The World Is A Book...: Buryats and водка On A 68 Hour Train Ride...

Right now, we are 58 hours into our 68 hour journey from Irkutsk to Kazan. It's 5am in the morning...or is it? To be honest, I don't have a clue anymore. We've travelled through four different time zones during this whole trip, and I think parts of my brain are in sync with each of them. While we slept last night, we passed from Asian Russia to European Russia, separated by Yekaterinburg (or Y'burg) and the Ural mountains.

"It doesn't matter if this train ride is more chilled than the last. We've had our train of fun."

Those were my famous last words to Patrick at the start of this journey. That all changed upon meeting Bulat- a 17-year-old Buryat sportsman who is heading to Kazan to join a military academy. Buryats are a Russian minority group, of Mongolian ancestry and mainly based in the Ulan-Ude area. The younger generation, such as Bulat, can speak Russian and Buryat, but many of the older generation can only speak the latter.

Anyway, Bulat was very keen to chat to us for 2 reasons: a) we were the only ones speaking English, and b) he was alone in his kupe compartment, and bored. At the time, we were sharing a compartment with a surly, cropped-haired Russian businessman. It turns out he was pretty keen to swap compartments with Bulat so that he could be alone with a bit of how's-your-father with the providnistas...apparently quite a common request! That's a British saying, but I think everybody can get the gist. Bulat was far more blunt about it!

As soon as Bulat joined us, so did another Buryat man called Ayur; shortly after, so did his brother, Dodgie. Patrick and I had trouble remembering the latter's name, and eventually used the car 'Dodge' to help us. This was very appropriate, as these two brothers were car dealers. Customers would give them some cash upfront, then Ayur and Dodgie would take the train to retrieve the car from elsewhere, and drive it back to Ulan-Ude.

As the hours passed, we shared our beers and life stories, met another Buryat called "Dennis", and continuously swapped the names of famous football and hockey players. Football and hockey are the two major Russian sports; between us, Patrick and I have moderate sports knowledge (I bring us down to moderate, naturally).

Of course, when you meet new people in Russia, there must always be the exchange of 'souvenirs'. This time, we were definitely outdone... I don't have many bracelets left to give! Dodgie gave Patrick some brown prayer beads with a Christian cross- really beautiful That's not all Dodgie gave us (that sounds more 'dodgy'- ha,ha- than it's meant to!). When we headed to the dining cart, for fear of waking everybody in our kupe, Dodgie bought us beer (our favourite, Baltika number 3), salad, water...and vodka! The latter had to be taken in the traditional way- by toasting each other with Russian 'Vashe Zdorvie', and Buryat 'Men-dee', downing the shot, then sucking on a salt-covered lemon. Definitely made the shot go down a little easier. Dodgie also taught Patrick how to make a toast to 'beautiful women' in Russian; I took a video of the occasion!

On a sadder note, it was during our 'vodka' experience that we also had to witness the racism that Buryats have to face. These guys are Russian citizens, yet they have to listen to their fellow Russian citizens call them 'Japanese, Japanese'. According to Bulat, this is a very common reaction towards Buryats, and really demonstrates the divide between the 'European' and the 'Asian' sides of Russia.

Walking to the dining cart was in itself an experience. (Quick side note: this was the same dining cart where, earlier on, I had a very unique lunch of a salad with-wait for it- chicken, cheese, apples, prunes, mayonaise, lettuce...and to top it off, a squirt of ketchup. Actually not as bad as it sounds!) Anyway, back to the original point. The dining cart was situated right at the other end of the train, which meant we got an insight into life on every other kupe and plaskart carriage. Passengers were playing cards, eating noodles, sleeping beside their dogs, drinking beer, staring as we walked past...the whole scene had almost a theatrical feel to it, as though this was a 'typical train journey' scene dreamed up by a playwright.

Other vital statistics from our journey:

Snacks: bread, meat-infused cheese, crackers, sausage, bananas, strawberries (first time in 6 months!), dill pickle, dill pickle crisps, and a large dill-covered meat dumpling (can you tell we like dill?). In a few stations, the vendors would be waiting for you on the platforms; other times, Patrick and I would have to run to the supermarket, and try not to miss our train!

Number of showers: One, in the toilet, using a water bottle. Not the most thorough wash.

Temperature: Ranging from 15 degrees at night (fine with our blankets), and 35 degrees during the day (not fine with unopenable windows).

Number of providnistas: Two- one short, blonde pretty one (probably the object of our neighbour's affections), and a hard-faced brunette one.

In the span of scribbling this blog post, we are now 60 hours into our journey. I've got to finish Dostoevsky's 'The Idiot' before this journey ends...there's no better place to read a classic Russian novel than on a Russian train!

By the time I publish this post, I will be in Kazan- the home of another Russian minority group, the Tatars, and where the author Leo Tolstoy went to university. Zaftra- tomorrow- MOCKBA, and the official end of the Trans-Siberian route...although we've still got St. Petersburg to look forward to!