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Published: October 2nd 2006
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Notes from the Trans-Siberian
...farm, straw hats, gravestones in copses, shrub and brush, glass-fragment guarded prisons, rows of brick houses, hidden courtyards, putrid rubbish pits, lambent peaks, trees sprout from stonewall, moss melts down the craggy crest, little Russian lad with a toy motorcycle, sandals and a chocolate mustache, lone sunflower on a dirt pile, rows of rice pass, conical strawhats float over the fields, mules trot sluggishly hoofing dust, distant monastic isles in an expansive bog, the great mountainous wall of nature drapes the horizon, the jigsaw skyline of jagged summits, slender dancing tree swarm flat prairie and climb stepped terraces, lone stonemarker at a dirt crosspaths.
Nearing Ulan Bataar: horses' hooves tied (chained?) together, lone motorcycle on the prairie, camel carcass guarded by a vulture (falcon), "outdoor pool" (morning game of billiards on the green), falcons perched on power lines poles, two house town, two horse rider watches on, wife in one house, motorcycle propped in front next to satellite, information, web of power lines fifteen feet up, Oortsog Zigzr (town?), mother & child check hanging blanket of earthy hues, orange of Gobi sunset, brown of the horse's tail, tan of the horse's hide, triangular patterns across rays
of color... a white rodent scurries away to his burrow as the train's wheels screech their turn.
I was standing outside of my cabin in the hallway, looking towards the east. My contemplation of the passing landscape was deterred by the passage of another traveler. He was distinctly Western and his North Face jacket revealed his American origin. Seeing each other, we immediately began talking.
"Hey" he began.
"How's it goin'?"
I replied, confident that he was an American like any other. "Great, man. This is an amazing place, eh?"
He was a taller fellow and more hirsute. I could tell that he exhibited the manneurisms of a rushed mountaineer looking for the next summit to climb, a typically American characteristic that one also finds in an optimistic entrepreneur or a suburban driver during rush hour.
I looked out to the naked, green prairie where horses and wild animals dwell and roam. "Indeed. It's the image I have of the American West. Where are you from?"
"California. And you?"
"North Carolina."
He reached into his bag and produced a large camera. The lens was the size of a German beer bottle and the apparatus itself occupied both of his
hands. "It's a digital. This thing takes amazing photos," he boasted without my having even asked him about it.
I said nothing and returned to my gaze out onto the scene. Just then, a hawk came flying into view, following the pursuit of the train like a remora behind a shark. My interlocutor quickly drew his camera to his eye and clicked repeatedly on the button. The lens eye blinked as if engulfed in a series of spasms, and followed the bird as it helplessly fell out of view from the speeding vehicle.
Withdrawing his recently purchased mechanism, he turned it towards me and said, "Check it out."
The little display screen showed a picture of the same bird behind a backdrop of prairie. He flipped to the next one, which showed the same scene, with a few minor differences. The subsequent photos gave the whole series of images an air of flipcard animation. He regarded the digital reproductions with a look of pride at having encapsulated and preserved a piece of Mongolia, and replaced the camera into its pouch.
"How much was it?" I inquired.
"You don't wanna know. It certainly wasn't cheap. How far are you going?"
"Just
to Ulan Ude in Russia. And you?"
"I'm going all the way to Moscow. I'd like to stop, but I just don't have enough time."
I remained silent for a minute, amazed at the notion of staying trapped on this train for six days, forced to watch passing scenery and have ephemeral interactions with random passengers. I thought to myself, "If life for some lasts eighty years, how does one not have enough time?"
After the silence, he said "Well, it was nice to meet you man. I'm gonna head back to my cabin."
"No problem. Safe travels, man."
He turned and walked down the hallway to the end and disappeared.
Mongolia
The train slowed to a halt. I was unsure of which Mongolian town it was... some cluster of plain houses on the edge of the Gobi where grass struggles to sprout. Eight minutes was the scheduled time allotted for who knows what. I stepped down onto the sole platform of this unknown town.
Locals stepped to their doorstep curiously watching as the exotic passengers exited the train for a stretch and a breath of dusty air. The twice daily arrival of the Trans-Mongolian must be the most
amusing event of a day on the prairie. Here, horses gallop wild and free, hindered only by the iron fence of the railroad. An arrival of a train is the only indication of measured time in this expansive land of uncivilized hills and timeless horizon.
On a Cyrillic sign off to the side of the station, I made out the word Bar. Maybe they know the score of the England-Nigeria game. Down the steps and through the door, I entered a dimly lit room with a veritable bar in the corner. A man sat on a stool, ignoring my entry; the barmaid glanced up and continued wiping a washed glass. In the corner behind her, a television blinked in black and white trying to get in touch with some distant satellite.
I had barely begun my individual study of Russian, which was apparently useful in the middle of Mongolia. I gave it a shot.
"Zdrastvuy.." I mumbled.
They echoed whatever I had just said.
"U vas yaste match Neegeria Anglia?"
"Shto?" replied the wincing woman.
"Football?" I pleaded.
Having understood the universal word for the sport, the lady fiddled with the antennae, flipping the channels to no avail. "Nyet." In
an hour, she conveyed.
The man, intrigued by this newcomer in the bar asked me where I was from.
Searching my mind for the correct response, I answered, "Ya, americanets."
His eyes widened in surprise. I understood his next sentence to be: "You well speak Russian."
This was indeed a compliment for my amateur level of Russian. I remembered, "Spasiba" and began to head to the door. Just then, the whistle blew.
In no way was that eight minutes. (Was the previous passage eight minutes long? No.) Back out in the open, I saw the train already inching forward. My hastened pace accelerated into a full sprint towards the only open door of the advancing car. The provodnik had already raised the steps and was standing five feet above looking down at me. I attained the speed of the accelerating train and aimed for the handlebars on either side of the steps, grabbing them and lifting myself up onto the landing as the conductor watched in amusement. Upon the ledge of Russia I grinned at the man and winked in assurance.
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