Dust and dreams

10/2
No Catherine today, so I had all day in Moscow. I had given up my room, so had my bags with me. I wandered about, getting one last look at Moscow, bought a few souvenirs, and reorganized my pack (yes, in public), jettisoning a few things to ease the way.
I was at the train station early, but that was good because it occurred to me that I would need some rubles for the train.  There was an information booth, but she spoke no English, and wrote 23 on a slip of paper, pointing toward the numbered ticket windows. #23 also spoke no English, and wrote 13 on her slip of paper. So I went to 13, at which there was a line. I then realized that I had time to leave the station and find a bank or exchange place on my own.

"This is my dilemma . . . I am dust and ashes, frail and wayward. . . riddled with fears, beset with needs. . . but there is sometime else in me. . . dust I may be, but troubled dust, dust that dreams." Richard Holloway

This is a quote taken from a book I read on the train these last days.  I am in Almaty, or Alma Ata, Kazakhstan.  I am posting my notes from the train in several posts.  Sorry for the deluge.

The lure of the familiar goes with us even as we seek out the unknown, exotic and entrancing though they may be. Sometimes I have just wanted to speak and be understood. I realize that I am the intruder here, and it therefore falls to me to adapt-whether by learning the language, following custom, or accepting things as i find them. Still, I confess to visiting McDonald's for lunch in Moscow. Even that required the use of a special laminated picture menu. I suppose it is why immigrants tend to group in their new environs: security, familiarity, ease of understanding and being understood, whether the spoken language or the meanings assigned to events and behavior. Which is , I suppose, why I am hoping there will be another traveler on the train who speaks English.