Ministry in Australia

exchange place. After I had received my dollars, there were still 50 kopeks left, which they didn't want to exchange. Again they suggested I should keep it as a souvenir. 'Nyet, my dear', I said again, this was illegal, and since I insisted, they eventually gave me another dollar, as they didn't have any smaller change (or couldn't they work out the amount?).

Meanwhile, the bogies had been changed again, and the train was approaching the actual border. Our Polish companion pointed out the barbed wire on the Russian side, whereas the Polish side had no wires at all. His comments were: "This is just one example of the difference between us and Russia. They don't want anybody to leave Russia, whereas we can travel wherever we like."

The Poles seemed a free and easy people. Even the border police did their inspection while the train kept moving. How sensible, I thought, why can't the others do the same? Two hours later we arrived at Warsaw.

The station was most impressive. Announcements were made in Polish, English and German, no Russian. I changed some money into Zlotys, bought a ticket to Poznan, and was told that our train would be leaving after 1pm. So we had ample time on our hand. Our clocks had been put back by two hours and since breakfast seemed a long way ago, we were rather hungry. There was a buffet style restaurant in the station with an excellent choice of food.

Well satisfied we ambled along the station, not really knowing how to pass the time, when I heard the announcer mentioning the arrival of a train to Berlin via Poznan. We rushed to get our luggage from the hold and made it to the platform just as the train was pulling in. It was the Moscow Berlin sleeper, which we could have caught, but which must have been fully booked from Moscow. As we saw some people getting off, we went to the conductor, showing him our tickets, including Beijing Moscow to prove that we were international travellers. He got a bit confused, but let us board the train anyway. This would save us two and a half hours.

We thought of Margie, who could be in Poznan by then, as it was the 12th, the earliest we said in our cable we would arrive there. Would she be already waiting for us, or would we arrive before her? When one is eagerly expecting a meeting, time is usually crawling. So it was with our journey from Warsaw to Poznan. We just longed to meet up with Margie. At the station in Poznan there was no Margie. It was really silly to think that she would be there waiting for us. We hired a taxi and arrived at the Metropole around 3pm. Standing at the receptionist desk, having just booked a room for us, I asked whether a Margaret Tieman had booked in earlier. Suddenly somebody grabbed me from behind. I turned around and found myself in Margie's arms. She had arrived just four hours earlier. What a wonderful re-union after such a long distance travelled!

As soon as we had checked in and showered, we went for a sentimental walk through the city. It had been more than 42 years since that fateful

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