Train encounters

B/W OMSK and TOMSK (17 June)

Another 14 hours stuck in crammed conditions in a top bunk where there isn't even room to sit up straight. Our little 2 hour breather in Omsk involved a visit to the local fried chicked joint and the supermarket. This train is worse than the last as there is neither ventilation nor air-condition, only the stifling stuffy air of the upper regions of the carriage.

I decide to walk around the carriage, hoping to find some empty place at a lower bunk so I can actually sit up straight for a while. Soon I find one at the head of the carriage. I sit down and continue to read my book. In between tales of deforestation and environmental disaster, a man comes in reeking of alcohol and smoke and sits across me from the table. My eyes remain fixed on the page. Soon he buys a Baltika 5 and opens the can a few inches from my book. The smell of beer wafts into my nose as he takes a slurp.

"You don't speak Russian?" He breaks the silence, pointing at my book. I shake my head at the youngish looking man with short-cropped blond hair and blue eyes.

"I learnt English in school," he says with much difficulty, his eyes scanning as though he were looking for the words in some crevice inside his mind. "I going home, 20 mins to home, home, home, home...." he sings, breaking out into laughter.

"My name is Anton he says," offering his hand. I offer my hand and name in return. Anton offers me his beer. I stare at the cold can momentarily and politely refuse.

"I like Batika. 3, 5 and 7," he says. I tell him my favorites.

"How about vodka?" I ask.

"Of course, I am Russian." I laugh with him.

"Where is your motherland?" He asks in the most matter-of-fact manner. "Singapore," I say and he nods with a little puzzled expression on his face. I stare out of the window wondering where this conversation was going and try to return to my book.

I hear his eyes scanning again for the words. "What language you speak?"

"I speak English, China and Ispania," I reply, vaguely recalling wrongly the Russian word for Spanish.

"I Russian and English choot choot. My English teacher, good," he grins and gives a thumbs up, "very good woman." I nod and smile in return.

"Do you smoke?" He asks me.

For a while a little internal conflict rages on in my conscience as I weigh my resolution to stop my infrequent affairs wih cigarettes and sharing one with a Russian.

"Sometimes," I say weakly.

"If I smoke, will you smoke with me?"

I agree.

We head over to the smoking section between carriages and he offers me a cigarette before dropiing his one on the floor. He laughs and I pick it up for him, fearing he might fall over in his state if he tried to do it himself. We light up and take a drag, sharing the silence for a moment.

The train stops.

A train attendant barges in through the door, shooting off in Russian at him. He obviously forgot his stop. He stubs his cigarettes our and looks me in the eye, offering his hand, "good luck, Andrew." I shake his hand and smile.

And then I am left alone in the smoke-filled room with a cigarette not even half-finished between my fingers. I take a final drag and stub it out, a little disappointed at the brevity.


-Andrew

(Disclaimer for mum: don't worry, I haven't strayed that far)