What a surprise this place was to us. Who the heck ever heard of Ulan Ude?
As we have transited from the western part of Russia, officially known as European Russia, There has been a continually changing landscape along with observable changes in wealth of the countryside.
We we left Moscow the city slipped away and the country changed to birch forests and some homes that we got a glimpse of through the bush. They have generally left a strip of forest between the tracks and whatever is beyond that. Not always but most of the time.
As we progressed east and into Western Siberia, the homes became poorer and poorer looking. As we moved eastward there was a visible improvement and in Eastern Siberia it looked like an entirely different country, far more prosperous looking.
The big cities we have visited have also amazed us with their size and western-looking appearance. A city is a city almost anywhere in the world it seems. To me, the trust measure of a country is not the shopping malls but how the country folk are doing.
The country folk in Eastern Siberia appear to be doing much better than their more western citizens. Of course Moscow is the Sacred Cow in Mother Russia and I suppose everybody wants to live there.
Back to Ulan Ude. What a pleasant change from the other big cities, sure, it has its downtown core of modern buildings but they have a different look and lack the massive concrete appearance that seems to creep into all previous c]ities we have visited.
The architecture has a definite Mongolian/Chinese influence for sure. About 1/2 at least of the citizens have Mongol or Chinese facial features. They speak Russian but are of a different ancestry, Buryiata is the correct name for their racial origin before the Russians took them into their sphere of influence some hundreds of years ago.
The city of Ulan Ude is a mere 200 miles, [320 Ks] from the Mongolian border so it is no wonder that 'It's Beginning to look a lot like Mongolia'.
We had a walking tour of the city, being transported from spot to spot when it was some distance. There was a noticeable lack of Hustle-Bustle today. We had lunch on the top floor of a hotel with a revolving restaurant. Yup, a revolving restaurant in Ulan Ude!
Later we had a performance in the civic Opera House for train passengers, [about 175 people in a 2500 capacity theatre]. It was staggeringly beautiful in there. The Opera house was built by Japanese prisoners of war. The Russians were fighting the Japanese until 1946, holding the prisoners until 1955! Nice eh?
I think that I speak for all that this city on the Russian/ Mongolian border is one of the most attractive since Kazan several days and hundreds of kilometres away.
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Around 9:55 tonight we stop while still inside Russia and the Russian Border Control folks board the train. We are told to be in our cabins, lights on with our passports ready. Hopefully that is just a simple procedure and we can than exit the country and proceed Mongolia. About 1 1/2 hour experience, we are told.
We are told that we then can go to bed/sleep, leave our doors unlocked and passports lying on our little table. At 12:15 AM, the train stops inside Mongolia and the Mongolian Border Control folks board the train and either take them away, stamp them and then return them and we go on our way, or, we fill out forms for them.
Interesting experience.
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