Transportation

For the health-minded, traveling anywhere is generally not advisable. Siberian Air operates daily flights from Moscow to Irkutsk, Novosibiersk, Ulan Ude, and a snowy mountainside somewhere in the Urals. On the way, passengers may encounter unfeeling stewardesses, bad feeling drunkards, and, squeezed somewhere in front of one’s seat, non-feeling legs. While a trip home on the microbus is a cheaper, chancier, and kitchier alternative to a roller coaster made of rotting wood, getting in and out demands all sorts of intense determinateness and awkward body-twisting (befitting only of a culture obsessed with gymnastics), hairy, head-injurious jumps in and out of a moving vehicles, and a range of stares that would make even Clint Eastwood keep his eyes glued to the window, with its gorgeous display of spewing factories and smoke-brown apartment complexes. A taxi might be the best and safest way to go, assuming you don’t speak Russian in which case the driver may be less likely to spend half the trip facing the backseat in conversation.