We arrived in Beijing, our jumping off point on a nonstop Air China flight at 4 am this morning. There are three routes on the Trans-Siberian; the Moscow to Vladivostok route, the Trans-Mongolian from Moscow to Beijing via Ulaanbaatar (our choice) and the Trans-Manchurian from Moscow to Beijing via Manchuria. Travel east or west with or without stops. We have elected to journey east to west with stops and will cross 5 of Russia’s 11 time zones.

Birthdays are the same everywhere. We ran into these three ladies celebrating Mo’s 50th birthday with a cake after they finished their day as elementary school teachers. They live and teach nearby in this city of more than 21.5 million. Children attend school year round.