Michal, the beautiful thing that you’ve just said… is complete utter bullshit.

Random Tinder date after 3rd beer

Context. It’s all about context. Context influences our perception and ultimately defines how we see, explain, and excuse our behaviour. Sometimes, certain things make us run. The usual reason is to run away from something, to escape it. But after a while, the context can change, even if the actual activity doesn’t. The original reason, the initiating factor, stays the same. But the context changes. Running is not about running away from something anymore. It starts being about enjoying the running.

Running becomes running after something new.

 

The grey subway vagon stopped and I almost collapsed under the 15kg of luggage that was barely hanging from my weak shoulders. I wanted to make a promise with myself that next time I should reconsider inviting a friend over to my place for two bottles of wine and some rum. I immediately knew that this promise was a harsh lie so I focused my mind to the present and looked around.

Heavy pillars supporting the even heavier concrete above my head. Washed out colours. Overall dimness. People watching the ground. People watching their smartphones. All this reminded me of the subway in Pyongyang I experienced few years ago. Well, maybe minus the smartphones and plus a pinch of ever-present despair. I located the nearest exit, walked through the ever-moving masses of people and finally stepped on the escalator. It felt too tiresome to stand without losing balance but I knew that I have to finish what I have come here for.

First objective was clear – collect the remaining tickets as not everything could be bought online. It was Saturday, many shops were closed, and I was desperately hoping that the agency through which I ordered the “offline” train segments would hold up to its promise and leave them with the guardsman that was supposed to wait for me in one of the buildings. If any single block of this chain failed, I’d end up stranded in Moscow. Which wouldn’t be a bad thing – it would only lead to a different story. Most probably about running crazily through the city, trying to get the tickets in a different way, and maybe ending up drunk somewhere in the suburbs of Moscow.

Hm, funny thing. Now that I am thinking of it, there was actually no bad option.

The urban area was a typical mixture of grey concrete, formless playgrounds, and occasional trees, carelessly covered in shallow, snowy ash. I saw babushkas selling things. Children playing, running around. People running errands. Buying things. Everything was completely normal and felt natural. The lovely and completely unromantic puddles of mushy snow eventually led me to the building where I was supposed to receive my tickets.

The front door was luckily unlocked.

I entered the building and was immediately greeted by two middle-aged men that had absolutely no clue what I was doing there. Ahh, the lovely moment of silence when the other side has no idea what you want and you have no idea how to explain what you want. A short session of cross-cultural exchange resulted into them directing their cold gazes on a small locker standing on the opposite side of the room. I understood their warm, kind message and went to open the locker just to find everything I needed.

I cried “спасибо” at my two new short-term friends and ran outside of the building.

The adrenaline rush lasted approximately 500m. Just enough to climb the stairs and enter the closest fast-food restaurant. I ordered a Russian cheeseburger for a late lunch, sat down, took out my diary and spent half an hour putting together my thoughts and feelings. The topic was the difference between knowledge and personal values in the context of showing them off and the content was too random to publish anywhere.

Eventually I’ve put myself together. In spite of my sleep deprivation and no place to leave my luggage, I decided to take a 3 hour walk through the city centre – see the famous Red Square and the infamous Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge. There was one thought lingering on my mind – the train leaves close to midnight and my time left in Moscow is limited, therefore I should make efficient use of it and see as much as possible.

And I deliberately chose not to. I arrived at the station close to 19:00, almost desperate to sit down and warm myself up. The first steps led me to the ticket office to exchange my confirmation email for an actual ticket. The activity took much less than expected and I ended up with having more than 4 hours of time until the train departure. I knew that the moment I close my eyes, I fall asleep and won’t wake up for the next week. So I did all there was possible to not to.

Watch people. Take random pictures of people. Write random comments to the diary. Intensively watch the clock. Buy instant noodles. Repeat.

I surprisingly managed to keep my mind busy. As the time of departure came closer, the emotions in my head again started to explode. Funny how uncertainty can both kill and boost one’s morale. But then yet, it’s all about the context. What do you associate the uncertainty with?

In my case it was a hope for growth. It wasn’t an expectation for certain adventures. It was an expectation to live through random adventures.

I decided to give this uncertainty a shape and decided to board the train. Finding the platform was the easy part – Trans-siberian connections were leaving mostly from the furthermost terminal. The problem was to chose the right vagon from the long chain of steel cages on wheels that would become my whole world for the next 5 days.

I used my polished communication skills earned earlier in the day and approached a group of 3 train conductors. They helped me to find my compartment and… voila, there it was. My personal world.

The compartment had 4 bunk beds: 2 lower and 2 higher ones. My place was the left higher one and I could see that the remaining places already had their owners sitting on them.

I said a weak здравствуйте to my 3 new companions: two Russian babushkas and one blonde girl in the second half of her 30s. First babushka (temporarily named “Berta 1” as I didn’t actually bother asking her name) had a lot of energy and willingness for control. The second babushka (her working name was “Berta 2” as I didn’t catch her name) was a nice, calm lady with deep eyes hinting lots of experience with coming to terms with whatever the life brings. The blonde girl was called Tatiana and was heading to Beijing for her studies. She decided to take the train due to her fear of flying.

Berta 1 seemed to be really anxious to keep her immediate environment “under control”, even though she was leaving the train sometime during the night. Tatiana’s luggage was too huge to hide under the lower bunk bad, but keeping in the aisle between the beds was a big no-no. I was sure about the actual structure and firmness of her argumentation, but watching Berta 1 yelling words like “TOALETA!” and “DISKOMFORT!” repeatedly several times in a lovely Russian accent was actually quite funny and made me smile.

I helped Tatiana with tossing the luggage to her upper bunk bed and crammed my backpack on my bedside as well. Berta 1 abruptly turned off the lights and went to sleep. I decided to follow her example and climbed on my bed. The mattress had a strangely hard quality to the touch and reminded me of the 1.5 cm of foam on a wooden plank I used to sleep on during my studies in China. Lovely memories. I put of my winter jacket, stuffed it away, removed my shoes, and stretched my body. Suddenly, I heard a sound of multiple wagon cars gently nudging into each other – a clear sign that the train started to move. The careful, haphazard nudging slowly transformed into a steady flow of sound of the wheels hitting the track. It was beautiful.

I closed my eyes and my face turned into a smile.

This time, the smile was not because of amusement.

I smiled because I felt a tear slowly falling down one of my cheeks.

One tear heavy filled with so, so many feelings and meanings.

As my mind gently slipped the world of dreamless darkness, everything felt light and clear.