Russia, 1986

The Trans-Siberian Railway
In the spring of 1986, a Soviet engineer moved in below me at Tianjin University's Foreigner Guest House #2. His name was Yuri, and he was the only retired MIG-25 fighter pilot that I've ever known.


Yuri's English was better than my Russian, but both were quite limited. Neither of us were getting along very well with our Chinese classes, so he took it upon himself to teach Russian to several of us who were there with him in Guest House #2. Yuri basically taught us how to drink vodka while slurring together various Russian words and phrases.  The main consideration in my mind was that the lessons were especially easy.
Sadly, my Russian language education came to an abrupt end that summer. Yuri returned home to Minsk.
A year later I was preparing to leave China to return to the United States. Several friends and I thought it would be fun to route ourselves through Europe, rather than fly back over the Pacific Ocean. We took about a month to collect all the right visas, and on July 1, 1987 we set out from Beijing on the Trans-Siberian Express.

As scheduled, the seven-day trip to Berlin was in itself an amazing venture. The route took us through Mongolia where the train's wheel gauge had to be changed.  (This was a standard practice used to slow the progress of any potential invaders). We then traced the south side of Lake Baikal before heading west through Siberia and on to Moscow, and then further west to Berlin.

On July 4th the train stopped in Novosibirsk, Siberia's largest industrial city. We were told that the train would be leaving again in fifteen minutes. A fellow traveler, E. H., walked around the station with me for about ten minutes. We returned to the platform with at least four minutes to spare. Unfortunately, the train had already gone.  Within moments I discovered that Yuri's Russian lessons were failing me just when I needed them most.

That same hour E. H. and I were locked in a room somewhere in the train station. To our relief, the local officials chose to place us on the next train to Moscow, which was running only about four hours behind the train that we'd lost.

Of course, they barked at us for losing our train, but the officials were still good enough to wire ahead to our friends, letting them know that we'd eventually meet them in Moscow.  Our biggest problem at that point was that we would be "stranded" without food or money for the next two days.

To our surprise, in that short period of time, we felt as if we'd suddenly mastered the Russian language. One of our new found teachers, Mikhail "Mike" B. was happy to share his sausage, caviar and vodka. All he wanted in return were some jeans, so we promised to provide an extra pair for him once we could get to our packs in Moscow.

As it turned out, Mike was fortunate that we were never able to supply him with our extra jeans. I later learned that he was detained for over two days by the KGB for being "too friendly with the foreigners." Our Levi's would have done little to help his case. He now works as a chef at the Taj Mahol in Atlantic City, NJ.  He and his wife Lana were able to emigrate from the Soviet Union in 1990. He tells me that, among other things, the KGB asked what exactly he knew about us and why we were all so friendly.

"I was just talking with some people on the train. I don't know anything about them."

What language did they speak?" asked the KGB.

"I don't know, but they did not speak good Russian. Maybe they were from the Baltics."

Since then both Mike and I have given up on vodka, but he's still good for a quick Russian lesson every now and then. E. H. returned to a job in Boston and later went on to school in Chicago.  I hear he was working on an archaeological dig at a remote site in Kamalapuram, India, at one time. I've lost track of Yuri, but I believe he returned to Minsk to teach engineering and physics.

Me? For a time I'd taken to working with international students back here in the ‘States.

(Look for more from Jim in coming weeks.)