Railroaded by border security

Midnight, on a train somewhere between the Russian and Ukraine borders.
The sound of the immigration officer could be heard as he stamped passports in each compartment.
He finally arrived at my section, where he first checked my Russian neighbor’s passport - he had a red one. Stamp! Quick and easy.
And then I handed over my passport; a blue one….a foreign one.
The inspector’s face slowly changed from confusion to horror, as he realized there was a foreigner on the train with a different coloured passport. All he had to do was open it up to find my transit visa in there.
"Australia", I offered as a helpful suggestion, hoping to give him a clue.
"She’s going to Bucharest", my Russian neighbor told him in Russian.
The inspector looked at my passport… then at me……. and then he ran away…. with my passport. I was in a dilemma – should I run after him out into the dark in no man’s land and risk being pounced on by armed guards and vicious dogs?
What if he didn’t come back with my passport?
What if I was hauled off because I should have been flying in a plane, instead of taking the train through Eastern Europe?
I reluctantly stayed and waited, nervously counting the long drawn-out minutes - there really wasn’t much that I could do under the circumstances.
Eventually, a young Russian military officer returns with my passport.
“Sorry for the delay, Miss Kotrotsios,” the officer says in perfect English.
“So you are a journalist?” he asks casually.
I froze. Was this a trick question? How could he possibly know?
After all, I had written my occupation as English teacher on all my visa applications from China through to Russia, Romania and Bulgaria.
“….I’m on holidays and just passing through…..” I replied.
“Well, enjoy your holiday,’’ the officer said, handing back my passport, with my visa stamped accordingly.

Two weeks earlier: I was in Beijing, in China, riding around on my rental bicycle for a week.
One day, I noticed that I was near the embassy compounds and, on the spur of the moment, decided to look for the Ukraine embassy and sort out my visa before I arrived in Moscow, as I was only planning to stay there for three days.
So I peddled down a long, tree-lined avenue, trying to read the embassy names on the plaques on the walls, which were of course all in Chinese!
I eventually stopped in front of an armed guard where I thought the Ukraine embassy was located.
“Hello. Is this the Ukraine embassy?” I asked the guard.
No response.
“Can I go in?” I said, pointing into the compound.
Still no response.
So I hopped off my bicycle and slowly started wheeling it past the armed guard. Well, he was either going to shout at me or shoot at me……
He did neither!
In the courtyard I found a woman and asked her where I could apply for a visa and she very brusquely pointed me towards a building.
As I sat inside the empty room, waiting for someone to attend to me, I could hear voices from behind a closed door; loud, angry voices.
Well, I’m here now, I thought to myself, so I may as well just wait and see what happens.
Eventually, two men came out, still arguing very loudly with each other. One of them stopped suddenly and looked at me.
“What do you want?” he asked very rudely.
“I…need a transit visa…?......” I said almost apologetically.
“Come in,” he said.
Ten minutes - and 20 US dollars later - I had my transit visa stamped into my blue passport.
So why is this so significant?
When I arrived in Moscow 10 days later, there was a huge notice on the wall of the youth hostel, which said: Important notice - all visas to the Ukraine take 10 days to process.