My Almost LostJourney

I want to share with you my story about my almost lost journey. It was 10 years ago when I studied in Russia. I had to go to pass exams two times in the year. As you know, I lived in Turkmenistan, it is my country where I was born. Among our youngsters it is very popular to study abroad. I studied in Nizhny Novgorod, but went there through the capital of Russia, Moscow, because from our country that was the only way. When I was heading back home, I stayed in Moscow for a couple days. Usually, I would visit my best friend. She was also a student at that time.

I traveled between Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod by train. As a habit, I had large and heavy luggage. I left it in the storage room at the station, then I went with my friend. We walked in the city and visited our other friend. The same day, we visited my mom’s friend. We walked in the park near the railway station and my mom’s friend made me a little present. She bought tickets for me and my friend tickets on a special train to the airport. At that time, it was an expensive present for students like me and my friend. We were very thankful.

The next day we had to go first to get my luggage in the storage room and then go to our express train, (which we called shortly ”express”) to the airport. The storage & rail road station was located in the same station but in opposite corners. I asked my friend how long it would take to go from her home to the railway station. She said we have enough time to go there. We started our adventure. We walked in the park near her home and talked about how wonderful the weather was. We didn’t hurry up until my friend looked at her watch and told me, “It seems we are late.” We got lost in time and didn’t notice how quickly time flew by. In that moment our adventure turned into a big race.

We ran to the underground and waited for our train, but for us everything seemed like all things around us were stopped, except time)) Our train came and we arrived at our transit destination. We ran to the railway station, approximately 100 ft. First, I had to take my luggage and then go to express. We decided to split up, I went to take my luggage while my friend went to find the express train. We did everything like a sportsman, cause we were late and ran nonstop. All our conversation was while we ran. 

When my friend passed me, she came back, she looked at my eyes and gently asked me, to not tell my mom’s friend the reason, we missed the train. She was thinking that we might be late to ride the express train because of her. This ticket, as I said before, was an expensive gift. I took my luggage and continued to run but now it was more difficult than running without my luggage. My suitcase was on wheels, but it was so heavy and when I was running it couldn’t stand on the wheels. I heard a lot of suggestions to put the suitcase on wheels but it was impossible because of my speed. I heard the voice of my friend she again and again came back to me and showed me where we had to run.

When I saw the train itself, I was 20 steps below. I saw my friend, she tried to talk with the train conductor and asked him to wait 1 minute. I gathered all my strength and began my way up the steps. My friend came to me and tried to help me and in the last seconds we were able to do it. I felt the door slam behind me at the last split second. The journey to the airport lasted 40 minutes, but we laughed so loudly and cheerfully that we didn’t notice how 40 minutes flew by like seconds. It was the most memorable trip of my life.

~

Viktoriya - Turkmenistan