'It is vital to spend the few hours it takes to master the Cyrillic alphabet before you go, otherwise you'll have trouble deciphering the names of streets, metro stations and most importantly the names of stations along the Trans-Siberian and Trans-Mongolian routes.' I read this sentence in the Trans-Siberain Handook as we departed from Warsaw on a twenty hour train journey that took us to Moscow. I scan quickly down the neatly presented Cyrillic alphabet, with its Roman alphabet equivalent listed alongside. Cyrillic is derived from Greek, so everything is recognisable, but not quite the same, with a few curls and dots and character reversals thrown in. 'A' in Roman is 'a' in Cyrillic. 'B' is 'b' but with a horizontal line coming out of the top of the 'b'. No problem. Next inexplicably is 'V',
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