Day 6: A Room on Rails

Sunday May 11 - Moscow

At around 8.00 pm, we arrived at Yaroslavskya station. After staring at signs, timetables and anything else with writing on it, Fizle - my second cousin, travelling partner for this leg of the journey, and rusty Russian speaker - said we are in the right place.

At the end of platform three, small, diverse groups of people gathered. Neat, carefully dressed Western Europeans in defensive circles around their bags. Russian families with huge blue striped bags – perhaps one metre cubes – sitting in lines as their children danced and cavorted in front of them.

Sole, expressionless young men, stared at anyone who dared look too hard, one hand in the pocket, the other clamping a cigarette. And a group of about twenty, teenage female Russian athletes, perhaps gymnasts, mostly blonde, all with pony tails, moved and bounced with straight backed disciplined in matching red, white and blue tracksuits.

The train suddenly curved into view. The locomotive was unassuming, ancient, abstract and humble. It barely looked up to the task of getting the red and blue carriages to the platform, never mind across a continent. As soon as the brakes screeched to a halt, the people began their farewells, grabbed their bags and waddled in search of their carriages.

We bid our goodbye to, Jeremy, and old school friend and our host for our short time in Moscow. He was as gentlemanly and unperturbed as ever, and reciprocated my firm handshake and Fizle's gentle hug. The next port of call for he and his family, after five years in Moscow, is a teaching post in Cambodia. That would be a gargantuan step for me, but to Jeremy, Tracey and their kids, it is merely another place on a limitless map. Nothing phases that guy.

We found carriage nine and we found Natalia Alexandriov, our carriage attendant. She had the obligatory everything: the blue uniform, the thick ankles and the unapproachable face that said ‘you may have paid for your ticket but this sure as hell is my carriage.’ Natalia checked our tickets and cross-referenced them with our passports. She told Fizle that she was in bed 23 and I was in 21. She seemed intent. Any 'unofficial' swopping, I felt, would be dealt with severely.

We found our four-bed compartment and it seemed that we would not be sharing. Only two beds – the upper bunks - were laid out. Four people for seven days in such a small room would be tough, especially if the other two were the average sized Russian. We touched wood, crossed fingers and said silent prayers to the god of space.

The train left two minutes early by my watch, at 9.23pm. We spent the late evening sorting out our beds, stashing our stuff and repeating our hopes that we would be alone for the duration of this epic journey. No matter how optimistic we were, deep down we knew that the room for two would soon be a little more crowded.