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  Mark well, O Job, hold thy peace, and I will speak Job 33:31     To deliver man from his neighbours – isn’t that the function of progress?  And what are the joys and calamities of humankind to me?  That’s right – nothing at all  Then why is it that I can’t have any time alone, not even when I’m travelling?   They asked us: Who’s going to Petrozavodsk?  A conference  An international conference  Come on, doctors, someone has to go!  Yes, we know what these conferences are like  A couple of emigrés – that’s the ‘international’ for you  The short bout of drinking, the hotel, the lecture, the long bout of drinking – then back home again  After the lecture, you’re still answering questions, but behind your back, brawny little red-faced men are pointing at their watches – time’s up  These little men are the local professors – in the provinces these days they’re all full professors, the same way that a white man in the American South is either a judge or a colonel   Well then, who’s going to Petrozavodsk?  So I volunteered:  Lake Ladoga?  Alright, why not?   ‘Not Ladoga  Onega’   What’s the difference?  Have you been to Petrozavodsk?  Neither have I       The station is a pretty frightening place  For my own protection I assume the air of a veteran traveller  I walk to the carriage pretending I’m bored, so that it’s immediately obvious I’m no stranger to railway stations – no point trying to rob someone like me   The train from Moscow to Petrozavodsk takes fourteen and a half hours, incidentally  Your fellow travellers are almost invariably a source of unpleasantness: beer and vobla, cheap cognac – ‘Bagration’ and ‘Kutuzov’ – pouring out their hearts one moment, picking a fight the next   The train begins to move  Everything’s okay – for now I’m alone   ‘Tickets please’   ‘Excuse me,’ I ask the conductress, ‘but could we reach some sort of I mean so I can have the compartment to myself?’   She looks at me ‘That depends on what you’re going to do in it’   What is there to do in it?   ‘Read a book’   ‘In that case,