24th April 1984 Passing through Mariinsk, Novosibirsk, Omsk

Tuesday 24^th April  During the previous day’s travelling, we passed through forested country which still has patches of resolute snow which refuses to melt; a lot of melted run-off flowing through the streams and rivers. Trees, trees and more large woody plants.

  Ah, but during the nocturnal sphere of Chronos, we passed through another one of the common atmospheric, nay, meteorological, aberrations of this region – a snowfall. We stopped in Mariinsk just after I got up at about [early morning]. It had snowed there of course, and Brian [Hampson] and I had a little snow foray.

  

Mariinsk Station, by Keemka

   But the snow doesn’t last forever – after all, who knows what happened to the snows of yesterday? [où sont les neiges d'antan, if you prefer] – and sometime during the day we passed through country with old patches of the stuff, brown grass growing up through it.

  It’s a flat landscape with forested land – mostly birch and a bit of fir – and vast fields which are probably useful for growing wheat or peasmould or cuttlefish or some such crop. Often, but not exactly always, there are trees planted alongside the railway; evergreens in front, birches behind. These act as a windbreak or perhaps just as a screen. There was about a kilometer of more stretch of birches that had hundreds and hundreds if crows’ nests with accompanying crows. I presume they’re crows; they might be zagreetoes for all I know. But such aerial wildlife is more in evidence now; we can also see animals tracks in the snow along the railway, leading to puddles (large) of icy water.

   We had a stop in Bogotol just after I got up. This contradicts a statement made on the previous page. Wherever it was – Bogotol or Mariinsk – we had breakfast some time after. Boiled eggs with apple juice, but it’s very hard to remember what else or who with – Wayne and Debbie again, perhaps. Lunch was at lunchtime, much of a oneness – with that foul mineral water again. Probably Wayne, Debbie and Roger.

   Lunch finished when we arrived in Novosibirsk. Soup, that’s what else for lunch, with stroganoff type stuff. [Hmm, no comment about Novosibirsk. I do recall very clearly that I went up on the pedestrian bridge over the railway tracks with my camera out and a LOL (little old lady) told me not to take any pictures. I think I got one of the station, anyway – but all my photos are in storage back in Australia, slides affected by mould.] [Novosibirsk is the third largest city in Russia and the administrative centre of Siberia, but it has the largest train station.]

A view of Novosibirsk Station, thanks to The Siberian Times

   At various times during the day, passing through rural settlements and at stations, one may cast one’s orbs over round, or perhaps here an octagonal one, towers, the purpose of which is not known to myself or my big toe Rex. They might be elaborate grain silos because they are elaborately made of grain bricks; though some appear to be residential places. But not all.

   Talking of bricks, we pass buildings that are going up and have gone up, and the brickwork is atrocious, really. It looks very unclean.

   We had dinner, of course. Now, that was the meal with Wayne, Debbie and Roger. I think. Anyway, not much different from any other meal on the train except it was very cold and I couldn’t face eating but a wee bit of it.

  We had a night stop in Omsk, and I’ve just realized why this diary has become utterly dull reading in the last few pages. Well, maybe I’ll furnish it with such information at a later date to come, in the future, you see.