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From “Fonske” <amlozano@iies.es>

Date Friday, July 23, 2004 07:22

To “List of contacts”

Subject à bord de le vostok

dear all,

the goodbye of irkutsk is magnificent. siberia appears again esplendid and plain. we say good bye to baikal in the very morning, but during a while it accompanies vostok and dedicates us its mist. the passengers are now mainly chinese. i start to have the feeling than they are more people than they appear to be. always busy up and down in the corridor, shouting or filling the smoking room, which is an aromatic london. there is also a brazilian that smiles but that never speaks to us, only at the end, when the last stop took place; i think he and his companion (an absent youngster) go to a congress in beijing, in the most surrealistic mean of transport; and a slight and gleaned american that - circumstances - studied classic philology in madrid. his spanish is complicatedly basic, he accepts us a whiskey while he speaks about dead languages. the other passengers we manage to identify by their name are another american who travels to japan from france, without airplanes and two english girls, shy enough or silly enough to answer with monosillabic words.

zabaikalsk. in russian comes to say: beyond the baikal. so true. here is where the border crossing takes place. first big wave in form of russian customs inspectors, most of them of mongoloid features, peculiarly accompanied by beautiful, short and blonde hair, slavic females. russian officers are correct, bordering the kindness but without getting touching it. the heat in the compartment is frightful and after five hours of asphyxia neither them nor us have the desire of being tough in the registry. but the work is the work. they raise to the bunk above, focus with the lantern to our overbooked "fridge", that now is a set of organic material that begins to be rotten. she didn't even look at the knapsack, that is with the most suspicious element. she just pays attention to the odd russian boiled ham, that now more than boiled is annealed and is sticky; mixed with the constant dripping of the russy standard - that piece of paradise in russia - and along with the scent of the smoky fish forms a disgusting combination. our noses, however, neither those of the border guards are able to distinguish anything. at the end she only seems to be interested by the clarinet suitcase , that makes them feel dizzy. a russian girl of fine face and moscow skin smiles when see our spanish passports. the correct official, after interchanging some words with her becomes rude in front of her amused glance (i try to imagine her undressesed, or at least out of that soviet uniform). she does not know a single word of english. while she watches with curiosity to us, she has asked for him to make us a small interrogation. "what are you doint in russia" i vacillate before wonder "i don't know... to chase my imagination?" but i answer "just tourism". the russian girl, i do know, has imagined to anyone of the three of us in her bed. in this point unknown spot of the planet called zabaikalsk, whose only merit consists of being the transiberian border with china three spaniards appears to her more exotic than the beaches in which the russians dream when they dream and which unfortunately I do not know. when they have finished, still ther is time left for the compartmet increase its oven characteristics. we drink water with the desperate certainty of which we will sweat it immediately. when crossing the fence and leave behind the panel that says russia, the soldiers seem to watch us resigned but in their glance there is also a bunch of hopes, focused on those uniforms that never seem to fit them. i believe that there's no russian who is a soldier. i still have not seen a civil employee, police or soldier in russia that shines as an hussar of old times. therefore i have this impression of russia as a puzzle of gigantic pieces that never fit. on the other side there is another panel with chinese ideograms that shows the beginning of manchuria. we have already had left back the birthplace of genghis khan, lord and sovereign of the most extensive empire of the world. china receives us with extensive yellow steppe, worsened by the twilight in an unknown time (our clocks tells three times, none of them the local one). the colors are plaster, in contrast with the russian part, that is sketched with bright oil. where siberia changes country to be called manchuria, we are meaningful memoryless points, moving with vostok's speed. we feel every kilometer, we know we belong to the landscape, from time ago.

manzhouli is the first stop. the clock will follow here beijing time. this guarantees us nine hours more of heat. the station is very out of proportion. it is surprising big and clean. Against the chaos that seems to reign in any russian station, where coexist farmers, merchants of the most varied merchandise (the smoky fish is the star, whose scent we supported with christian resignation), police, soldiers, workers of the railroad, vagabonds, beggers, dirty children and babushkas, in manzhouli the small civil employees of customs appear firm as soldiers of xian, in perfect formation, like escorting the vostok, our train, that breaks through between the platforms arduously. in the station there is music, that somebody defines as chinese-chill. it seems to surround the station a false idyllic frame. our officers are two young girls, of pleasant features and so tiny that hardly can intimidate anybody. they put at the door of the compartment a laptop of several generations ago, and examine with ample smile our passports. they do not seem to identify us individually and we are those that indicate them who is who. one of them dispassionately places a seal next to the visa and disappears. here there are no soldiers looking for nothing in our compartment. when we are finally authorized to get off, the night has fallen on manchuria, the moon is crescent. the miracle vanishes when looking for the only store "friendship shop", says the ad, i get confuse and fail to find my way. soldier runs towards me, shouting, to indicate me the right direction. in the interior of the building, after iron fence, about one hundred chinese men change currency disorderly, in front of the impassible glance of the soldiers. when I have yuans in my pocket, knowing that still i have three hours until customs officers end the registry of ther compatriots, with a complementary interest to which they have with us, i decide that it is time to have a nap.

vostok crosses the steppe cleanly, our long serpent that will end up becoming the dragoon that symbolizes china. the stations and megalopolis follow one another. those cities lodges to million of chinese in miserable hovels. the railway workers by the track side, the chess, the chatting, the pious americans with we share some hours. the only ones capable to stay fresh and clean seem to be the english girl of compartment three, but they don't show us excessive affection, so we ignore them too. we suspect that the continous flow of people in the toilet in our carriage side is related to their abetment with the provodnitsas to have a compartment with bathroom included. that's how it happens that we have to wait for ages to use it. that's how it happens that (it was my error), the door opens when I'm sitting in obvious physical activity, while i'm farting like a hooter. we look each other and talk. of course we don't understand each other. but from then, everytime i find her at the corridor, she lowers her sight.

siberia behind, manchuria start as a desert. i think i've heard the rumour of the pacific ocean when i wake up after a nightmare one night. i watch through the window and i know it's there, whipping the chinese coast. i understand that reality is polyhedral, that i won't be able to see eveything, that there are some things i will feel for its sound, for its tact, just because i've been able to think about them. it happens short after shenyang, a black clean station, like all those here in china.

at four a.m., provodnitsas decide to clean the train for beijing. they wake up with the vacuum cleaner and then a argument started for a towel. after half an hour of lack of air (no more air condition), we found it below the seat. sorry, honey, we didn't want to rob it.

many hours later, when it's five a.m. beijing appears. it's hot. the air is liquid.

the hugs and the kisses,

fonske.

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