(St Petersburg - Minsk 864km/536 Miles)Total distance traveled = 13,124 km/8154 Miles
I arrived at the station about an hour before my train left as I was leaving Russia and entering Belarus. I had to get visas for both countries, and neither are known for being liberal so I was expecting quite a lot of paperwork and procedures. There was a sign outside the station for the customs office in Russian and English, but very few in the staion and all were in Russian. I eventually found the office with the help of a security guard, but it was closed. Slightly worried, so went to a ticket office to check what to do. Luckily there was an English speaking woman to help me explain the question. The cashier disappeared for about 10 minutes, then came back and basically said 'What's the question? you already have a visa'. So it seemed there were no procedures.
In fact, although they're seperate countries, there's no border control between Russia and Belarus. So I crossed the border without any checks on the train or in Minsk. Theoretically I guess it's possible to enter Belarus from and return to Russia without a visa, so long as you don't get stopped in the street by the police.
I was lucky on the train again in that I was sharing with someone who spoke pretty good English. He was a Belarussian who travelled a lot between the two countries with work, and so as well as chatting to me, he told me about places in Minsk, and helped me order the (free) meal on the train.
Arriving in Minsk, I found the hostel quite easily. It was dead in the centre of the city, in the shadow of the KGB building. It was another converted apartment, but not too cramped and pretty nice. The owner, Oksana, was very helped too. There was a German traveller (Franzen) and an Australian girl there when I arrived, then later a Japanese guy came for one night, and a Croatian too. I went out for a few drinks with the Japanese guy (Michihiro) one night too, it was nice to speak a bit of Japanese again!
The city was similar to Russian cities in that many buildings were new and Soviet style. The streets were wide and there were lots of expansive squares too. What differed was the cleanliness. I was hard pressed to find any litter or grafitti, and it was a lot quieter than I expected for a capital city. I'd planned the trip without knowing knowing much about the country, so I was pleasantly surprised. Everything was pretty cheap, and it was pleasant just to walk around the city and parks. There were unique elements too, like the proliference of Soviet symbols like the red star, or hammer and sickles. The functioning secret police is still called the KGB, and there's a statue to Dzerzhinsky (founder of the Russian Cheka - torn down in most other cities after the collapse of communism).
In the months before my visit there had been demonstrations, mainly fuelled by problems with the ecomony. The Belarussian ruble had been devalued by about 30%. This had made everything cheap for me, and people were desperate for foreign currencies too. Franzen spoke Russian and had a few friends in the city, and so he was able to change money at a higher rate (10,000 to the Euro, rather than 7,000). Oksana too was keen on me paying for the room in foreign currency.
I saw very few police over the first few days, then was surprised on Monday when there were uniformed police, military police, and undercover police around the city. There was some kind of event in the main square, and I guess a few officials - hence the security.
The city was a lot smaller than St Petersburg or Moscow and there were fewer specific sights to see, so my stay was more relaxing and I didn't feel like I had to rush around and see things. I hoped that Brest would be similar. It was around 4 hours away and I'd bought a train ticket for about 3 pounds! (400 yen).
Photos...
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