We’ve reached the last day of the Moscow>Irkutsk journey. To be honest, it was much better than I had expected, mostly because I had cool people as “roommates”. The impression I had gotten before coming was that the provodnitsa (train conductor) was going to give you a difficult time if they don’t like you and will tend to be a bit corrupt and charge you money to charge electronic devices by turning off all the electric sockets. This was not true (for our carriage anyway), although not the jolliest of women, the provodnitsa generally didn’t bother us much and I only got yelled at once for taking photos at the entrance of the train (“Either get on or get off!!!” is what I understood from her barrage of Russian).
Oh and no one speaks any English, at all. I think with all Russians, they may seem a bit hostile at first with their unsmiling faces but they are actually not hostile at all, they only smile when they mean it, which makes their smile all the more sincere. In my opinion, it is the Russians who smile for no reason who freak me out. 😂😂😂 And I loved the lady who works at the dining car, she was always patient with the tourists although none of us speak Russian and we could communicate easily even though we spoke different languages.
Also, as I’m sure you are all curious about: the toilet. There is no shower, only a toilet and sink. When you flush, you step on a pedal that opens a hole at the bottom of the loo where your excrement is freed onto the tracks directly, so they usually close the bathrooms when the train stops at stations (so you don’t go to the bathroom and stick up the tracks in the station I guess). Yes, it’s possible to use the bathroom sink to groom yourself, but you will not want to spend more than 3 minutes in that bathroom with the smell, trust me. The best way to keep yourself clean is to brush your teeth and wash your face twice a day, use dry shampoo so you don’t end up looking like Severus Snape, do not exert yourself, better yet, lie perfectly still on your bed so you can keep sweating and body odour to a minimum, use deodorant if that fails. The ventilation is decent so you shouldn’t need to sweat even if it is summer.
Sorry, I have no idea what station this is again. 😂
A little Russian Orthodox church tucked away next to the station.
An army literally got on our train… Better hide that dead body I had been transporting through Siberia… 😱😱😂
I choo-choo-choose you! 😁
Doggy!!! 🐶
This train looks so Soviet with it’s red star.
Last meal at the dining car. Hamburger steak! 😋
Around ½ of The World in 80 Days 