30/3/97

The plan was to catch the train to London from Bristol Templemeads, and then take the tube to Victoria coach station, where the bus to Warsaw left just after 2 pm. What actually happened was that the train was cancelled ten minutes after it was supposed to arrive. Luckily Mum and Dad had stayed to see me off, so they were available to rush me to the nearest train station with a train to London; Swindon, which I had just left! I made it with five minutes to spare, and as soon as I got on I noticed that I wasn't feeling nervous anymore; already in travel mode. Got to the coach station in plenty of time for everything but a seat to sit on, but lets face it, sitting on my rucksack is something I'm going to have to get used to.

The people on buses to Poland are tremendously varied. The most unusual was a twelve year old girl travelling with her father; she had a large birthmark on the side of her face which was being gradually being given laser treatment in Britain. Apparently she's done one year and has two more to go. Anyway, off we went to Dover and onto the ferry. Since Blighty was about to disappear over the horizon for three months I felt I owed it to my country to follow tradition by getting completely pissed in the "Posh Bar" in order to throw up over the stern. Sadly, three pints of cider wasn't enough, and I just did a terrible job of chatting up some girl from a disabled charity instead.

Back on the bus, and the driver turns the heating up to sweltering; every two hours or so fifty bodies pile out and lie on the ground long enough to recover before spending truly extortionate sums buying Coke etc. I suppose it must be a good scam, 'cause when I asked for the heating to be turned down they got rather upset and turned it off completely, and we all reverted to shivering.

31/3/97

One in the morning, and we arrive at Brussels coach station. It looks suspiciously like a bombed out multi-storey car park, but perhaps this is just modernist architecture Belgian style. After half an hour, a few Poles turn up, and we progress through into Germany. Crossing into what was East Germany is -finally- new ground to me, and I feel I'm travelling at last. About 8 am, and we're at the Polish border. An hour later and we roar off - up the wrong side of the motorway! Cue half a mile of rapid reversing while half a dozen border guards fall about laughing. About thirty kilometres on we stop at a truck stop where all sorts of booze is freely available. I settle for tea while twenty extremely optimistic wallys queue for the one shower, and marvel at the desolation of the Polish countryside. Dead grass covering flat fields, with not even a token farm animal to break the monotony; no wonder they're all swigging vodka at 10 am. A Polish girl sitting at my table turns out to speak perfect English; she's doing a photography course at Newport Uni! I ask her how she makes ends meet. "Oh, I'm a hardcore jungle DJ at this club called TJ's. Do you know it?". You bet I do, I've been in there on rock nights about five times! Two days in and the incredible coincidences have started already.

We get into Warsaw about 5 pm; three hours early. I said goodbye to my seat companion of the last 36 hours, an Irishman from London. We had discussed politics, family, religion cabbages and kings during all this time, but when we shook hands we'd both forgotten each other's names; happened all the time when I went through Australia five years back! I then ran off to get a ticket to St Petersberg, only to find I was in the wrong station. Pity I didn't know any Polish, but it did make getting to the right station and getting a ticket so much more challenging. Of course, five minutes after getting my ticket I met a bunch of Russian teenagers who spoke fluent English! I thought I might be on the same carriage for the 36 hours to St Pete's, but communist attitudes are still alive and well; as the only foreigner I was allocated a carriage all to myself.

1/4/97

I woke up at about three in the morning on the floor of my compartment; Polish track is extremely rough by British standards. Given that sleep seemed rather unlikely, I decided to make myself some tea using the samovar at the corner of the carriage. My attendant (well, there was no-one else there) was propped up in his bunk reading, so I tried a little phrase book Russian. He didn't laugh at least, though I suspect my accent is a little dubious, and pointed out a few landmarks.

At 8 am I was at the Belarus border. The first thing they do is uncouple my carriage and shunt it into it's own siding. They then left it for an hour while I ran through increasingly alarming scenarios; they've forgotten me, this line goes to Siberia etc. Finally the Belarus and Russian border guards arrive, and make a great show of searching everything apart from my luggage. At 1030 we move off again, and this time I decide it's time to check out the restaurant, which is largely deserted. Despite this, they cook a good meal, which I eat with a Simonenko Vova, who has a dangerously high tolerance for vodka. I stagger back to my compartment and sleep till 6 pm, when I drink a lot of coffee before going off to see the Russian teenagers I met earlier. They were drinking vodka too, so I only stayed a couple of hours.

2/4/97

Arrived at St Petersberg about 9 am. The first impression is that it's a lot nicer than Warsaw; plenty of pre-revolution buildings. I walk outside the station to see a series of massive holes in the road, but it soon becomes clear that it's just that the Russians take roadwork's very seriously. A taxi driver prepositions me, offering to take me to the hotel for- twenty dollars! Luckily I can read Cyrillic, so using a city guide is no problem, and the Metro is extremely efficient, although the only way of telling what station you were at was by listening to muffled announcements on the tannoy; station signs are non-existent.

The Rossiya hotel looks quite impressive from the outside and has obviously been prettied up over the last year or two, but some things will take longer to change; the receptionist scolded me for being late and confiscated my passport in short order. I decided to explore the obvious sights straight away, i.e. Winter Palace etc. All rather picturesque, but the lack of people around them is a little unnerving; perhaps the locals are just bored. Once I got back, I noticed that my feet were rather painful, with blisters on all pressure points. Apparently the American hiking socks my mother insisted I take were producing some allergic reaction; fantastic start to my journeys. Limped out to some Finnish restaurant called Daddy's for dinner, then checked out a couple of local bars. They seemed to be mainly populated with drunken men dressed in shell suits and prostitutes, so I went straight back to the hotel.

3/4/97

The shopping here is quite impressive; you can get nearly anything for much the same prices as you can back home, but the majority of Russians would have great difficulty paying for them. They seem to shop from the kiosks that saturate places like parks and metro stations; my local has thirty two within fifty metres of the entrance. Booze, fags, vegetables etc, all on sale from little shacks about two metres square.

Had a look at the main shopping area; not bad at all, and very reminiscent of Scandinavia. There is a "John Bull" English pub which sells; Skol! God knows what they think of that, although the Russian man I met there said it was better than the local brews. He turned out to have had an exciting childhood in Irkutsk; he'd nicked a Lada when he was 15 and driven to Moscow in it. The journey took two weeks, mainly because of all the checking for police checkpoints that this entailed.

On going back to the hotel I got into the lift with two heavily made up floozies and a shifty looking bloke. It was perfectly obvious who they were, but I hadn't expected to be propositioned within three floors either! I declined the hard sell. Sad really; I understand that female Russian teenagers believe that the highest paying job they can aspire to is a hard currency prostitute. Funny thing is, the babe factor in St Pete's is extremely high, especially in the metro, where you fall in love every five minutes with exquisitely dressed (with their budget!) visions of loveliness, often escorting slouching monstrosities in shell suits. The nicest thing about them is when you look at them they look back and smile; not something you see on the London Underground.

4/4/97

Last day here, so I got up rather late; the train leaves at 2359. The dezurnaya (floor supervisor) was very friendly this morning; she probably heard my screams last night when I was filling my blisters with surgical spirit!

First order of business was to check my train ticket. Unfortunately, although it appears to list just about every detail up to Yeltsin's birthday, departure station is not one of them! Luckily, in the course of my wanderings around various stations I completed my sightseeing and shopping, and at 6 pm I'm sitting in the waiting room drinking truly awful Russian lager while watching Russian TV. Sadly, all the good looking women seem to have stayed on the metro, and I'm stuck with a few suspicious babushkas, along with a cohort of even more suspicious OMON riot policemen. Family photographs are produced, and all suddenly becomes peace and light.

Inside a Polish train	St Petersberg street