Bonka Bonka Train Adventure......

The Bonka Bonka Train To Zap.....

So we are off on the bonaca bonca train!  Natalia help us load up all our 6 bags and backpacks into her Corolla Toyota.  We were packed in!  Seatbelts who needs seatbelts we were moving as tight as it was.  We would need the jaws of life to just pry us out from under the suitcases.  We got to meet up with Tatiana Titova who we love and adore.  So good to see her smiling face and meet up with our translator Oksana.  She has been a delight!

So we board the train and the folks that check us in were wondering what we were doing with all these big luggage’s.  They said something in Russian and I shrugged and said I only speak English and then it was on.  Not sure what all they said but I obviously cracked them up with all my stuff!  I was laugh at worthy the luggage’s are above my waist these things are not joke and I can shove Kolya in one and Sergiy in the other and they would fit quiet nice. (:

Ok this one goes out to all you blondes out there.  Ok this time on the Bonca Bonca train there ain’t no sleeping.  Poor Oksana she is stuck with tweedle dee and dumb.  Joe gets settled and about an hour after the lights are out and we all attempt to sleep suddenly you hear change falling from the bunk.  Joe is moving and his blankets and clothes are falling and change is coming out of his pockets.  Then about 10 minutes later you here him saying”Chess”!  So now he is playing chess on his little notebook thingy I bought him for Christmas.  I start to dose off again and then I hear a bag crumbling and then crunching he is into my nuts.  The boys does not know how to be still or quiet.  Then I flip over and have two folks snoring in the cabin next to us and one of the folks snoring sounds like a  Ton Ton from Star Wars yelling out.  Holy Cow.  The snoring was so loud that my legs and legs just say where the sun does not shine was vibrating through the wall to my bunk.  Then you add all the train stops and lights.  Sleeping was obviously not in the agenda for me.  So I decide to go the bathroom thinking it gives me the chance to move around.  Here is my blonde moment.  I left the cabin, went to the bathroom came back to my cabin……….cabin…..or crap which cabin??  See I was in such a fog I neglected to see which cabin number I was in.  Can’t use the excuse it was in Russian.  The numbers were in Roman Numerals which I learned in 3^rd grade.  So now I stand there not having a clue my cabin number, no jacket in the drafty hallway and I am the only one who speaks English only.  Oh boy.  So I realize hey I got a little seat attached to this wall I can make do.  I look at my watch and realize I have another 6 hours of train.  OK it will be a cold long train ride but I can look out the window and look at the beautiful countryside. So I grab the handrails and just enjoy the scenery in the dark.  The snow glowed it was beautiful.  Some houses had lights on and others not.  We passed villages, farms and even a boarding school and my heart sank thinking of all the kids with no mom’s and dad’s and if they do they are not with them as they should be.  I started thinking about how although I am lost in the hallway of a train at least I am somewhat warm and sheltered and over 100 have died here in Ukraine in the cold, even in their own homes losing electricity.  And this is only people accounted for and how many others are not like the kids that leave the boarding school and find the streets better then trade school.  As I am standing there in though a man comes out of the bathroom he grabs the rail and stands to the left of me for quiet a while just staring out the window like myself.  So much beauty even in the dark.  Then the thought comes to my mind if this happened in the cabin with Kolya he would come look for me that boy has mommy radar.  Joe well the plus is he is awake and crunching on those darn nuts!  So I was thinking I had a chance of being found by my prince without his white horse but his little nook computer.  Sure enough after about 30 minutes the door swings open and there is my man.  He came over and said whatcha doing.  I said waiting for you, I got lost.  He laughed and said I know.   Had a funny feeling you forgot the cab number.  Thank heavens my man was up eating those nuts! 

So now that neither of us can sleep I decided to write our adventure so far on the way to Zap!  My plan was to pretend I was asleep in order to fall asleep.  That didn’t work out so well.  So sleep who needs stink’n sleep!  (: