bummed a ride with them to her dormitory building. I got a chance to play tour guide by taking Ola first to a bank where we could change money and then to the Mobicom building so she could get a local SIM card. Finally, after rattling around for a bit, we ducked into the expat-friendly, wifi-providing Cafe Amsterdam so that I could look up a way to contact the folks I hadn't been able to locate at the train station. They suggested I take a taxi to their headquarters. I couldn't just abandon Ola without any idea of how to get back to her dorm, so I dragged her along to the office and she sat outside while I tried to figure out what to do next. Eventually, we picked up my stuff from Ola's building and brought it to my new apartment.
Here endeth the dry-as-dust account of my arrival in this dry, dusty country.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Monday, September 6, 2010
Cast of Characters
Setting: On a train from Moscow, Russia to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
Cast of Characters:
Free Agents
Angela, 22: Narrator, traveling solo to an internship in UB.
Ola, 21: An erstwhile runway model from Poland with a don't-mess-with-me attitude. Declined an opportunity to join the fashion world in Milan in favor of pursuing her education. Travels with an impressive array of instant soups and desserts and an abundance of bad luck. Traveling to Ulaanbaatar for an exchange program featuring a year's worth of Mongolian language classes. Adores all things Japanese.
Vodka Train-ers
Cat, 21: Student from North London. Making a movie about time travel, using the crossing of time zones as a metaphor. Had 3 parties when she turned 21, one of which involved renting out one of London's top clubs and spending $4000 on alcohol. Denys being rich.
Paddy and Amish, 19: Scottish friends, traveling together. Their accents get thicker with each drink, and after a few no one can understand them save the other one.
Melissa and Rick, 24 and 25: A couple from Manchester, met at a party at age 15 when she was completely wasted and he took care of her. Have been together ever since. Taking time off from their jobs as an accountant and a lawyer, respectively. One week into a full year of traveling together.
Alex and Angus, 21-ish: Australian best buddies since childhood. Alex bears an impressive resemblance to Harry Potter. Seemed quite intent on getting in Cat's pants. Wonder if he succeeded?
The Aussie Tour
The UglyAmerican Aussie, late 50s: Complains loudly and frequently about pretty much everything. Expresses excessive concern over Narrator's wellbeing, much to her chagrin.
The Un-Ugly Wife: Traveling with her husband, The Ugly Aussie, but never stooping to his level. Largely quite, featuring a long-suffering expression.
The Little Bigot, also late 50s: Occupied his time spinning theories about how "you think they would at least learn some English" and about how "the fat one" must be in charge of the rest of the traders.
Crazy Party Mom: Known for her raunchy humor and good-time habits. Married to The Little Bigot. Enjoys sharing a story about how she used to have a tattoo on the top of her inner thigh, but her "pussy ate it." Said story was accompanied by a pulling down of her pants and underwear to expose said area of her anatomy. This took place about a foot from the face of:
The Desperate Son, mid-to-late 20s: Radiates an air of desperation for peers, especially of the male pal variety. Dubbed "such an ultimate lad" by those who have any idea what that would mean.
The Quiet Swedish Wife: Married to The Desperate Son, she is indeed quiet and Swedish. One has to wonder how she feels about traveling with such in-laws.
The Latecomers
Mr and Mrs Police Report, 60-ish: British couple who boarded the train in Irkutsk. Friendly and talkative, Mrs. P.R. chatted endlessly about family, home life, travel plans, and more while Mr. P.R. was largely quiet. Required significant assistance in communicating their desire for a police report detailing the theft of a phone and wallet for insurance purposes.
Quote of the Week:
"My god, it is like a new culture between my toes. I think that soon they will discover fire!" --Ola, upon washing her feet. There were no showers on the train.
Or, with a nod to gallows humor, a dejected, "I've got blood on my soup."
Cast of Characters:
Free Agents
Angela, 22: Narrator, traveling solo to an internship in UB.
Ola, 21: An erstwhile runway model from Poland with a don't-mess-with-me attitude. Declined an opportunity to join the fashion world in Milan in favor of pursuing her education. Travels with an impressive array of instant soups and desserts and an abundance of bad luck. Traveling to Ulaanbaatar for an exchange program featuring a year's worth of Mongolian language classes. Adores all things Japanese.
Vodka Train-ers
Cat, 21: Student from North London. Making a movie about time travel, using the crossing of time zones as a metaphor. Had 3 parties when she turned 21, one of which involved renting out one of London's top clubs and spending $4000 on alcohol. Denys being rich.
Paddy and Amish, 19: Scottish friends, traveling together. Their accents get thicker with each drink, and after a few no one can understand them save the other one.
Melissa and Rick, 24 and 25: A couple from Manchester, met at a party at age 15 when she was completely wasted and he took care of her. Have been together ever since. Taking time off from their jobs as an accountant and a lawyer, respectively. One week into a full year of traveling together.
Alex and Angus, 21-ish: Australian best buddies since childhood. Alex bears an impressive resemblance to Harry Potter. Seemed quite intent on getting in Cat's pants. Wonder if he succeeded?
The Aussie Tour
The Ugly
The Un-Ugly Wife: Traveling with her husband, The Ugly Aussie, but never stooping to his level. Largely quite, featuring a long-suffering expression.
The Little Bigot, also late 50s: Occupied his time spinning theories about how "you think they would at least learn some English" and about how "the fat one" must be in charge of the rest of the traders.
Crazy Party Mom: Known for her raunchy humor and good-time habits. Married to The Little Bigot. Enjoys sharing a story about how she used to have a tattoo on the top of her inner thigh, but her "pussy ate it." Said story was accompanied by a pulling down of her pants and underwear to expose said area of her anatomy. This took place about a foot from the face of:
The Desperate Son, mid-to-late 20s: Radiates an air of desperation for peers, especially of the male pal variety. Dubbed "such an ultimate lad" by those who have any idea what that would mean.
The Quiet Swedish Wife: Married to The Desperate Son, she is indeed quiet and Swedish. One has to wonder how she feels about traveling with such in-laws.
The Latecomers
Mr and Mrs Police Report, 60-ish: British couple who boarded the train in Irkutsk. Friendly and talkative, Mrs. P.R. chatted endlessly about family, home life, travel plans, and more while Mr. P.R. was largely quiet. Required significant assistance in communicating their desire for a police report detailing the theft of a phone and wallet for insurance purposes.
Quote of the Week:
"My god, it is like a new culture between my toes. I think that soon they will discover fire!" --Ola, upon washing her feet. There were no showers on the train.
Or, with a nod to gallows humor, a dejected, "I've got blood on my soup."
Riding the Rails
Five days is a long time to be on a train. I understood this as an abstract concept as I planned my trip from home, but the concept only solidified into reality during the 100-plus hours of my journey. A lot can happen in five days. A lot of nothing can also happen in five days on a train. There is plenty of time for both.
After we had been underway for a while and the tickets had been collected and belongings stowed, it was time to explore my new little world. I was heartened to learn that the blustering fellow would not be the only English-speaking person along for the ride. Instead, I found a group of 7 people of approximately my own age in my very own carriage. They were from England, Scotland, and Australia and ranged in age from 19 to 24. They were doing an organized tour called The Vodka Train, and they were predictably in the mood for a good time. The first evening, they shared both their good spirits and their clear spirits with me. I had a blast discovering what drinking games are like in their parts of the world (answer: they always seem to involve lots of yelling/loud singing) and chatting about what had brought each of us to this train car through Siberia.
At some point, the loud fellow next door came and pulled me aside, asking if I knew what was going on in my room. I went to check it out, finding that the owner of the handbags had taken up residence there. My would-be protector worried about whether this Mongolian truly was assigned to my cabin, but I wasn’t worried. This guy spoke a bit of English, and we bonded over a mutual annoyance at the antics of Mr. Loud.
The Brits, Aussies, and I decided to explore the train a bit more together, and that’s when we found Ola. She was furiously smoking a cigarette in the area between two of the cars, and she replied with equal ferocity to someone’s question of whether she was Russian. Ola is Polish, and does not at all appreciate being taken for a Russian. Ola, as it turns out, is also perhaps the most unlucky person to ever ride the rails from Moscow to UB. As she was boarding the train, her phone was stolen. Not only was this an item of material value, but it also contained all of her pictures from a lengthy trip to Japan and the contact numbers she needed to use upon reaching Ulaanbaatar to get in touch with the faculty who arranged her year-long educational exchange to the National University of Mongolia. The thief had passed the stolen phone to his compatriots, and police let him go after ascertaining that he did not have it on him. In addition to an unhappy Ola, we also found a car of Russians that we were not welcome in and a dining car were a glowering fellow snapped, “What do YOU want?” as we passed through.
Right around this point, the monotony set in. There comes a point when the typical small talk has all been exhausted, and yet the level of contact is too casual to afford the chance to dig deeper without feeling like you are prying. This led to seemingly endless rounds of asking each other what we had been up to, with the obvious answers being either reading, sleeping, or eating. I divided my time mainly between watching the forests of rod-straight trees pass and hungrily devouring the books I had brought along. This routine was occasionally broken by stops at stations, which ranged from less than 5 minutes to around 25 minutes at the longest. At these stops, traders like the man I was sharing a room with would flock to the platform and hawk their wares.
I got to know my cabin mate a bit better. He informed me that his name was Choy, which I thought a bit strange for a Mongolian. He seemed quite embarrassed by his line of work, repeatedly asserting that he was unable to find a job in Mongolia and he had a baby to feed back home. He bought me ice cream and made me tea. Then, in the night, he covered me with his blanket. After that, he touched me. I will never know if he was innocently tucking the blanket around me or if his motives were less pure. There was no groping, and it wasn’t anywhere on my body that would prove his actions unambiguously impure. He was such a genuinely nice person that I have decided to think the best of this situation, but I still left immediately and bunked with Ola thereafter.
The following day was pretty much the same as any other, until it wasn’t. I had spent most of the day in Ola’s cabin, talking and watching as the scenery rolled past. She was gracious enough to share with me a Polish dessert called liquid jelly, which turned out to be quite tasty, if unusually-textured. In the evening, we sought out the Vodka Train folks to see what they were up to. We decided to join them for a few drinks, and at some point Ola slipped out to get something to eat. The next time I saw her, she was bursting into the room covered in blood, verging on hysterics as she told us that she had almost been raped.
She had fallen asleep, she said, after eating a sandwich in her cabin. She awoke to find a man in her room, touching her and trying to undo her pants. He had also taken off her money belt, which contained her passport. She pulled out a knife she had taken to carrying after her phone was stolen and refused to let the man go unless he returned her passport. At some point, she bit his arm and cut him several times about the arms and neck. A cleaning lady alerted the police, who arrived and confiscated her knife.
She left the door unlocked for me. Because she expected me to be coming to bed. If I hadn’t asked to stay with her, she would have locked it. Because of me, she didn’t.
That night, we all jumped into overdrive. We had to do something, but what was there to do? One member of the group got on the phone to his lawyer parents, and we did what we could to comfort Ola. Eventually, filled with tension and uncertainty, we all fell asleep in one of their cabins. Ola slept on their spare bed, and I spread my sleeping bag out on the floor.
Ola wanted her knife back. It was a relief to have a concrete goal that we had a chance of accomplishing. She and I set out to find the policemen who had taken it, and we soon found ourselves in the middle of a full-blown police interview. “What would you have done if you had killed this man?” What kind of a question is that? Did they expect her to say that she'd have chucked the body out the window and carried on with her nap? Ola is shaking, and I take her hand. I think about everything I have learned, read, or seen about re-victimization. The room fills with more and more men who stare at Ola as she recounts her tale. She keeps her eyes on her lap or toward the lone female officer in attendance. She rearranges the band of fabric she has wound around her watch to deter thieves, trying in vain to conceal the dark brown bloodstains that cover not only this fabric but also that of her shirt and pants. She is terrified that she will be sent to prison, and I promise not to leave her alone to such a fate.
In the end, we were told that it would be too dangerous to return the knife now, but that they will give it back when we reach Ulaanbaatar. They feared she would track down her attacker and kill him. “What do you want to do to this man now?” they asked.
We returned to my carriage, now hers as well. My Mongolian friend had disembarked, so we had my room to ourselves. Hours passed, and eventually there was sleep. There was no party that night.
I awoke early, thrilled to find that we were passing Lake Baikal. The endless expanse of water, sparsely populated by fishermen in rowboats, was a mesmerizing sight. There is so much beauty in our imperfect world.
I emerged to find that we had acquired new neighbors in the night. The first thing I did was help them deal with the police to get a report written about the phone and wallet that had been stolen as they got on the train. The police clearly recognized me. I wonder if by that point they figured I was running some sort of an insurance scam. They were very polite; the report was written and they even asked me how Ola was doing.
Bu the final day on the train, we had all become quite adept at waiting. We waited, of course, for the train to arrive in Ulaanbaatar. We waited for the next station at which the train would stop, and then we waited to get underway again. We waited to get together in the evening, and we waited until everyone woke up in the morning. But none of this prepared me for the level of waiting I was to experience that day.
I spent the early part of the day waiting to reach the Russian border with Mongolia. When this finally happened, it meant several hours of suspended animation. We sat in semi-darkness, curtains drawn across the windows to obscure our surroundings, which we were told were "confidential." We were given forms to fill out, and we sat for hours waiting for someone to collect them. Finally, after each passenger's form was stamped not once, not twice, but but FIVE times and a cursory search of the cabins showed no concealed cannons or ax murders, we were on our way. This meant we crossed a forbidding no-man's land into Mongolia, where we were subjected to more forms and more waiting. A few hours later, we were on our way again. After one last hurrah with the Vodka Train group, I packed the last of my things and fell asleep, to awaken a few hours later as the train pulled into the station at Ulaanbaatar.
I made it!
After we had been underway for a while and the tickets had been collected and belongings stowed, it was time to explore my new little world. I was heartened to learn that the blustering fellow would not be the only English-speaking person along for the ride. Instead, I found a group of 7 people of approximately my own age in my very own carriage. They were from England, Scotland, and Australia and ranged in age from 19 to 24. They were doing an organized tour called The Vodka Train, and they were predictably in the mood for a good time. The first evening, they shared both their good spirits and their clear spirits with me. I had a blast discovering what drinking games are like in their parts of the world (answer: they always seem to involve lots of yelling/loud singing) and chatting about what had brought each of us to this train car through Siberia.
At some point, the loud fellow next door came and pulled me aside, asking if I knew what was going on in my room. I went to check it out, finding that the owner of the handbags had taken up residence there. My would-be protector worried about whether this Mongolian truly was assigned to my cabin, but I wasn’t worried. This guy spoke a bit of English, and we bonded over a mutual annoyance at the antics of Mr. Loud.
The Brits, Aussies, and I decided to explore the train a bit more together, and that’s when we found Ola. She was furiously smoking a cigarette in the area between two of the cars, and she replied with equal ferocity to someone’s question of whether she was Russian. Ola is Polish, and does not at all appreciate being taken for a Russian. Ola, as it turns out, is also perhaps the most unlucky person to ever ride the rails from Moscow to UB. As she was boarding the train, her phone was stolen. Not only was this an item of material value, but it also contained all of her pictures from a lengthy trip to Japan and the contact numbers she needed to use upon reaching Ulaanbaatar to get in touch with the faculty who arranged her year-long educational exchange to the National University of Mongolia. The thief had passed the stolen phone to his compatriots, and police let him go after ascertaining that he did not have it on him. In addition to an unhappy Ola, we also found a car of Russians that we were not welcome in and a dining car were a glowering fellow snapped, “What do YOU want?” as we passed through.
Right around this point, the monotony set in. There comes a point when the typical small talk has all been exhausted, and yet the level of contact is too casual to afford the chance to dig deeper without feeling like you are prying. This led to seemingly endless rounds of asking each other what we had been up to, with the obvious answers being either reading, sleeping, or eating. I divided my time mainly between watching the forests of rod-straight trees pass and hungrily devouring the books I had brought along. This routine was occasionally broken by stops at stations, which ranged from less than 5 minutes to around 25 minutes at the longest. At these stops, traders like the man I was sharing a room with would flock to the platform and hawk their wares.
I got to know my cabin mate a bit better. He informed me that his name was Choy, which I thought a bit strange for a Mongolian. He seemed quite embarrassed by his line of work, repeatedly asserting that he was unable to find a job in Mongolia and he had a baby to feed back home. He bought me ice cream and made me tea. Then, in the night, he covered me with his blanket. After that, he touched me. I will never know if he was innocently tucking the blanket around me or if his motives were less pure. There was no groping, and it wasn’t anywhere on my body that would prove his actions unambiguously impure. He was such a genuinely nice person that I have decided to think the best of this situation, but I still left immediately and bunked with Ola thereafter.
The following day was pretty much the same as any other, until it wasn’t. I had spent most of the day in Ola’s cabin, talking and watching as the scenery rolled past. She was gracious enough to share with me a Polish dessert called liquid jelly, which turned out to be quite tasty, if unusually-textured. In the evening, we sought out the Vodka Train folks to see what they were up to. We decided to join them for a few drinks, and at some point Ola slipped out to get something to eat. The next time I saw her, she was bursting into the room covered in blood, verging on hysterics as she told us that she had almost been raped.
She had fallen asleep, she said, after eating a sandwich in her cabin. She awoke to find a man in her room, touching her and trying to undo her pants. He had also taken off her money belt, which contained her passport. She pulled out a knife she had taken to carrying after her phone was stolen and refused to let the man go unless he returned her passport. At some point, she bit his arm and cut him several times about the arms and neck. A cleaning lady alerted the police, who arrived and confiscated her knife.
She left the door unlocked for me. Because she expected me to be coming to bed. If I hadn’t asked to stay with her, she would have locked it. Because of me, she didn’t.
That night, we all jumped into overdrive. We had to do something, but what was there to do? One member of the group got on the phone to his lawyer parents, and we did what we could to comfort Ola. Eventually, filled with tension and uncertainty, we all fell asleep in one of their cabins. Ola slept on their spare bed, and I spread my sleeping bag out on the floor.
Ola wanted her knife back. It was a relief to have a concrete goal that we had a chance of accomplishing. She and I set out to find the policemen who had taken it, and we soon found ourselves in the middle of a full-blown police interview. “What would you have done if you had killed this man?” What kind of a question is that? Did they expect her to say that she'd have chucked the body out the window and carried on with her nap? Ola is shaking, and I take her hand. I think about everything I have learned, read, or seen about re-victimization. The room fills with more and more men who stare at Ola as she recounts her tale. She keeps her eyes on her lap or toward the lone female officer in attendance. She rearranges the band of fabric she has wound around her watch to deter thieves, trying in vain to conceal the dark brown bloodstains that cover not only this fabric but also that of her shirt and pants. She is terrified that she will be sent to prison, and I promise not to leave her alone to such a fate.
In the end, we were told that it would be too dangerous to return the knife now, but that they will give it back when we reach Ulaanbaatar. They feared she would track down her attacker and kill him. “What do you want to do to this man now?” they asked.
We returned to my carriage, now hers as well. My Mongolian friend had disembarked, so we had my room to ourselves. Hours passed, and eventually there was sleep. There was no party that night.
I awoke early, thrilled to find that we were passing Lake Baikal. The endless expanse of water, sparsely populated by fishermen in rowboats, was a mesmerizing sight. There is so much beauty in our imperfect world.
I emerged to find that we had acquired new neighbors in the night. The first thing I did was help them deal with the police to get a report written about the phone and wallet that had been stolen as they got on the train. The police clearly recognized me. I wonder if by that point they figured I was running some sort of an insurance scam. They were very polite; the report was written and they even asked me how Ola was doing.
Bu the final day on the train, we had all become quite adept at waiting. We waited, of course, for the train to arrive in Ulaanbaatar. We waited for the next station at which the train would stop, and then we waited to get underway again. We waited to get together in the evening, and we waited until everyone woke up in the morning. But none of this prepared me for the level of waiting I was to experience that day.
I spent the early part of the day waiting to reach the Russian border with Mongolia. When this finally happened, it meant several hours of suspended animation. We sat in semi-darkness, curtains drawn across the windows to obscure our surroundings, which we were told were "confidential." We were given forms to fill out, and we sat for hours waiting for someone to collect them. Finally, after each passenger's form was stamped not once, not twice, but but FIVE times and a cursory search of the cabins showed no concealed cannons or ax murders, we were on our way. This meant we crossed a forbidding no-man's land into Mongolia, where we were subjected to more forms and more waiting. A few hours later, we were on our way again. After one last hurrah with the Vodka Train group, I packed the last of my things and fell asleep, to awaken a few hours later as the train pulled into the station at Ulaanbaatar.
I made it!
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Passenger in train-ing
I sat at the train station, waiting for the airport-like signs to tell me which platform I would be departing from. (Not that I knew the locations of any of the platforms.) I had gotten to the station a full three hours or more before my departure time, driven there by what I can assume was a family friend of my host’s; a taxi driver who refused payment for his services. This long-term, sedentary waiting was an odd conclusion to my time in Moscow. My gracious host Sveta insisted on waiting with me, maintaining that I would need help getting my luggage onto the train. I hated the thought of her spending hours twiddling her thumbs at the station waiting to help me carry bags that I had already managed to get halfway around the world largely on my own. I also didn’t want us to remember each other that way; each wishing we were somewhere else, smiling nervously at each other after all areas of small talk had been exhausted and no new topics presented themselves. But just how hard can you push in insisting that someone leave you and go away?
Eventually, my mild insistences and the reality of the situation prevailed, and I said goodbye to Sveta. And finally, all this waiting paid off and it was time to hurry off to my platform, which turned out to be quite far away. Not only that; I was assigned a berth in carriage #3, which meant I had to make my way past 15 carriages once I had reached my platform. Glancing nervously at the time throughout, I finally made it on board with just under 10 minutes remaining before the train was scheduled to depart.
The first thing I noticed about the train was how many Mongolians were on board. I had expected riders to be predominantly Russian, with a few Mongolians and foreigners rounding things out. I was thrilled; the Russians I had met had all been kind and helpful people, but I felt I could relate better to Mongolians. The second thing I noticed was an immensely unpleasant Australian who would be living a couple of doors down from me. He filled the carriage with his loud blustering about whatever displeased him, which incidentally seemed to be pretty much everything. The accommodations weren’t luxurious enough, there was too much activity as people bustled around, why didn’t his room have a private bathroom? He was an absolute caricature of the Ugly American (right down to the prodigious waistline), and I immediately worried that I was going to be associated with him simply by being an English-speaking person.
As the train filled with people, it also filled with merchandise. As it turns out, this particular train is a bit of a shopping mall on wheels. Great parcels of purses, clothing, and foodstuffs were hefted on board. These were parceled out and distributed across whole carriages, to my intrigued amusement and to the great displeasure of my vociferous neighbor. Once things settled down, I found myself alone in my compartment, but for the company of an impressive number of vinyl handbags. As the train slowly began to roll out of the station, I took one last look at Moscow, obscured as it was by the night. Excitement and trepidation warred within me for pride of place. Excitement won out, and I grinned widely as Moscow slid into darkness.
Eventually, my mild insistences and the reality of the situation prevailed, and I said goodbye to Sveta. And finally, all this waiting paid off and it was time to hurry off to my platform, which turned out to be quite far away. Not only that; I was assigned a berth in carriage #3, which meant I had to make my way past 15 carriages once I had reached my platform. Glancing nervously at the time throughout, I finally made it on board with just under 10 minutes remaining before the train was scheduled to depart.
The first thing I noticed about the train was how many Mongolians were on board. I had expected riders to be predominantly Russian, with a few Mongolians and foreigners rounding things out. I was thrilled; the Russians I had met had all been kind and helpful people, but I felt I could relate better to Mongolians. The second thing I noticed was an immensely unpleasant Australian who would be living a couple of doors down from me. He filled the carriage with his loud blustering about whatever displeased him, which incidentally seemed to be pretty much everything. The accommodations weren’t luxurious enough, there was too much activity as people bustled around, why didn’t his room have a private bathroom? He was an absolute caricature of the Ugly American (right down to the prodigious waistline), and I immediately worried that I was going to be associated with him simply by being an English-speaking person.
As the train filled with people, it also filled with merchandise. As it turns out, this particular train is a bit of a shopping mall on wheels. Great parcels of purses, clothing, and foodstuffs were hefted on board. These were parceled out and distributed across whole carriages, to my intrigued amusement and to the great displeasure of my vociferous neighbor. Once things settled down, I found myself alone in my compartment, but for the company of an impressive number of vinyl handbags. As the train slowly began to roll out of the station, I took one last look at Moscow, obscured as it was by the night. Excitement and trepidation warred within me for pride of place. Excitement won out, and I grinned widely as Moscow slid into darkness.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Moscow
Moscow: The city where everyone is perpetually in the biggest freaking hurry of their lives.
I'm afraid I don't really "get" Moscow. I also have the distinct impression that I could spend a month, a year, or even a decade in Moscow and still not get it.
The first thing that surprised me about Moscow was the scope of its sprawl. Now, I don't just mean that it's a big city, because I was fully aware of that. What I mean is that it is by far the most spread-out city I have ever seen. There are relatively large patches of forest in this city that is significantly larger than NYC. There were always constant throngs of Russians milling about, but I still couldn't help but wonder, where are all the people? Where do they live? Work? Shop? I suppose I was expecting a city like a turbo-charged Chicago or New York, and what I found was a Russian village that had eaten one of Lewis Carroll's enlarging cakes.
I did a lot while I was in Moscow. I was always rushing, power-walking, half-jogging to keep up the pace. There was nary a moment when I wasn't entirely occupied, from the moment I woke up in the morning to when I fell into bed at night, exhausted.
I can't say I really did anything in Moscow. My visit to the Kremlin consisted of a brisk walk from one side of Red Square to the other. I found myself whisked through a dizzying array of opulent Metro stations (seriously, google "moscow metro" photos), admiring or puzzling over each one for a scant moment before rushing to catch up with Sveta. A visit to a park with Catherine the Great's palaces (at least that's what I gathered it was) meant a power-walk on the circular path around the park. I'm not sure I could even recreate a chronological listing of my Moscow adventures (and I doubt anyone would want to read such a thing anyway), so I will give some bullet points about what I did.
I ate something called "ploff." Twice. To fully appreciate the unappetizing sound of this word, make sure to imagine it said with a thickly-accented Russian "o." It consists of seasoned rice with chunks of meat. Verdict: tasty!
I rode the Metro. Each station is decorated in a unique and impressive way, with mosaics, marble tile, and chandeliers. Some stations still feature amusing odes to communism. I was pleasantly surprised to find that transfers between lines do not require additional tickets. I was also pleasantly surprised and greatly relieved to find that descending down escalators well over a hundred feet into the bowels of the earth did not bring about the claustrophobic panic that I had been fearing. Verdict: an absolute pleasure!
I drank a 6-dollar-plus latte. I had read about Moscow being an expensive city, but the prices for everything were still pretty unbelievable, especially considering that the average Russian isn't exactly rolling in the dough. Verdict: watery, so not worth it.
I (kinda) saw Red Square. It was neither red nor square. It also happened to be filled with bleachers and a stage for an upcoming event. Verdict: TBD
I ate at Subway. My host wanted to grab sandwiches, so we did. I'm still not sure if she prefers Americanized food or if she thought I would want to go there. My sandwich came with little chunks of pressed chicken and raw bacon. Verdict: *shiver*
I watched Heroes. My host is a huge fan of the first season, but has a passionate disdain for subsequent seasons. At least now I know why everyone a few years back was saying "Save the cheerleader, save the world." Verdict: addictive
I learned that Starbucks in Moscow has gotten "too Russian" and is therefore no longer a good place to work. Verdict: ???
I ate Okroshka. It is a cold soup made from a drink called kvass, itself made from fermented rye bread. The version I tried was vegetarian, with small bits of cucumber and other crunchy veggies along with a heaping portion of dried dill. I tried very hard to come up with something to compare the taste to but failed utterly. The closest approximation I could imagine was that if gut cramps had a taste, this would be it. Verdict: ghastly
Overall verdict: Utter confusion I'm still not entirely sure whether I enjoyed Moscow. My host was a wonderful person, everyone I met was very kind, but somehow... I fly home from there, so I'm thinking of spending another few days there at the end of my travels to solidify my response.
I'm afraid I don't really "get" Moscow. I also have the distinct impression that I could spend a month, a year, or even a decade in Moscow and still not get it.
The first thing that surprised me about Moscow was the scope of its sprawl. Now, I don't just mean that it's a big city, because I was fully aware of that. What I mean is that it is by far the most spread-out city I have ever seen. There are relatively large patches of forest in this city that is significantly larger than NYC. There were always constant throngs of Russians milling about, but I still couldn't help but wonder, where are all the people? Where do they live? Work? Shop? I suppose I was expecting a city like a turbo-charged Chicago or New York, and what I found was a Russian village that had eaten one of Lewis Carroll's enlarging cakes.
I did a lot while I was in Moscow. I was always rushing, power-walking, half-jogging to keep up the pace. There was nary a moment when I wasn't entirely occupied, from the moment I woke up in the morning to when I fell into bed at night, exhausted.
I can't say I really did anything in Moscow. My visit to the Kremlin consisted of a brisk walk from one side of Red Square to the other. I found myself whisked through a dizzying array of opulent Metro stations (seriously, google "moscow metro" photos), admiring or puzzling over each one for a scant moment before rushing to catch up with Sveta. A visit to a park with Catherine the Great's palaces (at least that's what I gathered it was) meant a power-walk on the circular path around the park. I'm not sure I could even recreate a chronological listing of my Moscow adventures (and I doubt anyone would want to read such a thing anyway), so I will give some bullet points about what I did.
I ate something called "ploff." Twice. To fully appreciate the unappetizing sound of this word, make sure to imagine it said with a thickly-accented Russian "o." It consists of seasoned rice with chunks of meat. Verdict: tasty!
I rode the Metro. Each station is decorated in a unique and impressive way, with mosaics, marble tile, and chandeliers. Some stations still feature amusing odes to communism. I was pleasantly surprised to find that transfers between lines do not require additional tickets. I was also pleasantly surprised and greatly relieved to find that descending down escalators well over a hundred feet into the bowels of the earth did not bring about the claustrophobic panic that I had been fearing. Verdict: an absolute pleasure!
I drank a 6-dollar-plus latte. I had read about Moscow being an expensive city, but the prices for everything were still pretty unbelievable, especially considering that the average Russian isn't exactly rolling in the dough. Verdict: watery, so not worth it.
I (kinda) saw Red Square. It was neither red nor square. It also happened to be filled with bleachers and a stage for an upcoming event. Verdict: TBD
I ate at Subway. My host wanted to grab sandwiches, so we did. I'm still not sure if she prefers Americanized food or if she thought I would want to go there. My sandwich came with little chunks of pressed chicken and raw bacon. Verdict: *shiver*
I watched Heroes. My host is a huge fan of the first season, but has a passionate disdain for subsequent seasons. At least now I know why everyone a few years back was saying "Save the cheerleader, save the world." Verdict: addictive
I learned that Starbucks in Moscow has gotten "too Russian" and is therefore no longer a good place to work. Verdict: ???
I ate Okroshka. It is a cold soup made from a drink called kvass, itself made from fermented rye bread. The version I tried was vegetarian, with small bits of cucumber and other crunchy veggies along with a heaping portion of dried dill. I tried very hard to come up with something to compare the taste to but failed utterly. The closest approximation I could imagine was that if gut cramps had a taste, this would be it. Verdict: ghastly
Overall verdict: Utter confusion I'm still not entirely sure whether I enjoyed Moscow. My host was a wonderful person, everyone I met was very kind, but somehow... I fly home from there, so I'm thinking of spending another few days there at the end of my travels to solidify my response.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
A quick note on douchebaggery
I am going to be away from home for 4 months. I have to exist in weather from the high 70 F to around -40. I have a sleeping bag that takes up almost an entire large bag by itself. I have a lot of luggage.
The average person goes away for perhaps one or two weeks. This generally does not require clothing for a wide range of temperatures, various gifts for host families, food for a 5-day train ride, or a sleeping bag rated for -40 degrees.
Some people do travel with vast wardrobes, hairstyling appliances, and god knows what else packed into overflowing suitcases. These people are (generally) douchebags.
When I am in possession of said copious and voluminous luggage, I feel like the biggest douchebag on the planet. I feel this compulsion to tell everyone I meet about the peculiar circumstances of my luggage.
But I can't. So I guess I'm just another douchebag American in the eyes of the world.
The average person goes away for perhaps one or two weeks. This generally does not require clothing for a wide range of temperatures, various gifts for host families, food for a 5-day train ride, or a sleeping bag rated for -40 degrees.
Some people do travel with vast wardrobes, hairstyling appliances, and god knows what else packed into overflowing suitcases. These people are (generally) douchebags.
When I am in possession of said copious and voluminous luggage, I feel like the biggest douchebag on the planet. I feel this compulsion to tell everyone I meet about the peculiar circumstances of my luggage.
But I can't. So I guess I'm just another douchebag American in the eyes of the world.
I have always depended on the kindness of strangers…
I have come to the conclusion that people, in general, rock. Sure there are some bad apples here and there, but generally...I'd have to go with total rock-age.
Let me explain how I have come to this conclusion. First, I suppose a bit of background is in order. At this point in my travels, I had just arrived in Moscow. Let's just say that Russians in general, and Muscovites in particular, are not known for their friendly, helpful attitude toward foreigners (or pretty much anyone, for that matter.)
Before I tell you about the supreme awesomeness of humanity, I need to explain the decidedly un-awesome state of the arrival procedures at the airport in Moscow. After landing, we were all herded off the plane. The people who were continuing on to Singapore had to find a special transfer gate, and the rest of us had to do...something else. What might that be, you ask? Well, that's a very good question. Apparently it involves filling out a form (in duplicate, of course) and then standing in a long line to present one's passport along with said form to an official in a little booth. Sounds simple, right? Well imagine that the forms are not in an obvious place, and that the assorted lines to various booths are all labeled with different colors and different phrases in Russian. Also keep in mind that you, dear traveler, speak no Russian apart from "yes" "no" and "thanks." Not what I would call the easiest arrival procedure ever.
So I managed to randomly select an acceptable line, and I even found a very nice American student to chat with. He will be spending a year studying in Irkutsk. It makes my 4 months away from home seem paltry when compared to spending an entire year without access to all the people and amenities one relies on at home. I handed over my forms, got my passport stamped, and it was time to reclaim my bags. Once again, I found that this was easier said than done. The names of the cities from which the flights had arrived were written in Cyrillic characters, and the baggage claim area was packed with people standing shoulder to shoulder. When I finally reached the correct carousel (down a hallway away from all the others, by the way), a flashing red sign was announcing "last call" for reclaiming baggage. I go to my bag just as an airport employee was reaching to remove it from the belt and take it god knows where. Disaster averted!
I collected my voluminous luggage and headed for customs. Having nothing to declare, I just walked through the doors into the non-secured portion of the airport. I noticed that anyone who looked remotely non-white was being subjected to bag x-rays and/or further searches. I guess this is what it feels like to be in Arizona.
In the outer portion of the airport, I encountered another crush of people. Several people approached me to try to convince me that I needed a taxi or someone to carry my luggage. Some of them looked a bit dodgy, and I was aware of my vulnerability as a lone female with two big bags and not knowledge of the language. I obviously needed money, so I headed for an ATM, only to find that my credit card company was blocking my transactions even though I had alerted them that I would be traveling abroad. Fortunately, I had some cash to exchange.
With some Rubles in my pocket, I set out to find a phone to use to contact my host. After a goodly serving of fruitless wandering, I asked a family that I recognized from the plane for help. They turned out to be Americans originally from Moscow, and they were absolutely fantastic. They told me that if there were any public phones around, they would require phone cards, but they offered to let me make my call on their cell phone. I got in touch with Sveta, and we made some overly-broad and confusing plans on where, how, and when to meet. My saviors with the phone still weren't through; they not only explained to me how best to reach the location Sveta had chosen but also helped me find the bus that formed the first leg of that journey.
On the bus, another kind stranger helped welcome me to Moscow. Her English was quite good, and we discussed the differences and similarities of her life and mine. She was astonished that we have mushrooms in America, and I was equally astonished that she is able to gather them within a city of over 12 million people. I got off the bus and managed to lug my bags down a long flight of stairs into the Metro. As I stood in front of the ticked booth, clearly flabbergasted, another kind soul helped me buy a ticket for the number of rides I wanted.
I was still confused about what connections I was going to have to make, so I approached some other tourist-y looking folks for help. They weren't much more familiar with the system than I, but they gave me a map of the Metro that proved very useful. The next person I asked circled the stations where I would have to make connections. When my bag wouldn't fit through the turnstile, yet another person jumped in to help me by pointing me through a larger space and carrying one of my bags for me. When I showed him on the map where I was heading, he helped me find the right train and then even insisted on accompanying me through all 3 line changes! He took me to the last train I needed to find, where yet another person noticed that I clearly lacked confidence on the Metro. She helped me with my bags and even phoned Sveta to find out which of the two exits she was waiting for me at!
As I headed up the stairs to meet my host, herself a stranger who had agreed to let me stay with her and learn about her city, I couldn't help but be amazed at how much people freaking rock. (Ok, maybe not so much those who design airports, but pretty much the rest of the population.) Thanks to all these amazing people and their random acts of kindness, what could have been a very stressful nightmare of an introduction to Moscow was instead a life-affirming experience. So yeah. YAY PEOPLE!
Let me explain how I have come to this conclusion. First, I suppose a bit of background is in order. At this point in my travels, I had just arrived in Moscow. Let's just say that Russians in general, and Muscovites in particular, are not known for their friendly, helpful attitude toward foreigners (or pretty much anyone, for that matter.)
Before I tell you about the supreme awesomeness of humanity, I need to explain the decidedly un-awesome state of the arrival procedures at the airport in Moscow. After landing, we were all herded off the plane. The people who were continuing on to Singapore had to find a special transfer gate, and the rest of us had to do...something else. What might that be, you ask? Well, that's a very good question. Apparently it involves filling out a form (in duplicate, of course) and then standing in a long line to present one's passport along with said form to an official in a little booth. Sounds simple, right? Well imagine that the forms are not in an obvious place, and that the assorted lines to various booths are all labeled with different colors and different phrases in Russian. Also keep in mind that you, dear traveler, speak no Russian apart from "yes" "no" and "thanks." Not what I would call the easiest arrival procedure ever.
So I managed to randomly select an acceptable line, and I even found a very nice American student to chat with. He will be spending a year studying in Irkutsk. It makes my 4 months away from home seem paltry when compared to spending an entire year without access to all the people and amenities one relies on at home. I handed over my forms, got my passport stamped, and it was time to reclaim my bags. Once again, I found that this was easier said than done. The names of the cities from which the flights had arrived were written in Cyrillic characters, and the baggage claim area was packed with people standing shoulder to shoulder. When I finally reached the correct carousel (down a hallway away from all the others, by the way), a flashing red sign was announcing "last call" for reclaiming baggage. I go to my bag just as an airport employee was reaching to remove it from the belt and take it god knows where. Disaster averted!
I collected my voluminous luggage and headed for customs. Having nothing to declare, I just walked through the doors into the non-secured portion of the airport. I noticed that anyone who looked remotely non-white was being subjected to bag x-rays and/or further searches. I guess this is what it feels like to be in Arizona.
In the outer portion of the airport, I encountered another crush of people. Several people approached me to try to convince me that I needed a taxi or someone to carry my luggage. Some of them looked a bit dodgy, and I was aware of my vulnerability as a lone female with two big bags and not knowledge of the language. I obviously needed money, so I headed for an ATM, only to find that my credit card company was blocking my transactions even though I had alerted them that I would be traveling abroad. Fortunately, I had some cash to exchange.
With some Rubles in my pocket, I set out to find a phone to use to contact my host. After a goodly serving of fruitless wandering, I asked a family that I recognized from the plane for help. They turned out to be Americans originally from Moscow, and they were absolutely fantastic. They told me that if there were any public phones around, they would require phone cards, but they offered to let me make my call on their cell phone. I got in touch with Sveta, and we made some overly-broad and confusing plans on where, how, and when to meet. My saviors with the phone still weren't through; they not only explained to me how best to reach the location Sveta had chosen but also helped me find the bus that formed the first leg of that journey.
On the bus, another kind stranger helped welcome me to Moscow. Her English was quite good, and we discussed the differences and similarities of her life and mine. She was astonished that we have mushrooms in America, and I was equally astonished that she is able to gather them within a city of over 12 million people. I got off the bus and managed to lug my bags down a long flight of stairs into the Metro. As I stood in front of the ticked booth, clearly flabbergasted, another kind soul helped me buy a ticket for the number of rides I wanted.
I was still confused about what connections I was going to have to make, so I approached some other tourist-y looking folks for help. They weren't much more familiar with the system than I, but they gave me a map of the Metro that proved very useful. The next person I asked circled the stations where I would have to make connections. When my bag wouldn't fit through the turnstile, yet another person jumped in to help me by pointing me through a larger space and carrying one of my bags for me. When I showed him on the map where I was heading, he helped me find the right train and then even insisted on accompanying me through all 3 line changes! He took me to the last train I needed to find, where yet another person noticed that I clearly lacked confidence on the Metro. She helped me with my bags and even phoned Sveta to find out which of the two exits she was waiting for me at!
As I headed up the stairs to meet my host, herself a stranger who had agreed to let me stay with her and learn about her city, I couldn't help but be amazed at how much people freaking rock. (Ok, maybe not so much those who design airports, but pretty much the rest of the population.) Thanks to all these amazing people and their random acts of kindness, what could have been a very stressful nightmare of an introduction to Moscow was instead a life-affirming experience. So yeah. YAY PEOPLE!
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Getting carried away
Now that I find myself with access to the internet for more than a few moments at a time, I can finally update all my adoring fans on what has transpired in the last week and a half. (And by "adoring fans," I mean the two people I assume will be reading this. Hi Mom! Hi Lindsey!) I'll try to lay things out chronologically, which means you will probably wind up reading it backwards. Ah, technology. Here goes: *deep breath*
After some hasty final packing, it was time for the long drive to the airport. I hugged my dad goodbye in the car to avoid parking fees, and then checked in and said a tearful goodbye to the rest of the family. After that, the MSP airport is mostly a blur in my memory. I made it to my flight without incident, save having to pay outrageously for my second bag and walk to the very farthest away gate. My plane was a tiny affair, with 2X2 seating and only 20-some rows. I had a very pleasant chat with my seatmate, a nurse from the Houston, TX area who had been visiting family scattered all over the country.
The layover at Houston was stressful to the max. I think whoever designed that airport should be condemned to wander for all eternity through its seemingly-nonsensical arrangement of gates scattered across various terminal buildings connected by various means of transport ("take the bus to terminal D, then the tram to terminal A2, from which you can reach A1 by skyway...you *might* be able to check in there.") Here begins my reliance on random folks more well-equipped than I to deal with whatever situation I found myself in; after asking directions what seemed like a thousand times, and walking up and down a few terminals, I finally found the counter I was looking for and found that, to my great relief, I could indeed check in there. By this point, boarding was scheduled to start in less than 15 minutes. I was surprised and thrilled to learn that there were still window seats available, so I wouldn't have to sit crammed between two strangers for the nearly 12-hour duration of the flight.
There was one last bit of excitement/potential scariness as I was boarding the plane. Police officers made us leave our bags on one side of the corridor and stand along the opposite wall as they brought a dog past to sniff everyone's luggage. The dog seemed very interested in one Asian fellow's bag, and he and his luggage were taken aside to be further searched. I wish there was some way to find out what happened to him; did he have something prohibited, or was it a fluke? The flight's final destination was Singapore after a refueling stop in Moscow, and my mom pointed out that if he was smuggling drugs he is quite lucky to have been caught in the US as opposed to in Singapore, where such actions carry the death penalty.
Once I was on the plane, it was all excitement of another variety. It turned out that my window seat had two (2!) windows, and that the plane was so sparsely populated that I had an entire bank of 3 seats to myself! The entire experience was delightfully luxurious. If you ever have the chance to fly with Singapore Air, do it! The hot towels they brought around before takeoff were only the first of many amenities throughout the flight. The individual entertainment screens provided access to a huge variety of new-release and classic movies, tv shows, video games, and music choices. The food was not only edible but actually featured dishes that I would be happy to receive in a restaurant. I was almost sorry to see the flight end.
But end it did...
After some hasty final packing, it was time for the long drive to the airport. I hugged my dad goodbye in the car to avoid parking fees, and then checked in and said a tearful goodbye to the rest of the family. After that, the MSP airport is mostly a blur in my memory. I made it to my flight without incident, save having to pay outrageously for my second bag and walk to the very farthest away gate. My plane was a tiny affair, with 2X2 seating and only 20-some rows. I had a very pleasant chat with my seatmate, a nurse from the Houston, TX area who had been visiting family scattered all over the country.
The layover at Houston was stressful to the max. I think whoever designed that airport should be condemned to wander for all eternity through its seemingly-nonsensical arrangement of gates scattered across various terminal buildings connected by various means of transport ("take the bus to terminal D, then the tram to terminal A2, from which you can reach A1 by skyway...you *might* be able to check in there.") Here begins my reliance on random folks more well-equipped than I to deal with whatever situation I found myself in; after asking directions what seemed like a thousand times, and walking up and down a few terminals, I finally found the counter I was looking for and found that, to my great relief, I could indeed check in there. By this point, boarding was scheduled to start in less than 15 minutes. I was surprised and thrilled to learn that there were still window seats available, so I wouldn't have to sit crammed between two strangers for the nearly 12-hour duration of the flight.
There was one last bit of excitement/potential scariness as I was boarding the plane. Police officers made us leave our bags on one side of the corridor and stand along the opposite wall as they brought a dog past to sniff everyone's luggage. The dog seemed very interested in one Asian fellow's bag, and he and his luggage were taken aside to be further searched. I wish there was some way to find out what happened to him; did he have something prohibited, or was it a fluke? The flight's final destination was Singapore after a refueling stop in Moscow, and my mom pointed out that if he was smuggling drugs he is quite lucky to have been caught in the US as opposed to in Singapore, where such actions carry the death penalty.
Once I was on the plane, it was all excitement of another variety. It turned out that my window seat had two (2!) windows, and that the plane was so sparsely populated that I had an entire bank of 3 seats to myself! The entire experience was delightfully luxurious. If you ever have the chance to fly with Singapore Air, do it! The hot towels they brought around before takeoff were only the first of many amenities throughout the flight. The individual entertainment screens provided access to a huge variety of new-release and classic movies, tv shows, video games, and music choices. The food was not only edible but actually featured dishes that I would be happy to receive in a restaurant. I was almost sorry to see the flight end.
But end it did...
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