7:30 a.m.:
Carrying six bags of assorted colours, sizes, textures and contents, I boarded the international “Beijing–Ulan Bator–Moscow” train.
The night before, a whole crowd of people (each one in that crowd a dear friend) had stayed into the early hours at my house. I can’t remember what we talked about, only that a lot of them were standing (the rooms were small), and the place was wreathed in smoke. One friend had been out to buy two bottles of Great Wall Dry White (not Chinese báigān “white dry”) from the Beijing Hotel. We didn’t have a corkscrew at home, so I don't know how we managed to open them. Anyway, in the end, the white wine (the first product of a Sino-French joint venture), mixed with tears, had found its way down into our bellies.
On entering my carriage, I rushed to the window to look out at the eighteen friends gathered on the platform to see me off. I couldn’t really make them out clearly: The sky was not yet light enough, and my brimming eyes were just not functioning. I only remember that most of them looked sombre: What lay ahead for me?
I felt an urge to jump off the train.
At precisely eight o’clock, the scene on the platform began to shift: The train had started, and in the carriage music gradually grew louder: “Come Back to Sorrento”.
Come back to So—Sorrento? Come back to So—the Soviet Union? Come back . . . ?
I sat on my bunk, my eyes now streaming . . .
“Don’t cry! You are going to see . . . ” a voice said in English.
A handkerchief appeared before me.
Only then did I discover that there were two other people in the little “room”. It seemed they were quite old (to me, who just two days before had turned thirty, they were old men), their faces kindly. I nodded at the man who had comforted me, without speaking: “Don’t cry”? It’s easy to say.
In any case, I calmed down, piled my six bags in the corner next to the door, and sat there solitary. I had a feeling of infinite tiredness. After spending a night and morning drenched in tears, I was scarcely likely to have been in high spirits.
“You are going to Moscow?”
“Yes, but I will continue after Moscow, I'm going to Paris.”
“Paris! It’s wonderful! You are like Madame Curie! You should be happy!”
Truly, I was like Madame Curie: As she did, I was going to Paris . . .
“Where are you going?”
“I’m on a work trip to Ulan Bator; I am economic attaché at the Polish Embassy.”
“What about you?” I asked the other “old man”.
“I’m going to Moscow for a meeting, an international seminar on Russian literature.”
They were just on a work trip or going to a meeting—but me? Would I be able to return to Beijing to see my friends? My tears welled up again . . .
“Don’t cry. It’s good to go abroad. Will you be studying in Paris?”
“Yes.”
This second man, who understood English, was surely a spy!
Just then, a fat, middle-aged stewardess came in to offer us milk. When she saw my stricken look, she perched one buttock on my bunk, and, giving me a hug, directed a whole lot of Russian at me. I understood it all: kindness, love . . .
That evening I went to the dining car. Sitting behind me were a group of fair-haired tourists who had been in Beijing. As I listened to them talking about their impressions, I could feel my eyes start to water again, but fortunately I was alone so no-one could see me crying.
Beijing, my home town, I love you.
*
27 November, 8:00 p.m.:
The train was about to cross the border at Erenhot. No one came to check our tickets or passports—they had been reviewed repeatedly that morning.
Two Mongolians entered our compartment and asked us several times: “How are you feeling? Are you well?”
I felt quite touched. Only later did I understand that they were border guards doing a health check, concerned that we might bring some kind of plague into Mongolia.
I was sick—worried sick: I had two paintings given to me by a venerable old man in one bag, one to present to a friend, and the other for me to sell when I could no longer make ends meet. At that time, this artist’s work needed special approval for export. I had no such approval.
The venerable painter left China uneventfully.
My impression of Mongolia was of emptiness: The fierce winds of early winter seemed to have stripped it of all life. A wilderness, not a soul, not a thing—just like the snack counter in the waiting room at the Ulan Bator international train station.
The good old Polish economic attaché got off the train at Ulan Bator. My other companion and I saw him to the door—the door to our carriage—and then sped on.
After again stopping for twenty minutes, the train once more moved off.
My companions on the train told me that two Japanese were detained for taking photographs. So, what were the Japanese photographing? There was simply nothing to see . . .
*
28 November:
The train was about to enter the “Soviet Federative Socialist Republic”. (There would be an immigration check.)
My heart resumed its drum beat: in another bag, I had two volumes—The Gulag Archipelago, parts one and two. At that time, Solzhenitsyn’s work was banned in the Soviet Union (and he himself was also “banned”—his return to his beloved Russian motherland occurred nine years later). These two volumes of mine were Chinese translations, so the Soviets could not read them, but the covers featured large photographs of the author (and there were a lot more images inside) . . .
In preparing my luggage before I left, I’d chosen to consign some books, and only these two volumes had I taken the trouble to carry with me—supposing . . . ? This was the land of banned books.
What could I do?
I eyed my companion who was travelling to Moscow for a meeting.
“If you are going to Moscow for a seminar on Russian literature, are you a writer?”
“No, I teach Russian literature at Beijing Normal University.”
“Oh, you must know all the Russian authors then?”
He smiled (a restrained little smile that I recognized and found quite annoying): “Possibly.”
“So, are you familiar with Solzhenitsyn?”
“Of course!”
“You must know his works?”
“A little.”
“Which ones have you read?”
“I haven't. You can’t get hold of his books in China.”
“Then would you like to have a read?” (This ruse was worthy of a drug dealer, I fear.)
“If you have any of them, of course.”
“I do.”
The old man, who had been lying on the upper bunk (there were four bunks in our compartment), now quickly sat up.
“Oh, which book?”
“The Gulag Archipelago.”
“Where did you get it?”
“A friend gave it to me.”
“Can you let me see?”
“No problem, but I’m afraid . . . ”
“Why are you afraid?”
“You know, his books are banned in the Soviet Union. Supposing an inspector sees it?”
“That’s all right, don’t worry. If someone comes to check, just don’t say anything, I’ll talk with them.”
What would I have said? Besides, I couldn’t speak Russian.
My heartrate calmed considerably.
I took out the two volumes and handed them to him.
(For the next two to three days we didn’t talk much to each other. He had to focus on finishing the vast tomes before we arrived in Moscow so didn't have time to pay attention to me; and I had my own stuff to be getting on with.)
The inspection came.
After dinner one day, there was a knock on the door to our compartment. When the door opened, there were three Soviet soldiers shouldering rifles, each tipped with a bayonet.
This was the first time I had been at such close quarters with a soldier carrying a gun. I didn’t utter a word: I couldn’t speak and wouldn’t have known what to say anyway.
The Beijing Normal University professor, who had been reading, immediately greeted them in Russian. He jabbered a whole lot with them, and the three soldiers, roaring with laughter, left without checking us.
“What did you say to them? Why didn’t they do an inspection?” I asked him, as soon as I had recovered.
“I made a joke.”
“How lucky I am. Your Russian is brilliant!”
The professor told me that he had grown up on the Sino-Soviet border so had spoken Russian since he was a child. No wonder.
Solzhenitsyn made it safely into Russia.
*
Siberia!
Large cities are crammed with people jostling each other, but here, for mile after mile, we saw no sign of anyone. Outside the window, there was just blue sky, white snow, towering green pines and pale birch trees. The golden-coloured wooden houses with cooking smoke coiling above the rooftops are as vivid thirty years on as if it were yesterday . . .
Beautiful, pristine Siberia.
“We’re going past Lake Baikal!” someone shouted.
Sure enough, from the window, every now and then, we could see white forms passing. Lake Baikal, the deepest and by volume largest freshwater lake on earth, experiences lunar tides, and the extreme low temperatures freeze the waves that surge along its shores into disparate, beautiful “ice sculptures”.
If anything can be called “fairy work”, this is it!
*
Five nights on a train is a long time. We would drive for ten hours or more solid before taking a break for ten or twenty minutes. Only then were we able to get some fresh air.
I had to find a way to pass the time.
My method was Beijing-style chuànménr: dropping in on the neighbours.
In the next-door compartment there was a fair-haired young man from Britain. He had been to South Korea to see his girlfriend and was now heading back home, or on to another place, I forget. On striking up conversation I discovered he could speak French. What a coincidence: I just happened to have something French-related on my mind. To translate from English to French, I dictated and the young man wrote—and soon two letters were concocted. Such a likeable lad.
This “likeable lad” was not to everyone’s taste, however. One morning, I opened the door to our compartment to find on the left a heap of bags: The young man’s things had been thrown out into the corridor. We were all routinely checked, but the Soviets had a special partiality for this British lad. At that time, Sino-Soviet relations were far from sweetness and light—nonetheless the Soviets could distinguish between “contradictions among the people” and contradictions between ourselves and the enemy!
*
30 November:
The train arrived in Novosibirsk, the largest city in Siberia. By night the multitude of houses with their flickering lights were just like Beijing.
Just like Beijing . . .
*
1 December:
Some people in the carriage who had often travelled this route told me that they could spot the boundary stone between Asia and Europe. Inexperienced travellers would miss it. The train was moving at such a rate I saw no boundary stone.
The international “Beijing–Ulan Bator–Moscow” train had been travelling for sixty-seven hours through Asia, for nearly three days and three nights.
I found a German-language “West Berlin–Paris Timetable and Fare Schedule” in the carriage. The money I had on me, I calculated, would take me to Paris. Accommodation was not a problem: I’d spend the night at the train station.
*
2 December, 4.30 p.m.:
The train drew in to central Moscow. The whole journey had taken 128 hours and 30 minutes.
I got off the train, the Chinese train.
Suddenly I understood what the word “FOREIGNER” meant . . .
In the station, there were streams of people to-ing and fro-ing, everyone rushing somewhere.
After squeezing into the car sent from the Chinese embassy to pick up the Beijing Normal University professor, I asked the driver-comrade to take me to Moscow Belorussky Railway Station. This was the staging post from which I would set off the next day . . .
The car wove through the twilit streets of muddy snow. I kept thanking the professor: Without his help, my copy of The Gulag Archipelago might have been in trouble—perhaps me too!
Having deposited me at the Belorussky Railway Station, the embassy car drove off.
The station was warm. I congratulated myself on my correct analysis: The colder the geographical location, the better the indoor heating.
My several small bags were stored. The old man at left luggage wrote “45” on the wall, and I paid accordingly.
The Muscovites didn’t understand English. I tracked this way and that, and only after a long time found the ticket office for the Moscow–Warsaw–East Berlin line.
As I was queuing, two companions from the train came over: Like me, they had decided to make use of the one-day transit visa.
One of them was a doctor from Shanghai, going to do an internship in East Germany; the other was a lad from Shaanxi—I don’t know what he did, so I’ll give “lad” as his occupation—heading to a Chinese restaurant in West Germany. And there was me.
The “Moscow Roaming Joint Action Committee Team” was formally established!
When it got to my turn, I was told that the ticket check was first thing the next morning . . .
No matter, we would go out and about first!
The vehicles on the broad streets flew past, throwing up pieces of snow. The pedestrians were very disciplined: If there wasn’t a green light, they didn’t cross.
We walked into a restaurant—a genuine Moscow restaurant, and the waiter led us to a table a long way from the Russians already there. As we sat down, all the diners’ eyes were on us.
The lamps were low: It came as a surprise to me that the light in a restaurant could be so soft and dim.
As we left, a young girl waved goodbye to us from a distance . . .
We wandered at will, making our way back.
It was very cold. No wind, no sound, just cold.
In the station waiting room we sat on the floor, chatting before we slept.
“Little Li!”
It was the professor from Beijing Normal University!
“How come you’re here?”
“Why are you sleeping here? Come to our hotel!”
Of course, I wanted to go—if only to shower. But, “There are three of us . . . ”
“Come along all of you, there are carpets!”
*
3 December:
The Moscow subway was amazing!
On seeing the endless escalators, the dignified and elegant sculptures in the stations, the beautiful and mysterious murals, I came to understand what is meant by the fusion of culture and technology. The three of us, who up till now had been chattering non-stop, were simply struck dumb . . .
If you don’t make it to Red Square, or go to see (I misspoke, I mean “pay your respects to”) Lenin’s remains, you can’t truly be said to have visited Moscow.
I had only just left behind Tiananmen Square, so Moscow’s Red Square did not make much impression on me. But the cathedral was extraordinarily majestic in the winter sun.
Many people had come to pay their respects to the remains of the great man. They had to queue, in a great long line—queue, when the maximum temperature was 17 degrees below.
The clothes I was wearing were intended for a few degrees above freezing: shirt, jumper, Chinese-style short coat, long-johns, track-suit bottoms, gym shoes, woollen hat, woollen gloves knitted by a friend’s sister.
The gym shoes were frozen out of shape. I experienced the piercing quality of the winter wind and better understood the suffering of Napoleon’s soldiers . . .
Behind us were a couple of newlyweds (the locals told us that Muscovites like to go to Red Square to see the great man when they get married)—the groom looked fine, but the bride was wearing only a thin skirt, with a coat draped (draped, not worn) over her shoulders . . .
Lenin should have got up to take a look!
But Lenin did not get up. He lay quietly in his coffin, a shrivelled little old man . . .
After leaving Lenin, we went to see Gorky, first to understand the foremost master of the Soviet literary world, and secondly (more importantly) to escape the bitter cold: Buying a museum ticket allowed us to while away as much time as we wanted, and it was much cheaper than a restaurant.
The Soviet girls were all pretty, wearing flawlessly shaded make-up even in such cold. The Soviet Union was the land of beautiful women!
*
3 December, 9.30 p.m.:
I got on another train: “Moscow–Warsaw–East Berlin”.
The carriage was hot and chaotic, and attention to sanitation and service just as bad.
When I wanted to go to bed, I discovered there was no ladder. So, I went to look for the attendant, and found him holding a plate of cake given him by a co-worker. At first he said that he knew nothing about the ladder (how was it an attendant didn’t know the state of his own carriage!) It was probably only because of the angry look I shot him that he went to find one.
Lying on my bunk, I felt that I was irredeemably “going abroad”.
*
4 December:
Red-roofed houses, green grass, blue sky, black-and-white milking cattle (or perhaps beef cattle?)—everything tranquil and neat.
After six days in the wilds of Mongolia and Siberia, Poland looked like a delicate young girl.
This truly was Europe.
With new roommates, I continued the activity that I had started on the last train: dropping in on the neighbours.
On walking into one of the carriages, I spotted four people sitting opposite each other drinking tea. I was intrigued by their teacups. They were large glasses in protective metal holders, the holders engraved with delicate floral, openwork patterns.
“Good afternoon! Where are you going?” I attempted in English.
“We are going to Poland for work.” (Another work trip.)
“I see. Where do you work?”
“We are Muscovites, we work in—foreign—trade,” one of them told me haltingly.
Soviets? Going to Poland for “foreign trade”? Mongolia’s emptiness was created by Soviet “foreign trade” . . .
As we spoke, I noticed there were many different foods on their small table: bread, jam, smoked fish . . .
“What is this?” I asked, pointing at a small jar. There was something dark inside it.
“***”
“What?” I didn’t understand him.
“Eggs. Fish eggs . . . ”
Fish eggs? . . . They meant caviar!
“Very famous!” I said casually.
Caviar is indeed famous, but for me it was an unsubstantiated fame: I had never tasted it . . .
“It must be very delicious!” Again casually.
“Have a try!” They invited me to sit down.
I really wanted to try the “fish eggs”—not for their taste, but for their fame—but we Chinese can’t accept an invitation too readily, besides which they were not exactly begging me.
“I am very pleased to have met you!” I said politely, making my excuses.
That evening, a Chinese co-traveller came by: “Hey, there are some Soviets who want you to go over to eat caviar!”
“Really?! But just now . . . ”
“I know! I’m in the same carriage as them, and they said . . . I should come and find you.”
I took out some Beijing chocolate from one of my bags and followed him excitedly.
Caviar is a delicacy to which we need to get accustomed, like hundred-year-old egg, stinky tofu and cheese.
From then on, I could say I was someone who had eaten caviar!
Later I learnt that France and Iran also have “caviar”. Aha, I sneered at my friends, but I have eaten the genuine thing . . .
*
5 December:
As the saying goes: “A man who takes no heed of the future will soon encounter present worries.”
Sure enough: The train arrived in East Berlin, I arrived in East Berlin, but my luggage did not arrive.
I explained the situation, in English, to a female employee of East German railways, and showed her the baggage receipt. Putting on a stern “East German face”, she replied briefly . . . in German. I asked her if she could speak English, but she simply ignored me.
I looked around, but couldn’t see anyone Chinese: The doctor from the “Moscow Roaming Joint Action Committee Team” had gone off to his internship, and there was no sign of the “lad”. Anyway, what could they have done? They didn’t speak German either.
I was like an illiterate, with no friends (or at least no friends I could call on). The money I had on me was only enough for the baggage transfer, and to buy the train ticket to Paris.
I felt stupefied.
There were several people gathered around East German Face, one of them a Black man. Perhaps he was an overseas student in East Germany, I thought. China and the Soviet Union like to assist our African brothers.
“Excuse me, do you speak German?” I tried asking him in English.
“Yes, may I help you?”
A lifeline!
After having spoken with East German Face, the overseas student (he was indeed an overseas student) told me the station was not responsible for baggage transfer. I had to either handle it myself, or get someone else to do it.
“Do you know where the Chinese consulate in East Berlin is?”
“I don’t know, but I think you could take a taxi. Taxi drivers know where everything is.”
Smart thinking. Good man!
The Ugandan student’s talents were not limited to theory: We went out to the street and he hailed me a cab.
The streets of East Berlin were quite charmless. Unsurprising, since the city had only recently recovered from the devastation of war . . .
*
“Hello, I’m going to study in Paris. My luggage hasn’t arrived in East Berlin, but I have to leave today . . . ”
“Are you state-funded or self-funded?” the consulate receptionist-comrade asked me amiably.
“Self-funded.”
“Oh, self-funded . . . you’ll have to find your own solution, then.”
“I don’t have any money. I can’t speak German—I really have no options. Could you . . . ?”
“Just wait a moment.”
“OK.”
After a while (I forget how long), a man came down from upstairs. He had an affable expression and was wearing slippers.
“Just explain the situation to Consul X.”
Consul!
“Consul X, I . . . My luggage hasn’t arrived . . . Could I leave the receipt, fee and address with you? And when the luggage gets here, could you help me with the transfer?”
“Fine.”
Fine!
“Thank you so much!”
“Usually we don’t do this kind of thing for self-funded students. In fact, this is the first time. We’ll make an exception.”
“Of course, it would be no good if everyone bothered you with this.”
I had not realized before that I could be so selfish, or so disingenuous about gaining such special treatment.
With profuse expressions of gratitude to Consul X and the female member of staff as my luggage angels, I left the consulate.
(A few days after I got to Paris, the luggage arrived. I bought a large box of French shampoo, shower gel and toilet water, and sent it to Consul X. And later once when I saw a Chinese embassy car on the street, I waved enthusiastically at the people inside . . . )
*
I have scarcely any memory of passing through the Berlin Wall . . .
There were still a few hours before I had to get the train to Paris. So, I would go out and about again.
The winter stars twinkled. With the lad from Shaanxi (I forget how we were reunited), I wandered the cold streets of the British occupation zone of West Berlin.
A large window attracted our attention—we could make out a lot of people inside. Only once I walked in did I realize it was a café. The lights were low, some people were sitting, and some were standing. I registered that coffee and alcohol could be drunk standing up!
We didn’t drink. It wasn’t that we minded standing—we were skint.
We kept going. Not much further on, we could see lamps and steam. The white light made the night seem darker, and the night in turn accentuated the light.
A stall was set with small tube-shaped bread rolls, and next to it was a stove-like thing. Several people were standing there eating the “tubes”.
“What’s that?”
“Hot dog,” the seller of the “tubes” told me, laughing.
So, this was the famous so-called “hot dog”!
The lad from Shaanxi and I bought a hot dog each. We ate standing up.
Two Berlins, two different planets . . .
*
6 December, 6:18 p.m.:
The international “West Berlin–Brussels–Paris” train ground to a halt at Paris Gare du Nord.
Carrying those six bags of assorted colours, sizes, textures and contents, I walked forward alongside the train and soon I was sweating.
I needed something to drink.
“CHANGE”.
Change money!
On pocketing the few francs I had just changed, I scanned in all directions.
“Café”.
It must be a café?! This French is just like English! It took me more than a month or so to realize French is in fact very different from English.
I walked over, still slung with all my bags.
“A glass of beer, please.”
“A beer?”
I was served quickly.
The beer glasses here are so beautiful.
I swallowed a few mouthfuls of beer down into my belly—standing up of course!
Written April–December 2015
With thanks to my childhood friend Li Zhicong.
