Day 15:

Now leaving Chita! Neither time nor money enough to dawdle, I'm afraid, though I would have liked to. Chita has a lot of positives: more beautiful streets, a more cosmopolitan atmosphere, and a bigger public square than all of the eastern cities. I have a sense that Chita has been rewarded for its place in Russian history - rewarded with largese and construction projects (in true Soviet fashion, right?)

For good reason, perhaps. In 1905, Chita was at the heart of tiny "Chita Republic." That year, in the midst of the revolutionary fervor that followed Russia's military defeat at the hands of Japan, Chita socialists proclaimed their independence from the Tsar's Russia. The leaders of this movement were detained and punished, but the spirit of Chita - long a place of exile for political rabble-rousers - would not be crushed. Following the revolutions of 1917, Lenin created the "Far Eastern Republic," which was a pseudo-independent nation covering some 1,300,00 square kilometres. This nation was about the size of modern day Quebec, and acted as a buffer between the new Soviet Union and the empire of Japan. Bolstered by American, French and English troops, the Japanese managed to occupy and loot both Chita and Vladivostok, but the buffer served it's purpose: the enemies were repelled and in 1922 the Far Easter Republic was absorbed back into the USSR.

This demands another trip to the library, though: there were American, English, French and Japanese troops aiding the white army against the Bolsheviks in the east. Were there any Canadians? Did we go to war with them bad Russians?

Afternoon, on the train.

Scorecard: Chita to Ulan Ude, 8:30 am train, 8 hours.