“What was all the commotion about last night in your room?” Mom asked.
“Some guy kept calling us all night–” Ammon started to explain.
“Really?” Looking more than a little curious, Mom added, “Who? What did he want?”
“I dunno. Some pimp trying to sell me his girls.”
“No way!” I said with a nervous giggle.
“Yeah, way. There’s a reason they rent the rooms by the hour, ya know. Even after I unplugged the phone, they still kept calling. It was like a sick, twisted nightmare!”
Mom looked sceptical. “I doubt you really unplugged it, Ammon.”
“Okay, fine. What I mean is that I would have, but it was one of those kinds that goes right into the wall. Those really old-fashioned ones where the cord is actually connected inside. So it’s, like, there was no way I could escape it.”
“You mean, we couldn’t escape it,” Bree said, hands cradling her head. “I hope I never hear another phone ringing ever again.”
“But honestly, those idiots downstairs saw us check in. What were they expecting,” he asked, “when I’m already in bed with my sister?”
“Oh my gosh. That just sounds so wrong,” I said.
Bree cringed. “Eeew! I’m not sharing a room with you anymore.”
He let out a laugh before waving his hand at an imaginary phone. “They saw me walk in with three women. Why on earth would I need another one?”
“Oh really? What about that woman, huh?” Bree asked, arching a brow toward where Sorcha’s shadow was just appearing in the entrance. Ammon leapt up to greet her with a well-received hug. Her simple white heels complimented her white and pink floral skirt. Just once on this trip, I wanted to feel and smell as clean as she did.
Welcoming her warmly and thanking her for meeting us, Ammon went off with her to buy train tickets. Her blue eyes looked him over approvingly as she helped him translate. We three waited patiently off to the side. I almost felt bad for spying on them, but we began nudging each other like restless squirrels when we spotted her subtly petting his arm, standing closer than necessary, and smiling up at him.
“Ammon. You tiger, you!” Bree joked, making us giggle even more.
When they returned from the ticket window, Ammon said, “The good news is, there’s a direct train to Almaty from here. The bad news is, we might not be able to get tickets for the next one, which leaves in half an hour. The only option after that is leaving in three days.”
“Well, we don’t mind staying,” Mom said. “I mean, we’ve been travelling non-stop for quite a while. It might even be nice to have a few days to recover.”
“Yeah,” Bree and I agreed with suggestive smiles. When they returned the second time with tickets in hand, I could practically hear the wedding bells ringing. They were both tall and slender, and they actually would’ve made quite an attractive couple. I smiled as Ammon approached, already anticipating his next words.
“C’mon, get your stuff. The train leaves in fifteen minutes,” he said as he handed us our tickets.
“What?!” All three of us gasped in unison.
“We’re catching the next train out of here. We got the last tickets.”
“But, but, but…” I reached down to gather my pack and hoist it onto my back, his obvious insanity spinning in my head. No! There just isn’t enough time for love. My heart sank. We had barely enough time to buy noodles for our twenty-four-hour journey to Almaty, Kazakhstan’s previous capital.
I had liked the excitement and fairy-tale sound of having a gorgeous, half-Kazakh woman for a sister-in-law, so this turn of events was quite disappointing. I believed in love at first sight and in the idea of soul mates, though I knew that arranged marriages could also work; if people applied themselves with an open mind, they could learn to love anybody.
“I was so sure he was going to stay the extra couple days.” Mom was frowning.
“And you guys say I’m stupid.” Bree shook her head in disgust.
Sorcha stood on the platform, daintily waving goodbye. Her hair blew across her face like embers that occasionally sparked into flames, visually echoing the fire erupting in Ammon’s chest. I turned to see his face, but his expression was impassive. He didn’t give me a chance to search closer, instead quickening his pace to charge ahead toward the next challenge. It was as if the whole experience was nothing more than one of his many fantasies.
“Why on earth are we leaving?” Bree asked.
“Ammon, what exactly were you thinking? And right after you told us about making the same mistake the last time you were in Russia,” I said.
“I know, I know… I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Aiyyaiyai! Bro---ther,” Bree cried hopelessly. The metal doors shut almost immediately as the conductor jumped in directly behind us.
“For such a smart guy, you can be downright idiotic sometimes,” I said.
“I know,” he said, looking back for the last time. He let out a long sigh when she was out of sight, as if he had just barely escaped the enchanting songs of deadly sirens. I thought he was only out to get us, but he apparently likes to torture himself, too. What a masochist.
“So, tell us. What happened? What did she say? I still can’t believe you left.”
“Well, I basically asked her to marry me.”
“You what?!”
“I asked her to marry me,” he said. “I’m not crazy. I didn’t get down on one knee or anything. But I was basically like, ‘Yeah, what the hell, why not? I want a wife, and you want to get out of the country.’ ”
“So let me get this straight,” I said. “You pretty much proposed to a girl you met yesterday, which is freaky enough, but she doesn’t say ‘no’; she gives you her email address instead and then you, what? You buy the next ticket out of town?”
“That’s pretty much how it went. Yeah.”
The Unexpected Highlife in Low Class
7
For the twenty-four-hour journey farther into Kazakhstan, we were “blessed” with third-class tickets instead of the second-class seats I had anticipated. Of course! The consequences were apparent immediately as we tried to squeeze our way down the narrow corridor to find our designated compartment, which was already fully occupied. Luggage was strewn everywhere in the aisles, and people were pushing to find space for both themselves and their junk. The entire fifty-four-bed carriage was in much the same state of disarray.
We could forget about any attempt to claim our assigned beds – clearly, no one had noticed the little numbers on either the beds or their tickets. I could hardly blame them though. It was nearly impossible to see anything past the head of the person standing a mere five centimetres (2 in) in front of you.
We just stood there, sweating and aching beneath heavy packs, befuddled and unsure of what to do. Turning, I saw Bree’s horrified gaze fixated on a screaming, snotty baby.
“Eeew,” she shuddered, “this is going to be, like, ten times worse than dragging nails across a chalk board.” We were accustomed to overcrowded conditions, including not having enough seats on long journeys, but something about this train was unbearably smothering. At least it didn’t have the second-hand smoke we had choked on in China, but it felt claustrophobic in a stuck-under-a-fat-man’s-armpit kind of way. You’ve gotta be kidding me. This freakin’ sucks!
“Where are our seats? I thought we were getting second-class tickets?”
“Yeah, well. They were all sold out, and then they sold us these seats anyway. I don’t know what’s up with that,” Ammon said.
“You wouldn’t think they’d sell more tickets than they had seating for,” Mom agreed.
“I’m kind of at the point where I’m willing to believe they’ll do anything,” Ammon said.
“How are we going to spend a whole day in this?” Bree barked, more annoyed than usual by the baby gnawing and slobbering on a bunk railing.
Our arrival in the cramped carriage was the last straw for the people already oc
cupying it. They’d been fighting for seats even before we showed our dreary faces. I hated the heavy glares of people sizing me up. There were a few old men, some young families, and a couple of extra-large women taking up a lot of room on the compartment’s benches. They jabbered at us frantically, with their arms waving and their metallic teeth flashing. The heat and commotion were dizzying as the engine roared to life and the train began to move. Everyone was pitched off balance so we all fell into one another. There was no place we could sit or put our bags down, let alone sleep, that night. The continued shouting sent sweat and spit flying everywhere. Not only did I feel physically ugly and uncomfortable, but my emotional self was starting to feel about the same, or worse. I took it all very personally and grumbled under my breath, cursing every one of their golden teeth anchored in their clammy faces.
“Well, isn’t this just great?” I said sardonically, unconcerned by this time about whether or not anyone understood English. “We’re going to be sitting on the floor or on one of these fat babushka’s laps all night.”
“They sure can shout,” Mom said, as we manoeuvred to the side, out of harm’s way, as they fought it out amongst themselves. Apparently, we weren’t the only ones exasperated by this arrangement.
“Well, just be grateful you’re not on a boat.” Mom always had the strangest way of trying to put a positive spin on things.
“You know what, Mom? That doesn’t help. And it’s kind of annoying how you’re always so positive. It’s not normal. You can’t seriously expect us to dig this,” I growled at her as I continued to be nudged and bumped from all sides.
“I’m just saying that it could be worse. Stop acting so darned spoiled all the time!”
“Spoiled? Spoiled?! I know I’ve been a bit hard to handle sometimes, but seriously? Spoiled?! I’ve come a long way over the last few months, and it just makes me crazy when you put us through this kind of crap and then act like it’s normal.”
A woman who was screaming at the man who’d just given up on finding a place to lie down in the overhead racks shoved me with her elbow during her hissy fit.
I turned on Ammon, fuming. “Why couldn’t you just spend a bit more to actually buy us second-class seats? I don’t know what you’re trying to prove. This is so stupid.”
“Stop your whining,” he said. “This was the last thing they had. We couldn’t have gotten anything better, even if we’d been willing to pay more. So just stop it.”
“And it’s not about proving something, it’s about making the money last,” Mom added. “I can’t afford to spend a bunch of money on more luxurious tickets. This will be just fine. You’ll see. It’s a good lesson for you, anyway. You obviously need this kind of experience. You can be pretty darned ungrateful sometimes.”
“Yeah, you’re pretty much right, but a seat sure would’ve been nice,” Bree said. We were yelling over their yelling, and the three languages –Kazak Turkic, Russian, and now English –blended in a cacophony of incomprehensible noise. Under the pressure of an impossible language barrier, the overall uncertainty, the heat, and our growling bellies, we’d started to turn on each other.
“They never should have sold us tickets in the first place,” Ammon pointed out. “If it weren’t for Sorcha, we’d have gotten the cashier window slammed in our faces again. We’re lucky to have even got on… I think.”
“Lucky? I don’t even want to go wherever we’re going, and even if I did, I don’t know why we’d ever want to go there,” I complained.
“Who’s ever even heard of Kazak-stack,” Bree added.
“That’s ‘cause you never know where we’re going, Bree. You should try and act like you care a bit more, or we’re going to send you home,” Ammon threatened, the vein on his forehead bulging.
“Me?!” Bree gasped.
“Her?!” I said, our wide eyes meeting, and both of us wondering what we’d done wrong. And then another thought occurred to me. Just hold on one little second, here… What is she doing right so that she might get to go home?
“I’m the one who wants to go home,” I said.
“Great! Then you can both get lost,” he growled.
“Oh now… Stop it, you guys. You’re all just hungry,” Mom said. We hadn’t eaten much of anything yet, having gone directly to the station to meet Sorcha. Empty stomachs unleashed the monsters inside of us, much the way a werewolf reacts to a full moon. Fortunately, it wasn’t too long before the conductor of the train, a middle-aged man with a crooked purple tie, came to help sort everyone out.
He managed by pointing, and sometimes physically moving people, to arrange almost adequate seating. Though still not ideal, the conductor’s efforts did calm the waters, and like the turning of a Rubik’s Cube, people started helping and rearranging themselves. When he’d done his best, our group shared a total of three beds. One of the three was down at the end of the train. It seemed most sensible for we girls to stick together and let Ammon fend for himself. Bree and I would once again be sharing a bunk. From mattress to overhead divider, it was all of about two feet high, and though it was impossible to sit up, it was much better than what we’d started off with. We played musical chairs for a few more minutes. One of the women shouted at one of the men sitting on a bottom seat. She had him trade one of our top bunks for his seat, giving us a place to sit during the day. I sighed quietly, much relieved.
I managed to get a window seat with a small table for a few hours – a perfect opportunity to catch up in my journal, where I documented my observations about scenery, feelings, and people.
The countryside between Semey at the Russian/Kazakh border, and Almaty, near the Kazakh/Kyrgyz border, was memorably desolate. There wasn’t much of anything out there at all, and I could almost understand why they’d used this part of the country for nuclear testing.
Once everyone was a little more settled, the tension eased and we all began to open up a bit. I sat down and began to interact with people one-on-one, instead of seeing the crowd as one big circus. They practiced their few words of English; ‘I love you’, ‘Pretty hair’, ‘Beautiful eyes’, ‘How old are you?’, ‘Pretty smile’.
Ammon spent most of the day down at our end of the train, getting to know our new friends. A curious eleven-year-old boy named Sergei had wandered over from a couple of compartments down. He was like an endearing, blond chipmunk. He treated Ammon like a big brother and was always at his side. It took a little longer for his thirteen-year-old sister to work up the courage to approach us with a deck of cards. They began teaching us how to play a basic Kazakh card game with a thin deck consisting of only face cards and numbers above six. We felt like the Chinese men who had so often gathered round to watch us playing Jerk, trying to decipher the rules and join the fun.
Sitting in the lower seats next to us was a mother with two young daughters. The kids were playing quietly with each other as the mother sipped tea from a thermos. It turned into a bit of a party, with everyone sharing food, telling jokes, and laughing.
A young mother with the most adorable blond-haired toddler napped in a mid-level bed across from us. The angelic little boy curled his fingers in his mother’s jet-black hair. His huge, glossy eyes threatened to hypnotize me, and I had to control the urge to kidnap him.
When it was clear that everyone was winding down, Ammon said goodnight and made his way down the length of the train to his designated bed. Bree and I climbed up into our middle bunk parallel to the walkway, where we shuffled about for a while, trying to get comfortable in such a narrow space. Bree’s legs were stretched across my torso, and her toes were practically stuck up my nose. The two big ladies who’d shared our compartment all day wanted to do the same, but climbing up to their bunk on those flimsy rails looked pretty daunting.
Mom used hand gestures and words as she tried to convince them to trade places with her. I was really proud of her when she insisted, “No, no. Here, you can have my bed. You two. Here. You can have,” adding a few clear gestures and stepping away f
rom the bed, signalling them to take the bottom bunk. Once they finally understood what she was offering, Mom jumped up into their bed, leaving the more accessible bottom bunk for them. Watching the two extra-large-sized women trying to arrange themselves comfortably in the same sized space Bree and I were sharing was interesting, to say the least. We definitely sympathized with their plight, but the comical scene also had us constantly plugging our noses to hold our laughter in.
“And we thought we had it bad,” I whispered to Bree, making it even harder to control the few escaping snorts. It could be worse, I thought, comparing our situation with the two ladies balanced like walruses on a seesaw. The poor things ended up just dozing most of the night as they sat back to back. Even this proved to be a luxury, as they wouldn’t even have been able to sit in their original bunk. Sergei and his sister were curled up together on one bed, sleeping peacefully. A few less fortunate passengers resorted to stuffing themselves into the tiny space in the unpadded overhead luggage compartments. In the dull lighting of the night train, I could see baggage and limbs alike hanging over the edges into the aisle.
“How’d you sleep?” Mom asked Ammon in the morning.
“I was freezing, ‘cause the window was jammed open, but then someone came by and threw a blanket over me in the middle of the night.”
“Well, that was sure nice of them.” It always made Mom happy to hear about other people’s kindnesses.
“Yeah, it was. And how did you guys make out?”
“I think Bree might’ve chewed off some of my toenails during the night, but other than that, it was actually pretty okay,” I said.
Ammon looked at Bree suspiciously and said, “You beast.”
She rubbed her belly and made an animal-like chewing gesture, “Yummm.”
Knowing our journey was coming to an end, many of the passengers wanted to trade gifts and asked us to autograph their tickets or books for them. As I smiled and handed a notebook and pen back to a new friend, I guessed that tourists, particularly Canadian tourists, were as rare as celebrities to them, ‘cause they saw so few of either. We were certainly off the beaten track.
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