The Trip from Hell
The Trans-Siberian Railroad has been called one of the wonders of the modern world. If you take the entire seven-day trip from Moscow to the Pacific shore, you travel 9,289 kilometers. Though we were going only from Beijing to Irkutsk, Siberia, this was a three-day adventure, and one that I’ll never forget. In fact, a few times I silently compared the train trip to something like a thousand nights in a Chinese prison or a Russian gulag, or akin to being stranded on the Gobi Desert without water.
Well, that’s exaggerating it a little-- it wasn’t that uncomfortable. The problem was we just didn’t know exactly what to expect when we first got on the train!
Boarding the train in Beijing, Jean and I found our little home away from home for the next three days. We checked out our little villa, a compartment for two, which contained about four square feet of available floor space, a little table set with China cups, one built-in seat and the two single sleeping bunks. We found a tiny closet they called a shower stall to be shared with the adjoining compartment. If you ran the cold water for a shower, you had to pull out a pipe from the sink, and the water ran out on to the floor and through a floor drain. (We decided we didn’t want to soak our slippers and were content to take sponge baths.)
Jean kindly offered to take the top bunk, which we labeled the second story because she had to climb up a narrow ladder and propel herself onto her bunk near the ceiling all in one movement.
We settled in for the long haul, little realizing what we’d face come the dead of night. But that’s jumping ahead too fast. We headed out across Inner Mongolia within China’s borders, with several all-too-quick sightings of the Great Wall winding through the mountains and soon found ourselves
crossing endless Gobi desert grasslands. We viewed our first delighted sightings of wild horses grazing on the sparse grass and wild Bactrian (two-humped) camels wandering over the empty land.
As night fell, it was announced we’d soon arrive at the first border crossing and would be leaving China.
That’s where the “fun” began.
Before the journey ended, we would
--cross the Chinese border;
--enter Mongolia over the Mongolian border;
--leave Mongolia over the Mongolian border;
--and cross into Siberia, Russia over the Siberian border.
Which you’d think wouldn’t be a big deal. As travelers, we’ve all crossed many borders via water, land, and air, right? Well, these crossings were like none we’d ever experienced—or ever hope to experience again. Each crossing was an ordeal taking place diabolically, it seemed, in the middle of the night. Warned that this would happen, we quickly agreed we’d better sleep in our clothes—which turned out to be a good idea.
It went something like this at each border. We’d go to bed, turn out the lights and try to go to sleep. In the dead of night, someone would pound on our locked door (we were told to keep the doors locked because of threats of robberies.)
When we opened the doors, two armed military type soldiers, male and female would snap on the light.
They would bark:
Get up. Get down (to Jean).
Stand in the corridor (on the Siberian border).
Show passport. Show visas.
All demanded in a stern military voice.
Scrutinizing each line of the passport and visa interminably, they checked off each item on their own sheets. They peered at our photos to make certain we were the really the right persons. They asked what was in my luggage—and seemed not to believe me when I answered “clothes.” They pulled up my bed and checked under it, opened every drawer, poked open ceiling panels---all in the effort to find hidden contraband, smuggled people, liquor—who knows what?
The search, compartment by compartment, took several hours, usually starting at midnight or 1 a.m. and lasting three to five full hours (on the Siberian border).
I forgot to mention one vital thing about this train trip. At every local or border stop, they locked the toilet (W.C., lavabo, bathroom—call it what you will). On this train there were two toilets, one at each end of a car, consisting of a western toilet--but with a hole in the floor through to thin
air.
So at each stop, there went the toilets. Locked indefinitely. And at the international borders that was for a very very long time! Five hours to be exact at the Siberian border. The trouble was that for the last 1 l/2 hours from 3 to 4:30 a.m. we understood they would soon be through, and several of us waited in the corridor of the stopped train not knowing how long it would take for them to catch the smugglers or stumble on contraband or whatever—and unlock the toilet! At one point, there was a violent commotion at the end of our car. We learned later they had caught our porter smuggling boxes of liquor into Siberia. They confiscated most of the liquor for themselves, we heard, but didn’t arrest the porter and left a few bottles for him, we guessed because he was still there in the morning. When you don’t know the language and dare not ask questions anyhow, you never really understand what’s happening!
After two nights and several of these border crossings, we were exhausted!
However, there’s much more to say about that train trip. Like about the three kinds of dining cars. They switched waiters and types of food and complete dining cars as each border--we’d go to the dining car and find first Chinese, then Mongolian, then Russian food and service. But the food turned out much the same way—pretty much edible but mediocre and not too appetizing. But I was already prepared not to eat any uncooked vegetable or peeled fruit anyhow. So it didn’t bother me.
As the train rumbled along across endless desert landscapes, through dense forests on the steppes of Siberia, along the forests at the edge of Lake Baikal, the views out the window and constant rocking motion brought me to an almost hypnotic trance. Occasionally, we’d stop for ten or twenty minutes—Ulaan Bataar was one major stop, but we knew we’d be going back there later and at other stops we’d pop off the train for a few minutes just to stretch our legs. Three times a day, I would weave my way through cars to find the dining car. At other times, I’d check bathroom availability to stand in the corridor and chat with fellow travelers. Each night I’d hunker down in my bunk as night fell and fall into uneasy sleep awaiting the sudden arrival of the dreaded border patrols as the train screeched to a halt in the darkness of night.
The ride on the Trans-Siberian Railroad was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. I met some unusual people, viewed vast desert and dense forest landscapes I’d only dreamed about, and lived through some nerve-racking border searches. I wouldn’t have missed any of this for the world, but I can’t say I’d ever want to do it again!
[Go to Mongolia Part three]
