kylelonious

I did something similar in 2011, but took a more Northern route called the Baikal-Amur Mainline. I had this experience where - at one point - like twenty Russian guys got on the train and heavily insisted that me and my friends drink with them - to the point of being pretty threatening. They didn’t just drink casually either, it was literally dudes drinking vodka like wine, an entire bottle in a single sitting. I tried to humor them for a while but it kinda got to be too much and we accidentally pissed them off by refusing to the point where several them would yell and even get kinda physical with us. Overall was one of my more stressful travel experiences.

Wondering if you - along your way - had any similar experiences? The other people on the train didn’t act like this was abnormal at all and even said various things to us about how this was common to see out in Siberia. It always seemed so insane to me that this could be normal. I know they were different paths, but did you ever see anything similar along your path? Or anything that would hint this was normal behavior?

Well one guy tried to basically keep arm wrestling until he was kinda punching me and grabbing me. Just like going too far and kinda fighting but also kinda joking. Just was uncomfortable.

One of my friends is Muslim and a guy on the train was basically death staring him and would kinda get in his face and say what seemed to be racist things.

Also the woman was approached multiple times asking to be a prostitute and touched a lot too. Not like overtly sexual but definitely overly friendly.

Overall it felt like it was on this line where it could have gotten out of hand quickly if we even said slightly the wrong thing. And it was like that for hours. And there were basically like 20 guys that kept rotating between them.

Eh it was a good story in the end. But definitely was intense at the time.