The train to the Black Sea is packed with holidaymakers. Pasty faces of city Russians look expectantly out of every window. Soon they will acquire some summer colour. Maybe they’ve caught a little sun already. It’s a fine day.

You can tell it’s a holiday train because everyone is getting up, sitting down, getting something out of a bag, putting it up on the rack again, then getting up again to check that - whatever it was - was put away safely. Babies cry, older kids are getting bored. Cue for the adults to pass around the vodka and salt cucumber and make a party of it.

‘So why are we stopping?’
‘Kharkhov. Customs’.

Those who have done the journey before exchange resigned looks, sit back and fold their arms. The party is put on hold. Along the platform, Ukrainian customs officials are boarding the train.

Unbelievably slowly, the officials work their way through the carriages. They do the regular Russians first: those who have saved every penny, maybe for two or even three years for this holiday. Papers are
examined, opened, folded, turned over. One by one, each holidaymaker is asked the same stupid question.
‘Why are you travelling to the Black Sea?’
‘Holiday’.
The customs man never looks up or gives any indication that he has heard the answer. He slowly folds the paper as if to return it to the passenger but, just as the outstretched hand comes up to retrieve it, he stops. ‘Proof?’

Sometimes the Ukrainian demands a letter or a paper from an employer, stating that the holidaymaker really does have a holiday, or something stating the dates of the holiday, or when the factory is officially closed and when the man should be back at work. More papers come out to be opened, turned over, scrutinised, folded and given back. There’s always a good chance that a holidaymaker has forgotten something or other. Better, that he doesn’t know the regulations. And that means a nice fat fine for the official’s back pocket.

By now the train is heating up like an oven. It has already been standing for two hours in the high afternoon sun. The wailing babies are now wilting. Anxious mothers beg for bottled water or anything to dampen a cloth for babies’ foreheads. The toilets were locked half an hour before Kharkhov. But the customs men are unmoved. One man’s inconvenience is another man’s income.

‘How much currency do you have?

The Russian woman in the coupe replies rather too quickly: ‘Oh, I only have 100 dollars’.

‘Show me’.

And as she goes to open her handbag, it is taken from her. Dirty official fingernails poke into her letters, make-up bag, contraceptives, purse. About 1000 dollars are finally counted out. Nine hundred are confiscated and buttoned into the Ukrainian’s tunic.

The woman begins sobbing uncontrollably. ‘No, please no.’ she keeps saying. ‘I beg you. That’s all the money I have . . . all I’ll ever have . . . I beg you.’ The woman’s distress draws passengers from other compartments crowding into the corridor. Even the customs man begins to feel the heat. ‘That’s it’, he snaps. ‘I’m putting you off the train. ‘ ‘No, oh . . please no’, she sobs.

The Ukrainians form a little huddle on the platform to discuss the situation. Putting her off the train is a clean kill. If she carries on hysterically, she could cause trouble. On the other hand, putting her off the train means filling up a form. They would have to split the nine hundred with the Stationmaster at least, maybe the local police. They decide to play the long shot and the train finally moves off.

At Simferopol, the woman is met on the platform by her man. The whole saga of the journey is blurted out in an instant. They exchange words. The distraught woman starts howling all over again and he slaps her face. Through the window, everyone can read the man’s lips. ‘You stupid bitch!’.

Everyone on the train couldn’t agree more. Three hours with a locked toilet had been a living hell. And how can you possibly feel sorry for someone with more money than you. Let alone someone carrying 1000 dollars in her purse. That can’t be right.