I cant lug my gear around while hitch-hiking so decide to get a train to Prague, and see what happens.
It's been lonely on the train. There has been no-one interesting to talk to. In fact the train is almost empty. The countryside is boring. The towns look just like ordinary towns. I cross the frontier into Germany. It is raining. It always seems to be raining when I come to Germany.
I spend the night in the central station at Bonn. Every so often I get up and buy a hot chocolate, and then huddle down into my coat, my legs stretched out over my two suitcases. It is quiet, warm, and almost cosy. I doze rather than sleep. In the morning I have breakfast and board a train heading towards the Czech frontier, and once again I feel lonely. The countryside looks dull and quiet, and so do the other passengers. Good grief I might as well be on the suburban line going to work.
But something odd happens as we approach the frontier. I look out of the window. The roads are empty. Nobody seems to be travelling across the border. The train is also almost empty. At each station people get off, but no-one gets on. I am now the only person in my carriage. I feel quite conspicuous. It is only now that a ghastly thought enters my brain. Supposing they want to look in my suitcases at the frontier and confiscate the gear. That will be a disaster.
I panic. Why didn't I think of this? Why didn't I have a plan? Why...?
The train jolts and I nearly fall over. Why am I standing up? I dont remember getting up. I quickly sit down again. Suddenly the world doesn't look so wonderful and exciting as it did a few moments ago. Perhaps I ought to get off the train at the next station and think of a plan, get help, do something, anything, but... Help!
What? Oh what am I going to do?
We stop at another small station and a girl gets in. We smile and she chooses another compartment. It occurs to me that I really need help here. I wander slowly down to her compartment and stand at the doorway.
She looks up. She speaks in German, asking if I'm German.
I shake my head. “English.”
“I speak small English.”
“You go... Where?” I ask.
“Budapest.”
“You are Hungarian?”
She smiles.
“At the frontier, what do I do with my cases?”
“Oh.” There is a pause. “You smuggle some things?”
“Clothes.”
“What clothes?”
I pretend to hold up my breasts, and then point to my crotch.
Her eyes open wide. “You have much?”
I shrug. “Come and see.”
She gets up and follows me to my compartment, and I open the two suitcases.
She points. “Close. I come, sit with you. We cross frontier together. You speak no.” She shakes her hand at me and disappears, but is back in seconds.
“You just follow me. My cousin from Germany. Okay? You visit me and bring small presents for my family.” I know who to speak to. It will cost...” she rubs her thumb and two fingers together. “Everything cost bribe. No bribe then nothing. Bribe is make wheel go round.”
She sits down. “Now. Tell me. What you do?”
We chat. Her English is very good despite the funny way she uses it. I am looking out of the window. The railway line is running alongside a high wire fence with twisted barbed wire along the top. I point. “That is Czech?”
“That is Comecon prison camp. We all live behind wire. Much wire. They say to keep out West, but is to keep in East.”
“Why do they care?”
“Is control. Is power.”
“But...?”
“Is life. Is life behind the wire.”
“But you go and come back.”
“I have money. I know people. That is important. You need to know I am girl for fun, and I have important customers.”
I like the words. I must remember the question: 'Are you girl for fun?'
We are following the high wire, and then we are surrounded by guards with guns, and the rails burst through the high fence.
“We get out?”
“No-one get out. We sit. We wait. Man comes. This is not station. This is frontier.”
“Is there no station at the frontier?”
“Of course, but not close to wire.”
Two people who look like police come into the compartment demanding passports.
They scrutinise mine, and point. “You two? Friends?”
The girl for fun explains, and the police smile, and leave.
“So, are we friends?”
“Cousin. Remember. I ask how is police chief. They smile. If they know I know him they will ask no more questions.”
“It's who you know.”
“Of course.”
Two more officials enter the compartment. They point to my cases. I leave the matter to the girl who seems to know who it is best to know. But things don't go as I expected. They insist on me getting down the cases and opening them. This wasn't how things were supposed to go. I look across at my companion, but she is busy picking up items and talking fast. Of course, I cannot understand a word.
Five minutes later the two customs men leave, each carrying packets containing two bras and two pairs of panties. I originally assumed this was a bribe, but at the door they both fumbled in their wallets and brought out rather a lot of notes, looked very sheepish, and then disappeared.
“You...” I don't get any further.
“Your first sale. We make good partners. You bring, I sell. We go half. You half. Me half. She counts out the notes and gives me my share.
“What's this worth?”
“Not much. You wait to Budapest, we get three times this price.”
We sit waiting. “Who comes next?”
“We go hundred metres then stop for new ticket man. He look, then station.”
The train shunts forward, stops, rattles forward again, then stops again, and eventually pulls in alongside a platform.
I am rather annoyed to find that although I had a ticket to Budapest it is taken away from me and I am told it is not valid. “Only ticket bought here is valid here.”
“You buy ticket to next frontier, and then ticket to Budapest. Foreign tickets, and tickets bought in West not valid in these trains.”
“Do we sell more...” I point to the suitcases, “when we get to the next frontier?”
“Of course. Is our bribe.”
“But you need to know the right people.”
“Always. Don't come on your own.”
“Maybe we start a business.”
She laughs.
Maybe this is going to work. Maybe I will like things behind the wire, so long as I have a friend who knows the people one needs to know.
I open my wallet and inspect the strange notes. There does seem to be a lot of them.
“Don't worry, I will help you not to have your money stolen.”
“But they took my ticket away.”
“Is always like that. You never buy ticket all the way. You have the wrong passport. Is passport from West. You buy tickets here, not in West."
.....To be continued