What makes it worse is that my brain is still on BST, or Paris-time (BST+1) at best. So this morning, for example, I woke up at 08.47 Moscow-time (the time my phone is still set to, because all trains in Russia operate on Moscow-time and not local-time); this made it 10.47 local-time, but in my head, it was 06.47 BST.
W. T. F.
Then there is the other issue of when to eat. We had breakfast when we got up, around 2 hours ago (09.30ish Moscow-time), but it is now 13.36 local-time (and soon to be 14.36 local-time as we cross over into another time-zone) yet if you go off Moscow-time, it's only 11.36; so, do we eat lunch now or in a few hours when it's lunchtime in Moscow?!
Oh, so much fun!!
Our cabin is very 1960s (?) glam, complete with extremely dated chair-covers. We have a Jack-and-Jill shower, shared with next door (sadly, the toilets are shared with the entire carriage, so one at each end of the carriage); 2 single bunk beds (but wide enough for evening cuddles), the lower bunk doubling as a seating area during the day; a fixed table, equipped with a white cotton tablecloth; and a chair in the corner, enabling civilised (some might even say romantic..) meals of instant-noodles, eaten out of polystyrene containers.
Most of my day is spent cat-napping on the bottom bunk (I swear I must've been a cat in a previous existence) and playing with my mobile dummy (also known as my iPhone with 3G internet connection), whereas John keeps himself enthralled with the book Lu gave him when we were last in Edinburgh, "Age of Ambition" by Evan Osnos. We also have jackanory time, with each of us taking it in turns to read from the Trans-Siberian Handbook which Alex and Amanda bought for us. It is full of bitesize chunks of information and a great route guide towards the back of the book, telling you about the places you pass and how tell where you are, if you happen to take your eye off the ball for a few hours:
On the south-side of the tracks (luckily, the side our cabin window faces) there are "kilometre posts", on each post, the number on the face furthest from Moscow is larger by 1km than that on the face nearest Moscow (excerpt from "Trans-Siberian Handbook" by Bryn Thomas and Anna Cohen Kaminski). The posts display your distance from Moscow, and this is how you refer to the route guide in the book. Having said that, sometimes (the posts are) so close to the train that they are difficult to see. The technique is, (believe it or not) to press your face close to the glass and look along the train until a post flashes by.
Tomorrow is another day on the train, then we disembark at Слюдянка (Slyudyanka) early (or late, depending on what time-zone you choose to function in) Saturday morning. Slyudyanka is at the tip of Lake Baikal, where we are staying in a wood cabin with Fedor and Nataly; a taste of real Siberian-living! (Maybe..)
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