The Ost - West Express

.... or,

The Oleg Sokolv Experience

Okay, the obvious place to start is right in the beginning, London, just before I left. Of course, nothing exciting happened in London, save me nearly missing the train, but that's such a common complaint it's hardly even worth mentioning. Oh, the customs guys took exception to my having two knives in my backpack (one for bread, another for fruit) and I was worried about them overreacting, but everything turned out hunky dory in the end. It was my first, and most successful, brush with border control. Anyway....

...My passport back from the bloody Russians, I started at London Waterloo and made my way to Brussels, where I had an 8 hour wait before getting on the fabled Ost-West Express (I had never heard of it either, but apparently it's quite popular among train enthusiasts, those fun-loving ragamuffins). Spending my time wandering around the Belguim capial I was struck by how little the city lived up to my expectations - instead of being the vibrant and modern hub of Europe I was expecting, it was a very drab affair, full of hunched, shuffling people wandering about looking down on their luck, rather than up tight business men charging around dealing with important deals and mergers. Strange.

So, my personal verdict, don't go to Brussels - it's crap.

Boarding the train at a little after four I sought out my cabin and gracefully dumped my backpack down in front of three worn green seats, remarkably out of breath and looking forward to an extended sit down. Any desired respite was delayed however, as before I could so much as catch my breath, I was greeted by a grinning loon; meet Oleg Sokolov. Oleg and his friend Dimitri, floor managers for a huge European supermarket chain, were returning to Moscow from a training week in Paris, and had opted to take the train back rather than fly. I didn't see much of Dimitri over the next 38 hours across Europe as he was in the next cabin and had chosen to read and watch the countryside zip past; I was to share a cabin with Oleg.

At 31, Oleg Solokov had a receeding hairline and the heavy, dark set features of a stereotypical Russian male. Burst blood vessels in his cheeks and nose told of long harsh winters with more than a few open bottles of vodka, and he seemed to have the grace normally reserved for baby elephants at feeding time. Though heavily accented, he spoke very good English, and was excited to learn that he wouldn't have to spend the journey with a french or German speaker - so excited in fact, that he managed to talk almost non-stop for the next two days. It didn't seem to matter that he was repeating himself (for repeat himself he most certainly did), or if he was heading down an obvious dead-end avenue of conversation. He liked to talk. And talk. And talk.

He talked about many things - the weather, his job, European countries, Russia, Ireland - but his overriding topic of conversation, the subject closest to his big Slavic heart, was porn. He loved it, and made a passionate hobby out of collecting porn mags from every country in Europe (part of the reason he didn't fly - going through costums with a bag chocked full of pornography would be pretty embarrassing....). His dream is to work for the porn industry in Las Vegas and he wanted to know how much girls cost in London, which was, unfortunately, something I couldn't help him with. When asked if he wanted to play cards his first question wasn't what game we should play, but whether we should play with normal or dirty cards, and quickly came to the decision that normal cards where for before vodka, dirty cards for after vodka. When the train's PA system announced we were stopping in Brest, the first city in Belarus just over the Polish border, he slapped me on the back exclaiming "She said breast, she said breast!!" before collapsing in a fit of giggles worthy of a school girl. Humour, it would seem, was not Mr Solokov's strong point.

Despite his penchant for porn, Oleg was a genuine guy and spoke fondly about his home city of Moscow. He told me places to visit and plied me with information about getting around, all before deciding I had lived long enough without trying proper honest-to-God Russian alcohol and heading off to the dining carriage to pick us up an armful of bottles. And so now I am very pleased to announce that I have proved the theory that no matter where you are in the world, be it a train in the middle of the former soviet block in a full three berth cabin, when pissed it is always possible to rustle up a branson pickle and cheese sandwich.