There’s construction on the train lines, so the train is going slower than it’s supposed to, which shortens the time we have at each stop, and we’re asked to not even get out at many of them. It’s surprisingly easy to adjust to life on the train. When we can get out at a stop, there are often merchants on the platforms selling everything from ice cream to baked goods to smoked fish. Some of them are happy to talk to us on camera, some yell at us that we don’t have the right to film there — we actually do, but they’re peddling without a permit and are afraid to be reported.
Maybe it’s jet-lag, maybe it’s train-lag, maybe it’s just a lost sense of time, but we stay up late every night chatting, watching the scenery, I’m even surprised when I can help solve some of the Russian crossword clues in the puzzles Marianna and my father are doing. Then again, maybe it’s all the tea we’re drinking. The window shade works well, though, and we sleep in both the first and second morning.
The dining car is full of foreigners and Russians alike, chatting and sharing their travel experience. There’s a pay shower, and a car with playrooms for kids where they show movies.
One of the interesting things I learn is that the station in Ekaterinburg (the third largest city in Russia) was named Sverdlovsk, after a Jewish member of the Bolshevik revolutionaries. It’s also the city where the Romanovs were killed by the same Bolsheviks.