Wheels vs. Rails Part 2 (The rest of August)

This is the second part of what I was doing in August:

While it is possible to buy train tickets in Taldykorgan (which I did in July), there is not a train station in the city. To catch a train to Ust Kamegorsk, I had to take a taxi to Ushtobe, which is about 50ish kilometers to the north. I wish I could say more about Ushtobe but was too preoccupied with finding the train. I was very nervous at the train station. I had asked several volunteers about their experiences riding the rails, and they all ranged from "very good" to "borderline traumatic". However, the best advice came from a Taldy volunteer who said, "Trains can be intense, like 10 taxis all at once." I've had some awesome taxi rides and some horrible ones, so I came mentally prepared for the intensity.

The first 30 minutes lived up to the hype. During the first half hour, I was stopped twice for documents, boarded the train, and was stopped again. I paid 250 tenge for sleeping sheets and set up my sleeping area. I learned that the toilet empties out on the tracks and that hot water is free. I met my cabin mates who included 2 babushkas and a college student who learned English and baseball from a Peace Corps volunteer. The babushkas tried to feed me to death. The student tried to convert me to being a Yankees fan. This was how I spent the first half hour.

For the next 14.5 hours, I was bored to death. I slept and read a book. I did get my first view of the steppe, which was interesting for about 10 minutes, until I realized that nothing is on the steppe. I'm so used to seeing land with something on it (like corn) that the steppe was really disconcerting to me.

Early in the morning we arrived in Ust Komenegorsk (called Ust by the volunteers in the area). The first thing I saw of the city was a huge factory pumping God-knows-what into the air. I found out later that this was the metal company Kazinc. Ust may be pretty, but the water and air quality are not the best in Kazakhstan. Due to the production of heavy metals, Ust has earned a spot on the "Dirty 30": A list of the 30 most polluted cities in the world. After watching a fellow volunteer spend over 10 minuites scraping the metal residue out of her water distiller, I believe it.

Ust was also shocking because I felt that I stepped out of the train into a stereotypical small European city. There were electric trams, a small downtown, lots of parks and supermarkets. If the central area was made into "car free zone" the pollution cleaned, and all of the signs changed from Russian/Kazakh to German, I would swear that I was back in Freiburg im Breigsau, Germany.

My reason for traveling to Ust was to help out with a business English seminar. It was held in the American Corner (a valuable resource for volunteers), and all of the sessions were in English. The 2 sessions I led were on Customer Service and Marketing. Two very tough topics to do within an hour time limit, but I think we did ok.

I also had lunch with the US ambassador to Kazakhstan. Well, not just me, because I'll never be that cool. All of the Peace Corps volunteers in the area were invited to the luncheon, and I happened to be in the right town at the right time. We asked a lot of questions about what it's like to be an ambassador, in what areas and how the US cooperates Kazakhstan, etc. I found the ambassador to be a kind man, very intelligent and sharp. He also told a hilarious story about how he met and became friends with the current (and perhaps outgoing?) president to Afghanistan while he was working there in the 1980's.

After a week in Ust, it was time for me to go back to Karabulak. The method of transportation was a problem. I did not buy round trip train tickets because I wasn't sure if I needed to go to Almaty or Ecik before returning to Karabulak. As a result of my indecision I delayed buying tickets until the last minuite and then all of them were full. The only way to get back to Karabulak was the 20+ hour bus from Ust to Taldykorgan. That was what I did. It wasn't exciting; just a bus instead of a train, rumbling south across the steppe.

After doing the train and bus experiences, I'm not sure which one I like better. Each has their upsides. For example, the train has bathrooms, although they are closed near stations. You can stretch out to sleep and there is unlimited free hot water, which means Ramen, coffee and tea. The bus isn't as intense or formal as a train. It stops every couple of hours, usually at a café or a place where you can buy food, get out, and walk around. They can be more convenient than trains; busses can go places trains cannot (like Taldykorgan). It's easier to carry a lot of baggage on a bus although you will pay for it.

They also have their disadvantages. The train lurches, and I was almost jolted out of my sleeping area more than once which probably would have equaled a broken body part because I was sleeping on the top bunk. If you are into the sleeping thing, you have to pay for sheets. There is also the potential to be seated near creepy people (as with the bus). With the bus in many cases, it is a "same song different verse" situation. The roads between cities are horrible, and although Kazakhstan is working very hard to repair them, there are thousands of miles of road that still needs to be repaired. This makes for sleeping on a bus even more difficult than usual. Also, I have yet to see a passenger bus with a toilet.

So, if I had to make a choice between trains or busses to go to a particular place, I'm not sure what I'd pick. So far, I think the score is Bus 1, Train 1.