A Railway Station in Moscow

I rubbed my hands together, despite the mitts. Another gust of icy air blew through the station and took my breath away. It was like the first wintry blasts we get in Glasgow in October, wondering how it could possibly get any colder, and more importantly if we would survive it.

I walked along the platform to a metal seat and perched, for fear of further freezing my arse off but my legs were sore from standing in the cold so I chanced it anyway. I glanced around nervously, gleefully; the bright lights of the chandeliers in the foyer of Kazansky station burned in my eyes, the sounds of people chatting animatedly, trills of a language I only wish I knew. Few returned my smiles, but it didn’t matter, I was already tilting my head back as far as I could to take in this opulent interior. Steep, cream coloured segments of the ceiling interspersed between mint green walls and covered in a variety of window styles and gilded wall decorations.

From where I sat on the breezy platform I marvelled at the familiarity of the situation around me. The Cyrillic lettering above an exit way could only mean so much, even if I could only guess the matching Latin character. The weather was cold, but everyone was affected, the train was uniting us all at this moment. Some might be tourists like me; some others might be heading home to distant towns for the weekend; others yet, perhaps going on a longer trip. And here I was, a million miles from Glasgow, waiting on a train in Moscow.

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