So I mentioned in my last post that we had some misadventures and run ins with members of the Russian service industry during our trip to Moscow. Let me elaborate. When we arrived, the whole group went to see Red Square and GUM, and then we split into two smaller groups and went off into the city. The groups were supposed to meet up at the train station at 5:30pm to catch the 6:06 train back to Vladimir (I stayed the night, but I had to go to the station to change the time of my return ticket, so I went back with the other teachers).

We arrived at Kurskii train station at about 5:30, but the other members of the group were nowhere to be found. Their train wasn't yet listed on the departures board (that's how you find out what track your train is on), so I went to try to exchange my ticket while we waited. I went to ask first at the Russian Railways service center, and I got a curt--but efficient--answer that I was in the wrong place and needed to go to the ticket office. So I went to one of the ticket windows and waited while people in front of me bought tickets to Sevestopol (a city the Crimea).  When it was finally my turn, I gave the woman the ticket I wanted to exchange, and she explained to me that she could only exchange it for cash and not just change the time because the ticket was for an express train, which is operated by a different division of Russian Railways than the one that operates the local train I wanted to get a ticket for. Oh bureaucracy. So I took my money and checked the departures board again.

Their train was listed as departing from platform 4 at 18:06. So, after following signs for platforms 1-11 that led us to a barricaded door, we asked a policeman how to get to platform 4, and he explained exactly what to do. When we emerged onto the platform, there stood a train to Sochi (a city in the far south of Russia) and a train to Sevestopol--no train to Vladimir and very few people in sight. As the panic started to mount--at this point, about 10 minutes remained until departure--I asked an employee on the Sochi-bound train where the train to Vladimir was. He shrugged his shoulders. We got a similar response from a lady on the platform. One girl from the group asked, in bad Russian, "Where is Vladimir?," to which an employee simply pointed and said, "About 200 kilometers that way."

After sprinting up and down stairs and asking anyone we could find, we finally realized that we wanted not platform 4 but tupik 4 (a tupik is a dead end, as in, where the train tracks stop). We looked in the direction, and, across the train tracks, we watched the correct train depart.

So we headed back into the station to try to buy tickets for the next train. First, we thought it was worth a try to exchange the tickets, and here is where I met the most unfriendly servicewoman I have ever encountered in Russia. She was sitting at her ticket window tabulating something on the calculator, completing avoiding our glances and not acknowledging that we were there. After at least two minutes passed, she spoke: "And what are you gonna say?" (А что скажете вы?), which is really rude in Russian. She looked at our tickets, rolled her eyes, and said that she absolutely would not exchange them because we had missed our train (I expected that response).

So, the other teachers were out 383 rubles (about $10) and had to buy new return tickets. The woman who sold them, in stark contrast to the other people we had encountered, was really nice and patient. She explained exactly what to do, put up with our questions and worries about how the new tickets looked (they were just receipts, which is normal, but the other teachers were perturbed by their unofficial look). After I went back to ask her a few more questions and buy my return ticket, I thanked her, and she said that she sees it as her job to help people get to their destinations. At least someone has the right philosophy!

After getting tickets for the next train at 9pm, we decided that it was time for a beer and headed to a nearby cafe. It was a great choice. If you're ever in Moscow, I highly recommend Cafe Chaplin (Кафе "Чаплин") right off the Garden Ring south of Kurskii station. The staff was super friendly and spoke decent English, the beer was good and cold, and they gave us a cocktail they call the Drunk Alexei as a treat of the house. What's a Drunk Alexei? Take a martini glass and a hollowed-out grapefruit half. Fill the bottom of the glass with tomato juice, and fill the grapefruit with vodka. Put the grapefruit in the top of the glass. To drink, use the grapefruit like a shot glass, and then chase with the tomato juice.

It was just what we needed after a day like that.