Poland/Ukraine night train

The night train from Warsaw to Kiev was dirty, smelly, cramped, subject to interminable interruptions and I loved it. The guard of our carriage had all the genial affability of a prison warder, of the two toilets, one was revolting only after the first five or six hours, the other was a disaster area from the start and after the border was found to have been gaffer taped shut. We settled down to sleep at about 10, only to be woken at 11 by the door being flung open, the light turned full on and the Polish border police asking for passports. Another half an hour after having turned the lights back off the same happened for the Ukranians. The Ukranian policewoman had at least made the effort to apply an electric blue nail polish which matched her uniform to absolutely no degree whatsoever. We surrendered our passports and moved on to an engineering shed where the carriage was uncoupled and lifted several feet off the rails to have the wheels adjusted to fit the wider guage. I tried to make it to the end of the carriage as Helix had told me the door was open and afforded an excellent view of the proceedings. Our host however shooed me off in no uncertain terms before I could get there and so I was only able to watch from the side windows with the other passengers; After all the previous disturbance nearly everyone was now awake and observing. This, as you might expect was when the spirit of comraderie set in and we all stated chatting merrily away about where we had come from, where we were going, and how dreadful this all was. Secretly I think we were all loving it, as this sort of inconvenence is what makes travelling from A to B into a journey.Read more