Carrying a rucksack crammed with thermal tops and cup-a-soups to Brighton
station at 7.30am on a Sunday morning was enough to break most people, but
my flatmate coped admirably. Taking my bag, I dodged round the drunken
teenager trying to headbutt his way through the barriers and boarded the
train to London.
In an ideal world I would’ve been reading The Ecologist and
muttering darkly about global warming. Waving around my copy of Heat magazine
(“I’m sure Kylie’s wearing a hemp dress in that photo”) just didn’t have the
same effect.
From London Bridge it was two stops to Waterloo International for the train
to Brussels, and after a two hour wait it was time for the train to Cologne.
It was modern and bright but irritatingly I was in the smoking carriage.
With stinging eyes and cursing the girl behind me who was practising
Riverdance, I sank into the (very comfortable) seat and tried to snooze.
Having arrived at Cologne station I joined the line for the information desk.
As my turn approached I hurriedly ran through the phrases I remembered from
school: ‘Mother, where is the cat?’ and ‘I don’t know Hans, is it under the
wardrobe?’. Brilliant. With lots of gesticulating and scribbling of numbers,
I discovered the platform number and that there was no passport control.
The platform indicator didn’t show the Moscow train until five minutes before
it was due to leave, by which point I was rigid with fear, thinking I was in
the wrong place. Once inside the cabin with its three bunks and sink, far
plusher than I expected, I opened the guidebook to read, with a sinking
heart, that there was no restaurant car. I was cheered to discover later
that this lack of research must be peculiar to journalists - a BBC foreign
correspondent I met on the Moscow to Beijing leg had had to survive on
chocolate bars for 36 hours on the same journey.
A mug of hot chocolate later (free hot water, as on all the trains, was
constantly available) I went to sleep. At 1am two Belarussian schoolgirls
returning from an exchange trip to Denmark joined my cabin. At 3am passport
officials flung open the doors and barked ‘Passport’, and the guard, with a
flash of genius, blasted out REM’s Shiny Happy People from
his wheezing stereo.
After the interrupted night I slept through much of Poland, waking up to
golden-leaved trees with the occasional patch of snow. I was cornered by a
Russian portrait painter whose favourite English phrase was ‘I love you’;
rather disconcerting when combined with his habit of stroking my hair.
Shoving my phrasebook between us and asking how to pronounce words meant my
Russian wasn’t too bad by the time the train arrived at Moscow on Tuesday
morning.
After a day sightseeing around Moscow I watched the shabby Trans-Siberian
train slowly pull in to the Moscow station. Seconds after I got on board two
British people came in to the four bunk cabin. Introducing themselves as
Doug and Holly, recent graduates from Newcastle University, Doug admitted he
had been hoping to share with a vodka-swigging Russian. I kept quiet about
my high cup-a-soup threshold, realising it didn’t have quite the same kudos.
It quickly became apparent when I got into bed that the train was not stuffy
as promised. Wrapping a scarf around my head helped against the cold air
rushing in through the window seal, but it was an uncomfortable night with
my frozen hips bruising against the hard bunk. The next night I was more
prepared, with hat, scarf, thermal jumper, pyjamas and socks. This
discomfort paled in comparison to a Swedish woman, Cecilia, in the same
carriage who awoke one morning to find snow on her head.
Daytimes were spend looking out the window at the passing countryside,
chatting to other passengers, reading and sleeping. Conversations revolved
around the same topics: why does the toilet always smell so strongly despite
everything dropping on to the track the instant it’s flushed; what flavour
noodles were on sale on the last station; how long is it until the next
station; and has anyone seen the guard smile yet?
The scenery for the first few days was endless birch trees and the requisite
sprinkling of snow. Occasional plains of brown grass stretching into the
distance gave an indication of the vast emptiness the train was travelling
through, and it was while looking at this view that I ate my first meal in
the restaurant car.
Although the Russian woman in charge handed me a menu there appeared to be
little choice. With gold teeth flashing she told me what I was going to eat
– borscht, tomatoes drowned in mayonnaise and fried chicken with cold peas.
Worryingly this was probably the healthiest meal I had between Brighton and
Beijing.
Our carriage was a popular one as James, the now chocolate-hating foreign
correspondent, had stuck up a map in the corridor. Anyone tired of playing
cards or reading Dostoevsky or Bulgakov (popular if predictable
choices) would gather round and see how far we had travelled. Alex, a Russian
whose parents thought he was studying in Austria but was actually travelling
to less hospitable countries such as Afghanistan, had a handheld GPS. In
this way we knew which bridges and rivers we were passing, or as often
happened, which ones we had slept through.
By the Friday it was getting dark at 1pm as the railways in Russia run on
Moscow time. Changing watches to local time was necessary to get more
daylight, and getting up at 7am on Saturday morning to see Lake Baikal
sounded more reasonable than Moscow’s 2am. The train skirted round the edge
of the deepest lake in the world for most of the morning. Watching sunrise
over it was one of the most memorable parts of the trip.
The jetlag created by changing watches confused everyone, and early on Sunday
morning we grumpily limped into Ulaanbaatar, capital of Mongolia. This was
Doug and Holly’s destination, and I nervously waited to see who would join
me. Three Mongolian women piled in, one of whom spoke good English and
provided a great commentary on the incredible landscape. Gers, the tents
that nomads live in, dotted the edges of the capital and the vast, sandy
plains with their scrubby patches of grass. Hills created a dramatic
backdrop and for the first time in days, there wasn’t a tree in sight. A few
minutes of bird-watching established that I couldn’t tell a buzzard from a
black kite, but I had more luck identifying the numerous camels, horses and
cattle.
A Mongolian restaurant car had by now taken the place of the Russian one.
Surrounded by the carved wood décor a few of us watched the sunset over the
Gobi Desert, drinking coke in an attempt to rid our throats of the sand that
had formed hazy clouds throughout the train. That evening we reached the
Mongolian-Chinese border. Stepping out into the chilly night I was greeted
with loud speakers blaring out Moon River. As I walked the length
of the train, overwhelmed to be finally in China, I felt like Audrey
Hepburn, albeit a grubby, sand-encrusted version.
On Monday morning, after passing mountains looming over fields and Chinese
flags fluttering on ramshackle houses and large factories, the train stopped
near the Great Wall for the mandatory tourist photos. It wasn’t long before
tower blocks came into sight and, precisely on time, the train arrived in
Beijing.
Wednesday morning saw me at Beijing West Station, the largest train station
in Asia. The express train to Hong Kong was the chintziest of the lot – net
curtains with pink bedspreads and what looked like a doiley stuck on the
wall. The guards were polite and deferential, and I longed for the guards of
the Trans-Siberian who would glare if anyone got in their way and then
suddenly laugh for no apparent reason.
My room-mate was a Beijing-born American called John who helpfully translated
everything the guards said, although we never got to the bottom of why this
train was the only one to arrive at its destination an hour late.
We spent the journey chatting about living in China as the train travelled
south at high speed past factories belching out fumes, small patchwork
fields, vast rows of polytunnels and the seemingly constant construction
works.
A good night’s sleep and one more tray of rice, chicken and luminous pink ham
later, the train reached Hong Kong, my final destination after 11 days.
Travelling by train allows the luxury of effortlessly meeting new people and
having the time to read with a constantly changing backdrop. There is always
something to do, even if it is simply being lulled to sleep by the motion of
the train. As James remarked, having taken the train to China, the world
suddenly feels a rather large place again.
