Trans-siberian railway

Okay, so I we did it now. We spent 77 hours in the train, 4 nights and three days. The intresting thing is that we crossed five time zones so actually the train was in Moscow time and outside there was another time. They tried to adapt us to the local time by switching the lights off at 11pm and turn on the radio on 7am.
We took the train Baikal 10 and it's said to be one of the best trains what becomes to service. The third class, the fierd plaskartnyi wasn't really that bad!! There were to lower bunks and two upper and along the hallway there were one upper and one lower. The car was open so we good easily interact.
We swapped places with a nice guy from Irkutsk who looked asiatic so me and Tuula slept up, Dana under me and there was a grumpy Russian woman who only spoke to complain about something. She didn't even talk with Dana whose Russian is excellent. Along the hallway there was a Russian family with a small boy named Fimo. His dad offered us beers and thought Dana was our leader, because he couldn't get how foreigners can be friends!

We were just next to the toilet and the samovar that served us with warm water. The landscape was pretty much the same as in Finland...maybe more leave trees...bruces, pines, flowers (horsmia, koiranputkia, leskenlehtia, koivuja jne.) So basicly we were traveling in the taiga area where Finland belongs too. The villages where full of quite crappy looking wooden houses, ladas, soviet style block of flats, very old factories... What amazed me was the amount of cities with over one million people like Krasnoyarsk and Novosibirsk.

We found one common language with the Russians. I saw that the two Russian couples had a guitar so I started playing Finnish songs and singin with Tuula. Suddenly there was a lot of people around us and most of them looking at us with great intrest. They really loved Rafaelin enkeli and Lumi teki enkelin eteiseen. It was great to feel that kind of unity. We stoped at Barabinsk and the whole train said: this is the place where they sell fish!! So we went out and I bought some birogs and bread from the Babuskas. In the evening one Russian girl played guitar and sang really emotional songs. It was so touching! One was about the soldiers that had gone to fight in Afganistan and about their brides waiting for soldiers who never got back. The sun set behind the endless fields and it this moment was so immemorable and beautifull that I wish I will never forget it.

We even had the possibility to use the shower in the first class for 3,5 euros. We hadn't expecting that and actually I really liked plaskartnyi. It has to be remembered though that this was a good one. The toilet never run out of paper, was cleaned and the boss of the train also came to ask weather everthing is allright. We visited the restaurant car and you could have a proper meal for 100 RUBs which is about 3 euros.

Trans-siberian diet includes: noodles, bread, tomato, cucumbers, kolbasa(russian meetwurst), tea, beer, chocolate, dried fruits, (yogurt and baby food for me) berries, ice-cream, pirogis and fish from the babushkas.

The Russian women looked stylish even on board. Maurizio and Roby had as "compartement" companios two Russian ladys who I called the pink and the orange. The other one was wearing really tight and short blue shorts and a orange sleeveless shirt, high heales and blond hair. Other was wearing pink shirt and pink striped trousers. Seems like a lot of women wore shorts that showed half of the bare but. The men usually wore sleeveless shirts and black trousers...usually the clothes were quite casual. Lonely Planet had some tipes on how to blend in...I will write them later.

The train trip was nice and really comfortable....imagine having the food, bed, friends and even beer just a few steps away! There was a rumour going on in the train that there is a group of Americans in the train. There was also a French couple from Paris and the girl gave me a Chinese detective book in French (which I already have read in Finnish).

Anyway, I can recommend Baikal 10 to everyone. Go east!

Now we are in Irkutsk. Dana, Maurizio and Roby bought train tickets to Ulan Bataar and I got confirmation that me and Tuula will be picked up at the train station. We didn't book any accomodation and the hostels are full and HC is not really full of members. Well...I guess we will find something. The guys and Dana still need visa for Mongolia. Then we head for the lake Baikal. After Moscow I long for NATURE and WILDERNESS!

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