The international carriage.

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Our train east for Lugansk left at 11 in the morning.

In our compartment was a Russian girl travelling around Ukraine and a man who now lives in Austria, returning for his first New Year's celebration at home in five years. The four of us had a good conversation for a few hours, until the English Russian student and the Ukrainian English student decided to sleep. The train was equally hot and uncomfortable as the one from Moscow, so none of us rested very well. I feel bad that the man left while I was asleep and I couldn't say goodbye, or even find out his name. He was fascinating to talk to and asked me challenging, relevant questions about England - the royal family, religion, food and culture, Jamie Oliver - that I enjoyed answering. I also learned a lot about Austrian and Ukrainian culture from him and he helped me with my Russian.

We got to Lugansk at 5 the next morning after a sixteen hour journey.

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