From Behind The Iron Curtain.

Since my last post, I have accumulated a whopping 23 hours of train journey. I started Wednesday morning in Stockholm, and arrived last night in Krakow. I jumped on and off trains at Kobenhavn and Hamburg, and I stayed overnight in Berlin. In Berlin, I stayed at the hilariously named Pegasus Hostel, on the Strasse der Pariser Kommune, just south of the corner of Karl Marxs Allee. It felt rather odd being in East Berlin, and I have promised to return.

The train from Stockholm to Berlin - particularly the Kobenhavn to Hamburg leg - proved quite fascinating. So here, for your literary pleasure, are edited extracts from a letter I wrote to Erica, sent via photos and e-mail from the hostel that night.

So far, the Danish countryside has offered me some quite unnaturally cropped, presumably plantation forests; one vast sea and a connecting bridge; glasshouses and windmills. It is in no way as exciting as the moment, on the journey between Stockholm and Malmo, that our train passed the small Swedish town of Amthaus. Although the train did not stop, it offerred us a fleeting glance of IKEA headquarters, and of the first IKEA in the world, ever.

There is a young couple seated in the bank to my left. One is an Asian-American with an iPod, who has taken off his shoes, and i resting his besocked feet on the chair in front of him. His companion is a thin, mousey-haired girl, neatly dressed in a green shirt. She is travelling on a Norwegian passport (which is on the table in front of her), and speaks with its slight tinge on an otherwise American accent. They are currently discussing the differences between scientology and Christian Science (these are many and vast).

I have a feeling that the boy is an engineer. He is clearly a Christian, and he was explaining that the mathematical probability of everything working as it has to support human life is "practically zero". He has thus conceded, with the word "practically", that there is indeed some mathematical probability. After all, the universe clearly does support human life.

The boy just said that he believes love is everlasting. The girl is not so sure - she has been in love, it didn't work out, and since 'seeing other boys' she has changed her perspective.

The boy has now declared that he wants to have kids, and that he will stick around and be their father. But he doesn't believe that marriage need be a precursor to children.

She is by far the more interesting of the two. She is saying that one should not leave someone they love to chase a fleeting crush. But she is not saying this with the certainty of a hypothetical - she is saying this with the pained eyes and furrowed brow of hindsight. And, perhaps, even regret. Her open smile and tied hair exude an aura of youth and innocence, but I suspect far more behind her child's eyes.

* * * * * * *

On the way from Denmark to Germany, the train boards a ferry, and the ferry takes us across the sea. In the course of this, most of us went from the train to buy food and drink on the ferry. It was on the ferry that I finally met my neighbours. He's from New York, and has just finished an engineering degree (I was right). He is travelling until 31 July, whereupon he will start work as an environmental engineer with the City of New York.

She is Norwegian. She bought a 22-day Eurail global pass to travel aimlessly before going back to do a degree in development studies.

The two of them met at a hostel in Kobenhavn three days ago, and are now travelling together. They are having the kinds of conversation you can have with a close friend who is also a stranger. Before the ferry, she was explaining that sex has nothing to do with love, but that it is far better when you are in love.

And when I sat for 15 minutes talking to them, and sharing his toblerone, they not once asked me if I had been eavesdropping.

They are probably denying to themselves that they are courting. They live too far apart. They are only travelling together until, at latest, 24 July, when he takes a flight to visit a friend studying in Tel Aviv. She has been seeing people - he wants to fall in love. They are probably guarding themselves away from opportunity.

Yet he showed dramatic interest in the boys she'd been seeing since she lost her love. He was playing the romantic card, with a sprinkle of jealousy clearly visible to their crowd. He played her songs from his iPod and they listened together. They made plans, sate barely millimetres away from each other, and giggled at any opportunity.

I predict that, despite all their efforts, they will finally find themselves entangled. One night, in a faraway place, with nobody around, they will come together with fiery passion. He will return to New York longing; she will return to Norway free.

Or they could both return with regret.