Earlier this year, there were news about extreme cold temperatures in Russia, and when I realized I will be stepping over there for the first time, it was something I should think about seriously.

I planned to go to Vienna and meet Girlie, my schoolmate at UIC who lived there for about five years now. There are no diret flights from Hong Kong to Vienna so I had to resort to cheaper options in lieu of the trip delays. My research showed three airlines to consider: Malaysian Airlines, Emirates and Aeroflot.

I tried to book on Asian airlines as I was told most of them provide better service than the others. But I had my personal budget limit and restriction on dates of travel. Malaysian Airlines would have been the best option as the pricing was competitive and is known for great service. But I was frustrated that I can only be secured on my onward flight and had to be waitlisted on my return. I turned it down. Emirates seemed a decent offer and a favorable schedule, but the price after tax and all simply overshot my estimates and could dig into my pocket money. It left me with one last option: Aeroflot. Take it or leave it.

When I was settled on getting that Aeroflot flight and paying that deposit, I knew there is no holding back and I should prepare to equip myself with basic Russian, anticipate rude treatment at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport, as described in numerous airport reviews. I knew nobody who traveled there before so I had to rely on such online reviews no matter how overly exaggerated they may be. The next thing I had to do after securing Schengen Visa was to learn Russian a little bit. Forget learning basic German nor exploring Vienna through Lonely Planet, I'll let Girlie handle those things. I must ensure I have a safe passage through Moscow, where I will be landing twice in my stopovers on a combined stay of seven hours.

My first encounter with a Russian was over the phone when I tried to ask the Russian Consulate if I needed a transit visa. Based on her accent I knew the lady on the line was Russian, "Wut?, Rrrrussian viza? Why do you need a viza? Wut pazzporrt are you uzing?" Quite intimidating and by the time I put down the phone my question was still unanswered. In my childhood days I was fond of praising Soviet forces, to counter my younger brother's fascination on Americans as we played super trump. But realistically it was borne out of the fact that I am very curious about them, on why they possess much power in many areas such as excellence in pure science, pioneers in space exploration and dominance in sports despite getting less hype than the Britons and Americans. If there was a chance for me to find out and talk to a Vladimir, Nikolai or Sergei, this should be the chance -- at the Aeroflot flight or at Sheremetyevo.

The flight from Hong Kong to Moscow will take nine hours, which means that in the scheduled noon (HK) flight, the plane would land in Moscow at 1730 and I will experience the longest afternoon so far; Moscow is five hours behind Hong Kong time. Looking at the map at the inflight magazine I thought the plane would take a conventional shortest route from Hong Kong to Moscow, passing through China, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. But I later found out in my return trip home that the flight would take a reverse-L route, flying at 35,000 feet above Novosibirsk and Irkutsk in Siberian airspace before heading south towards Ulaan Baatar, Mongolia and China. That is why when I found guts to ask the Russian stewardess where are we above at, she looked at the map, asked her fellow crew and got back to tell me we were flying above Samara (formerly Kuybyshev). Being a geography freak by nature, I was not convinced and instead asked her again, "Are we not above Kazakhstan?", "No, no, no", she replied with a laugh.

No, I never sat next to a Vladimir, a Sergei or an Ekaterina to talk more about Russia or Soviet Union. I was seated next to a Chinese from Guangdong who prefers not to chat with me and often falls sound sleep most of the time. Russian passengers remain confined to fellow Russians, friends or flight acquaintances. They seem quiet to non-Russians but are pretty sociable in general. By the look of their faces I can probably distinguish them from Americans as much as I can distinguish a Korean from Chinese. Their eyes are most distinguishable, with those ocassional dagger look.

The International Herald Tribune reports a temperature range of -17C to -7C which is a little "warmer" than last week's report at CNN of -30C and photos of the homeless practically sitting on exhaust heaters. The jacket I bought is definitely not enough, but at least for the sake of fashion I don't want to show off as intolerant to the bitter winter by appearing to wear thin clothing, amidst the throng of parkas, jackets, camouflage suits and fur hats they prepared as they made a beeline to the exit door.

My first and lasting impression about the airport was that it was dim. I thought they were saving up energy to keep up with the winter fuel needs of home heaters. But hey this is Russia, the third largest oil producer in the world! Apart from that I had not seen a screaming immigration official in the transit area. I had my ticket to Vienna arranged in a minute by a counter attendant who is not smiling yet cooperative to my sign languages. The door to the main transit area must be opened by an airport personnel so I was stuck for a while with a few other passengers. Their "roving guards" appear calm and warm people and seemed helpful to those asking them. For passengers who have flown into spanking new airports elsewhere, Sheremetyevo is a dull, old airport. The rest of the hours were spent on walking through the duty-free shops to find that ref magnet and reading my book. There were not enough seats too! People are creative enough to find places to sit down like the staircases and the lobby at the upper floor next to the "Taj Mahal" restaurant. I remembered a joke I read recently that airport personnel deliberately dimmed the lights so people cannot see the filth in the confines of this Soviet-era airport; also, passengers were deprived of seating amenities to get motivated to sit down at restaurants that offer expensive food. But at least there were no official barking an unsuspecting visitor for sitting on the staircases.

I had one photo taken by a Japanese visitor but the lack of lighting showed up only a silhouette of me. In my unofficial count, Japanese make up the largest number of passengers at the time followed by Indians. Europeans actually dominate but they're multinationals as evidenced by their accents: German, Italian, French, Slovakian, Czech and Polish. I was glad I am in a company of Asians (the Japanese) who are seated not far from me in the departure lounge but as the flight to Cairo made its last call, all of them stood up and queued at the nearby boarding gate. As far as I can see I am the only non-European to take the Aeroflot/Air Austria flight bound for Vienna. So it was not surprising to be singled out to show passport and visa requirements.

My return transit stay in Moscow was even shorter. As I was already a little familiar with the system I was more carefree, and even got engaged to a lengthy conversation with an Indian medicine student on his way to school in Yerevan, the capital city of Armenia, located in Central Asia. We talked about India-Pakistan rift in the Kashmir, life in Armenia and other political talks. He never expected I would be well-versed on those topics as he never met someone who could tell that Armenian surnames often end in "an" as much as neighboring Georgia has "villi" or "ze". Now he met one. The talk was so interesting that it made my transite stay in Sheremetyevo very short. Shortly after wishing him well in his career, I hurriedly entered the gate and took the flight out of Moscow. There I saw more Asians with me in the flight, a sign that I am boarding the right plane. The return flight was much more comfortable as I was seated at the first row of the economy section. The journey's almost over and I am too tired to recall everything. And as I gaze on the plane's window overlooking what was supposed to be evening lights from Ulaan Baatar, I realized that many airport reviews were made by the overly sensitive people: either very much happy about the experience or very upset about the service. To me Sheremetyevo is not as majestic as Singapore or Hong Kong airports, but it's quite bad to get those descriptions it does not deserve.