Last year was full of fears and doubts. This war has disrupted my usual course of life several times. I adapted to a new environment every time life threw a lemon. However, I knew there was a limit to my flexibility: threatening my life or my freedom of movement.
When the mobilization was announced, I realized that the limit had been reached. I felt it was my last chance to avoid being stuck in the country. Likewise, going abroad seemed like a tough decision to avoid much tougher decisions in the future.
So after a day of doubts, the night of action came.
First I started booking plane tickets. This was completely impossible. The prices for overseas flights were increasing at an incredible rate. The price of any ticket went up 10-20 times in the time it took to fill out the reservation form.
At this point I realized that looking for plane tickets abroad was not an option. I had to try to leave the country by land transport. And the best option in this situation was the train. Fortunately, at that moment almost no one thought of such an option. Apparently, for most Muscovites the idea of going abroad by train was not a very obvious option.
Secondly, I had to pack my whole life into one city backpack and a big suitcase. There was nothing special about it. I just made it a little funny. Then, my new friends laughed a lot when they saw my heavy red portable (not so portable) bluetooth speaker, a huge plastic box of medicine, and other not very useful things.
I didn’t sleep at all during the night. I felt in a state of pursuit. Every moment I felt like I had less and less time left to slip out of the country. For the next two days I remember almost nothing. I just did what I had planned, like a robot. I took two flights within Russia and two train rides with almost no sleep.
I didn’t read social media and chats at all so I didn’t get nervous. However, I heard news about problems at airports from other people. It seemed like I was running in front of a big wave. No one knew exactly at what point the borders would be closed. Fortunately, most of the rumors remained rumors.
On the last train after entering Kazakhstan, we had a bit of a tense situation. Our train was stopped for no apparent reason for more than an hour. No one knew why. The personnel asked us to leave the vagons without luggage. On the station platform we saw many people in various uniforms and service dogs. Then somehow we were told about a false bomb call on our train.
I walked out of the station right into the sunset. I didn’t know where I would sleep the next night, but I was relieved. At this point I realized that the whole city was fully booked and night was falling. I was sitting on a bench, trying in vain to book something, when two Kazakh guys offered me a cab to Astana. Why not, I had only two options: spend the night at the train station or get out of this city.
In the car was one more Russian passenger and three Kazakh people include driver.
Kazakh guys spoke somtimes in Kazakh language betwen each other, sometimes ther spoke russian with us. They where kind, respectful, clearly understood why we ended up in theire country. We got lot of tips about Khazahstanian apps and lifestyle.
They asked us about our plans, but we didn’t have any plans for more than the next 12 hours. I usually had my annual checklist and planned my actions at least two months in advance, but at that moment there were only two steps on my checklist. Find a place to stay and buy a local SIM card. That was it.
This fact was surprising to the driver. He asked again three times, but always got the same answer.
It was dark. Suddenly, without any warning, our car stopped in the middle of nowhere under a streetlight. There was only another car standing on the side of the road, and in the light of the car’s headlights there was a man. Our driver came out to the man and spoke to him in Kazakh. We realized that the drivers knew each other. They were just standing between our cars and talking to each other. We didn’t understand a single word.
In a foreign country in the dark in an unfamiliar place, the other Russian guy and I were a little tense, because we were the only ones who didn’t understand what the two men were talking about between the cars.
Now I assume it was just friendly chitchat and a little bargaining, because at the end of the conversation our driver gave money to the other guy and explained to us that we had to change cabs to get to Astana.
As we found out later, this was an absolutely common scheme for Kazakh cab drivers. It would have been better if they had warned us about it in advance.
Anyway, I am very grateful to these people for their hospitality and really helpful advice to stick together with another Russian who happened to get in the same car with me. This was something new for us, because usually Russians avoid meeting other Russians abroad. But it’s the best way to save money and feel better in a foreign country.
We spent the next 5 months together, helping each other and just having a good time on our long journey.