Thus far my trip was gong really smoothly: I had cleaned my apartment, packed up, hung out with some friends and caught the marshrutka to Kyiv. I had called Tony, the guy I was staying with, and found out that "the horde", the group of Peace Corps males in my group who were spending the last of their vacation days marauding around Crimea, was staying with him for the next two nights, so I was walking into a party before I was even going to the festival. I was so pumped I was pumping my fist, excited to be back on the road after almost two weeks of sitting in Zhytomyr
I was in Peace Corps office, writing a blog as to where I was going: a whirlwind two night trip to Crimea to party at the alcohol-fueled nudist beach with a techno beat that is the month-long KaZantip Music Festial, when the series of unfortunate events started. After spending about forty minutes writing about the festival and my plans, I clicked the post button. Nothing happened. I had forgotten: the internet in Peace Corps gets turned off at 10:00 PM, and that had happened three minutes before.
Oh well, not a huge loss.
I leave Peace Corps to go the metro and arrive at the train station with exactly ten minutes until my train left, right on time. I look at the board, notice that the Kyiv-Simferopol train was ten minutes later than the time on my ticket, but thought maybe they had changed it.
I go to the train and the lady looks at my ticket: it's the wrong train.
I begin to run, something I'm familiar with at train stations, and get into the main station to look at the main board listing. There's my train, but there's no line assigned. That's bad. I look at the information board. My train has been delayed by four hours, to leave at 3:00 AM. That's very bad.
I go to the information window. An older guy ahead of me, in his fifties, asks about the same train I'm supposed to be on. The lady tells him 3:00 AM and offers no more information. Enraged, he spits on the glass seperating him from her. Since he summed it up for me, I just walk away.
I notice on the board there are two other trains leaving to the exact same destination, each leaving in ten minutes. Of course, there's a train full of people thinking the exact same thing. There's a mob at the sales window, and a lot of yelling. I figure it's not even worth it, and leave. It's strange, though: I've had problems with many trains in many countries, but in nearly two years I've never had a train in Ukraine be late.
I catch the metro back to Peace Corps office and read for three and a half hours, then call a cab because it's 2:30 AM, the metro is closed, and the last time I walked that late at night in a Ukrainian city alone, I got mugged. Because it was so late it cost 20 hriven, for a ride that should have cost six.
At the train station, the information board now says the train will leave at 4:30 AM. People are sprawled, sleeping on their bags, and the station is calm, quiet, a relief from the chaos just a few hours before. The situation is familiar, though: the last time I was on a train that was continually bumped back (in Budapest), it never arrived. I figure it's better just to catch a different train the next day.
I go to the information window and asked where to change my ticket. I was told at the sales windows on the other side of the train station, and this is a long, long train station.
I walk and walk and get to a window and ask about my train. The woman is honest: the train is coming out of Moscow and there are problems, but she's not specific as to what. No one actually knows when it will arrive, she tells me. The honesty is nice: In Budapest they kept us waiting at the station for more than ten hours before someone finally confessed there had been a train wreck and it wasn't coming at all.
I asked about trading in my ticket for a new one. Can't do it, I was told. I'd have to turn in my ticket and lose ten percent and then buy a new one.
I walked towards the sales window, but then passed a tiny window, manned by a guy wearing a tie. That looked promising. I told him the situation and he wordlessly stamped and signed the ticket so that I could get a full refund.
Another window later I had my refund. Another window later I had bought my new ticket. The ticket was exactly 20 hriven less than the one I turned in. So, a lot of time had been wasted but financially I had broke even.
I was deteremined to keep it even: the walk back to Peace Corps office was about 20 minutes, mostly uphill and with that risk of mugging, but I didn't want to bother with getting ripped off by another cab.
I walked outside into heavy rain. It was fucking raining. And all the cabs were full. After trying to find one for about ten minutes, I finally flagged one down. I told him my stop and even though it was five minutes by car, he said he didn't want to go there and didn't bother giving a reason. He was driving off as I was shutting the door.
Oh well, the rain meant no one's was going to mug me.
I walked, soaked, but luckily it was a warm night. I reflected on my situation and the possibility of getting mugged. The fact was that I looked Ukranian. I was travelling as light as possible to Crimea since I knew I'd be taking my stuff in with me to the festival. All I had was a bathing suit, a towel, a toothbrush, a contact case and a book in a canvas satchel. In my hand was a baba bag with some train food, which just made me look even more Ukranian. Add in the crew cut, the shaved face and the fact that every item of clothing I was wearing save my underwear, right down to my shoes, was made in Ukraine. On the street I passed a guy in the rain who was trying to flag down a car, a huge backpack on his back and NOT looking Ukranian. I thought, "hmm, maybe I should just mug him. Come out financially up for the night."
I kept walking.
Back at Peace Corps office I told the guard my story and he said I could sleep on a couch in the lounge. Only I knew they had two beds in the medical office for people who were sick. Are they being used? No. Can I sleep in one? No. Why not? We need permission from the medical staff. Can you ask? He glanced at the clock. It was nearly 4:00 AM. Too late to call. Whatever. I went upstairs, used my towel as a pillow and slept on the couch, clothes still wet.
A few hours later, volunteers started coming in, getting off early arriving trains. Their conversations woke me up, kept me up, so I went back downstairs to ask the guard to call medical. It was almost 8:00 AM, but after two calls to two numbers he couldn't get medical on the line. This is a business day, and medical is supposed to be reached 24 hours a day. Whatever. I went back upstairs and tried to get a few more hours of sleep.
I think I was happiest with my reaction to the situation: a combination of stoicism and determination. Peace Corps does that to you. I was never even annoyed during the whole thing, just went with the flow. I kept remembering Budapest and what a nightmare that was: ten hours in a fugue-Zombie state of half sleep at the train station before using the last of my cash to get a cab back to the hostel and then using my passport as collateral just to get a bed to get to sleep. That had cost me a lot of time and money. This cost me some discomfort and my trip getting pushed back a day (and now it really would just be a one night blitz at the festival), and I'd miss partying with the horde, but things were still on track.
I woke up on the couch a few hours later to hear volunteers complaining to each other that out that train traffic into Crimea was being severely delayed. I got online and found out that an arms depot right on the tracks leading into Crimea had caught fire and that ordinance was going off every two or three minutes, launching shells 900 feet into the air.
My train from last night was going right past that depot. Possibly that was the reason the train never came into Kyiv, although unlikely. The terminus was in Crimea but plenty of people would be on it from the Moscow-Kiev route, so it should have come in before turning back. So maybe that was my saving grace. I figured my trip would be scrapped, but then I checked my train routes. The depot was on the Eastern line. The train I had gotten for today, even though it was three hours longer (I had only picked it the night before because the departure and arrival times were more convienient), took the Western line. If I had picked the next train, leaving later and arriving earlier (and saving time), I would have been going past that depot.
So that was my series of unfortunate events, but things seem to be looking up (if not being on a train scheduled to go past an exploding arms depot is up). I'm more determined to go and have a great time at this festival, and, at the least, it's a story.
I leave in six hours.