A typical Trans-Siberian stop

Like our fellow passengers we spent our time on board the Trans-Siberian sleeping, playing chess, reading, paying visits to the samovar for hot drinks and more sleeping (train travel always seems to have a pleasantly soporific effect).

This monotony was only broken by the handful of stops our train made every day which allowed passengers to alight and stretch their legs. The following describes a typical stop.

The toilets have been closed for the last ten minutes, the passengers mill about in the corridor, expectant fags at the ready, the train starts to slow: there must be a stop coming up

Heaving to a shuddering halt, the expectant passengers impatiently wait for the provodnitsa to open the heavy steel door and haul down the steps. A physically-challenging and rather complex process, this often seems to require the help of one of the many bare-chested men who always seem to be on hanging around.

Outside on the platform a gaggle of Babuskas (is that the collective noun?) line up their improvised stalls, ready to hawk their wares - packets of noodles and biscuits, along with more homegrown treats such as cabbage dumplings, boiled potatoes and smoked fish.

The passengers gingerly step off the train, heaving themselves down off the high steps, dodging puddles, piles of ballast and the broken glass of beer bottles to make the ‘platform’, often little more than a rough strip of concrete, or even bare ground, with great waterlogged holes in it

The flock over to the babuskas, waving roubles and plastic bags in a frenzy of hunting and gathering.

The little shop set back from the platform soon attracts their attention: time to stock up on booze and fags. Passengers crowd around the tiny window, always seemingly built with your average Oompa-Lumpa, rather than a human, in mind.

Back by the train, a leathery chap saunters along the platform banging the wheels and undercarriages as he goes. This is no act of state-sponsored vandalism, rather he plays a key and rather reassuring role, searching the wheels for cracks and checking the integrity of our moving home.

He is followed by a weatherbeaten, broad lady, who jams a metal rod through a crack in the concrete platform, heaves on a dilapidated old valve and feeds water somewhere into the bowels of the carriage.

In the background the tannoy crackles and enormous freight trains roll by, dragging rusty wagons, past stray dogs, departing families and railway workers taking a break in the shade of a advertising hoarding.

Over on the next platform a train rolls up, carrying armoured personal carriers. From every window hordes of brawny soldiers crane their necks out, their eyes screwed up against the sun, on the lookout for more beer and fags.

Back on our side, other soldiers, off-duty and travelling amongst us strut about in their sandals and tight polyester shorts, swigging warm lager and sunning their bare, heavily-tattooed chests.

Suddenly the provodnitsa bellows: “All aboard, get back on now or spend the next night in the middle of nowhere.”

Like chicks to a mother hen, the passengers duly oblige and scurry back to their stuffy little cabins, waiting for the train to get moving and the air con to once more heave back into life.

Oh well, only another four hours of eating and sleeping until the next stop...