Nothing says "Soviet Era" quite like a boxy locomotive with a red star on the front. Our departure from Vladimir was early and expeditious; we were up early (5:10) and boarded the train by 7:30, having eaten, packed, loaded our gear, collected our passports, and bounced across town on the trolley-bus. Being reunited with our passports was a relief since it meant we could leave on schedule.
Everywhere we had gone in Russia the present merged with the past. At times it seemed there was no present. The train station was no exception. Police, indistinguishable from soldiers, were everywhere. We walked around the train station rather than through it. When we saw the army green train with its red star at the platform we began to think that the trip to Moscow would be grim. But then that vintage train pulled out without us.
When it had gone, a newer train pulled in, blue and white, not green, and we climbed on. Two female soldiers checked our tickets and passports before we entered our car, #10, the last car. Our tickets indicated assigned seats, bench seats like an American school bus, but facing each other. We hoisted our bags into the overhead bins and slid in. A middle-aged woman was already sitting next to the window. We filled in the other five places, three facing three.
My ticket put me by the window across from the woman, almost knee to knee. She looked steadily out the window and withdrew her feet as far back as she could. I sat back as far as I could; by withdrawing my feet as well I managed about an inch between our knees. Next to me was Skip Lord, then Joel. We were seriously crammed shoulder to shoulder. Next to the woman was John Woodard, then Eric. The five of us Americans -- all fairly big guys -- chatted most of the way.
The woman was hemmed in. Every so often she would look past John to make eye contact with an older woman, a babushka, across the aisle. Her mother, perhaps? Or just an older Russian woman with whom she could exchange a sympathetic glance?
Soon after the train began to move, a female conductor, also in a military uniform, came through to punch our tickets, making sure we are seated as assigned. So far, we had had our tickets torn, check-marked, and punched, our passports examined, by successive uniformed officials. This conductor smiled when she saw us and indicated she wanted to know who we were. We pointed to the logos on our jackets and said "Ba-skeet-ball" in that exaggerated way our phonetic phrase sheet indicated we should -- which made her laugh and nod. A rare display of friendliness we had not expected.
Outside the window the now familiar Russian scenes: forests, broad fields waiting to be plowed, old villages of brightly painted wood-framed houses, piles of garbage here and there, evidence of last year's dead grasses and weeds burning -- not all that different from what one might see from a train in many countries including our own.
As I look back on this experience nearly twenty years in the past, I am disappointed our contact with the Russian countryside was always from the discrete distance of moving vehicles. Like the back streets of Vladimir that we were able to visit briefly one afternoon with its deteriorating houses and its hidden wood-shop, a closer view of land features, of farm and village life, and what these might have told us about the heart of Russia, remained beyond our knowing.
I think, too, about the poor woman sitting across from me, who must have felt trapped. How does one reach across the barriers imposed by language, culture, expectations, speeding vehicles -- who knows what else?
About 90 minutes into our two plus hour trip, unable to stand-up, move, or stretch, I developed a serious cramp in my right hamstring. For what seemed like an eternity I sat with the cramp -- unable to stand because of the overhead luggage rack, unable to stretch my leg out into this woman's space, and unwilling to make the whole group get up so that I could slide out.
The cramp eventually went away on its own, sort of, but the memory of it has remained fresh. For those few uncomfortable moments I remember feeling I had no acceptable recourse but to endure. What I make of that moment all these years later is that it is like so much in life: knowing what the problem is and how one might resolve it is not the same as having the opportunity or the tools to solve it.
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