Friday 11^th April

I think I’ve done a pretty good job of this little old write-ip so far, but all the best shows have a bit of audience participation.  As the only alternative is to register and post comments, instead I think I’ll let YOU, oh glorious reader write today’s entry.  Ready? Eyes down here we go.

Today I

a)      get to have a lovely rest in a goose down bed with silk sheets waited on hand and foot by a dozen nymphets, my every wish being their command

b)      awake in a bath of treacle to discover a German shepherd dog playing Vivaldi’s 4 Seasons on an early 16^th century harpsichord

c)      get up early yet again and take a taxi to the airport

The airport at Krasnoyarsk

a)      is made of pure gold with polished diamond windows and each passenger has a dedicated manservant to carry bags and tend to their every whim.

b)      is in the lost city of Atlantis, 20,000 leagues below the Blue Square conference

c)      is a typical Russian provincial flea-pit where I again get stung to the eyeballs for excess baggage, and passed from pillar to post with people shouting at me the whole time in Russian

The people at the airport

a)      are, to a man, woman and child, impeccably mannered, intelligent, multilingual and polite

b)      are the actual tortoises who starred in the last David Attenborough series

c)      are the usual cold, rude, unhelpful types so typical of these places throughout Russia

The flight

a)      is how I always dreamed Concorde must have been.  Sumptuous luxury, acres of space, with caviar and champagne all the way

b)      takes in a trip to Venus before plunging through pools of scarab beetles, all hell bent on getting to the newsagents before the next lottery draw

c)      takes 5 hours, is cramped, the food is barely edible, but at least I get an aerial view of the frozen Siberian rivers and forests.

How did you do?

Mostly a’s – erm … no

Mostly b’s – I’ll have a pint of whatever you’re on, while we wait for the men in white coats to arrive

Mostly c’s – you’ve either been cheating or have clearly been paying attention to the previous however many entries

The taxi meets me at the airport, and before long I see a glimpse of the Pacific as I head to the hotel for a quick shower and then I’m met by Ekaterina (Katia), the branch manager for Vladivostok.

Katia is lovely and we eat at a Korean restaurant while she takes me through how it is to live life in Russia yet be 7 hours and several thousand miles from Moscow, while your neighbours are Korea (North), China and Japan.  I noticed that 9 out of 10 cars are Japanese and are right hand drive, despite them driving on the right, which leads to some fairly chaotic driving, something which I see again and again while I am in Vladivostok.

After the meal we go for a small tour of the city, taking in some great views of the Pacific and the river where there are still many shipyards.  We take a short stroll but the icy wind soon drives us back to the warmth of the car and Katia drops me back at the hotel.