Railway to Asia 1

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In Moscow YH, I met a Dutch couple, Wouter and Chloe, who had the same destination as mine. We were going to Almaty-Kazakhstan by train. It’s a long way. We would spend 3 full days in the train.

The train would depart at night. I had my last day in Moscow relaxing, after an emergency that I found I bought the wrong date ticket and rushed to station for changing. I was very nervous because my Russian visa would expire if I couldn’t catch my train.

We left YH at evening and took subway to the station with our packs which made us very conspicuous. We waited our train with beer. Since arriving Russia, I had drunk a lot of alcohol, especially the strong Vodka. The time was up. We separated, got in our cars.

The second night, the train stopped at a station for a long time. It’s midnight. I guessed here was the border. We stopped for some official procedures. I was lying on my low berth. An officer in uniform came in and checked our IDs. I handed him my passport. Obviously it’s not common here. He checked it for more seconds and then asked some questions. Finally he asked me took off my glass to see my purple color. Then he gave me a friendly smile. “Welcome to Kazakhstan” He said.

After a while, the attendant handed back my passport with a stamp on the visa. The train started again. It whistled in the night. The steel wheels clattered the rail. I watched outside the window. Obscure scene started to move backward slowly.

This was my first time to cross the border, overland.

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