What I learned on the Trans-Siberian Railway

This winter I had the privilege to hop on the Trans-Siberian Railway train. I went from Vladivostok to Irkutsk, so it's really only half of the entire railway. It was 4104km long, and it took all of 75 hours and 10 minutes. I would love to go all the way from Vladivostok to Moscow on a train one day, because even though I was only going from one place to another, I somehow learned some valuable lessons.

1. You don't care what time it is, and that's a good thing.

"What time is it? I need to be at *insert location* by *insert time*."

We say this all the time. We have a myriad of responsibilities, engagements to attend to, errands that needs to be run, it just doesn't end. Things that we actually want to do has to be scheduled around things that we have to do. Go to school, go to work, go to sleep, repeat. Do some stuff in between.

In the train, though, there isn't much to do. You don't even use your phone that much, so you don't even look at the time. You sleep when you want, wake up when you want, go to the dining car when you are hungry, and most importantly, you can daydream all you want. Nothing interrupts you. You can just lay there and have existential contemplation as long as you can. It's awesome.

2. Maybe fast and efficient isn't always the best way.

Like I said, I traveled 4104km in 75 hours and 10 minutes. Since commercial plane's velocity is about 870km/h, I could have gotten to Irkutsk in 5 hours instead of 75. In fact, I didn't do much in Vladivostok anyways so I could have taken a flight straight to Irkutsk instead of flying to Vladivostok, getting off, waiting until train departs, and then being on the train for 75 hours. If I did, would I be writing this? It's incredibly inefficient and time-consuming, but it's worth it.

3. You are reminded of how HUGE the world is.

I come from a relatively small country, land area-wise. I do live in a big city, but I hardly leave my home if I don't have to. The farthest I go on a daily basis is my school, which is 10km away. So yes, I paid attention in geography classes and I know that earth is 1,083,206,916,846 km³ big, but you don't realize how big that really is.

I have traveled, but on an airplane, even if you travel 10k+ kilometers, it only takes 14 hours or so, and since you are up there with clouds, it doesn't really feel like moving. Hop on the plane, fall asleep, look at some clouds, get off the plane. The farthest I've traveled on land was from Boston to D. C. and I stopped in New York, so it wasn't all in single travel. When you are on a train for 75 hours in Siberia, you see birch trees on snow fields for hours after hours after hours. The same scenery you saw before falling asleep is still there when you wake up. It's pretty beautiful, too.

Like I said, I've traveled before. But I've really only been to cities, tourist attractions, places like that. Honestly big cities pretty much look all the same. There isn't that big of a difference between Seoul and Tokyo, or even New York. I don't like tourist attractions, but when I do go to one of them, I tend to focus on the attraction itself. Which isn't a bad thing, it's supposed to be that way. It doesn't get you to see the bigger picture.

4. Yes, you can live without the Internet. You can even live without electronic devices, really.

I didn't use Internet except when I freeloaded on my dad's mobile plan by tethering to check on school stuff. Using Internet that way was really slow and painful so I didn't bother except when it was absolutely necessary. Even if I had mobile phone network plan in Russia, the electricity outlet in the train is very limited and you can't use too much. My dad tried to use his laptop at the restaurant car, and he had to quit because that made the lights go out. You're inclined to use your electronics much less than at home. It was much easier than I thought. The only digital device I really used was my Kindle, and I could easily have just brought a paperback instead of Kindle.

Internet is no doubt, a beautiful thing, but do we really care about the most of things we use Internet for? Well, I care about this website, that's for sure, but I spend more time on Twitter and Instagram. It's amusing, but there is honestly not much to gain from looking at Kylie Jenner's selfies, and you could do without them altogether. Unplugging doesn't get you to rethink the technology; it makes you rethink what you do with it. In other words, I'm putting more time into this website and less time into Reddit and Twitter. (Yay!)

5. You don't need that much space.

In the train 4 people are cramped into a teeny tiny room. At first I was surprised at how tiny it was. There wasn't enough room for 4 large suitcases, so they compromised our already tiny space. You know what? I kinda liked it. Of course, living in a space 'that' little is only doable temporarily, there isn't enough facilities to sustain an actual life. However it did make me realize that small space is pretty nice, too. We always want more. Bigger home, bigger car, bigger things, bigger cell phone screens. While some might argue that less is more, 'bigger' is definitely mainstream. Being in a tiny room for 3 whole days really put me back into a minimalist state of mind again, and it was great.