Chinese reserved seat carriages are modern. How the Chinese reserved seat works and what is its difference (photo). Types of carriages on Chinese trains

It seems that man cannot do without comparisons. I have noticed this so many times in myself and in other people. As soon as we encounter some new phenomenon, we begin to search our memory to see if we have encountered something similar. And if we find it, we immediately begin to look for differences between similar objects.

Apparently that’s why, sitting in the reserved seat carriage of the Chinese train taking me from Manchuria to Beijing, I involuntarily noted to myself its similarities and differences from the Russian reserved seat carriage, in which I had the opportunity to travel many kilometers across my native country.

First of all, it must be said that in China there are two types of trains: high-speed (in which, in principle, there are no sleeping places, only chairs) and regular ones. In a regular train, the carriages are divided into three classes: a soft sleeper (in our opinion, a compartment), a hard sleeper (in our opinion, a reserved seat) and a carriage with seats. Regular trains are three times slower than high-speed trains: a regular train moves at an average speed of about 80 km/h, while a high-speed train accelerates to 300 km/h.

Before this trip to Beijing, I had already traveled on a Chinese regular train, but it was a seated carriage. Traveling in a seated carriage of a regular Chinese train for 14 hours is a very difficult ordeal. I hope this never happens again. It’s not for nothing that the seats in such cars are called “hard seats”, because they are “tinny”. Although for short distances the carriage is quite suitable.

My past trips on an ordinary Chinese train gave me an internal fear of traveling in them, but this time, entering the reserved seat car and seeing the usual rows of shelves, I felt calm. The carriage seemed quite acceptable.

The first difference that caught my eye was the absence of side seats. On my ticket in the “place” section there was the number 10 and something was written in unfamiliar hieroglyphs. I found a compartment labeled 9/10. The two bottom shelves were already occupied by two Chinese people, who completely covered the table with their food supplies, and the beds with their phones, tablets, chargers and jackets.

The men began to cackle and point their fingers up at the ceiling. Wow! This, it turns out, is why there are no side benches here; they are turned into third shelves in the compartment, the same as luggage compartments on a Russian train.

The third shelf is the most uncomfortable in the carriage. The distance between the ceiling and the bench here is so small that it is impossible to sit on the shelf, even with your head bowed. You can only crawl onto this shelf by climbing a ladder on the side, from the shelf you can only crawl out, but changing your body position while on it is quite difficult. I was not able to sit downstairs on the lower benches or use the table. The men made it clear that this was their territory. For the unlucky ones on the second and third shelves, on the opposite side of the carriage there are folding chairs by the window and a narrow shelf - a pitiful semblance of a table. Above them, along the entire carriage, there was a luggage rack.

Side chairs and table

Luggage rack

But I liked the bed: a neat pillow and a soft synthetic blanket. Everything is already laid out. There is no mattress, but even without it it is quite soft, even though the carriage is called hard.

There is boiling water in the carriage, just like in a Russian train, but I didn’t find an outlet for charging my phone. But the problem of toilets, which are always occupied on Russian trains, has been solved quite well.

Here the toilet is always free. And all because there are two of them at one end of the car and the washbasins are located in a separate room from them. But passengers here are not provided with toilet paper.

Another pleasant difference from Russian trains is the convenient transitions between cars. Here you can pass from one carriage to another without even noticing it. On a Russian train, the passages between cars are closed with doors and look creepy. There are also sellers of food and all sorts of things walking around the carriages, but unlike Russians, Chinese sellers can put on a real show to sell some little thing.

At night, I noticed a significant inconvenience of the Chinese reserved seat: the benches here are a little narrower than ours. There are no shelves on the walls for essentials; they have to be kept right there on the bench, which makes it even more cramped.

Weighing all the pros and cons of the Chinese reserved seat in comparison with ours, I still haven’t come to a conclusion which one I like better. Probably, the best one is the one in which you are traveling in a pleasant company, with your friends or just with good fellow travelers.

P.S. I was asked about ticket prices. Prices are about the same as ours.

What an innovative reserved seat looks like in China

In 2017, trains with new-generation reserved seat carriages were launched in China on the route between Beijing and Shanghai. Double-decker trains immediately fell in love with both the Chinese and guests of the Middle Kingdom for their comfort, smooth ride and personal space for each passenger.

In order to implement all the conceived ideas, Chinese engineers had to increase the internal space of the train by almost 40%, and also raise the upper shelves as high as possible.

The main distinguishing feature of the new train was the absence of vestibules and transitions between cars. In fact, the entire train interior is a long corridor with sleeping places on the sides. The boundary between cars in the new trains is purely nominal: toilets and drink machines are located here.

Unlike traditional reserved seat carriages with longitudinal-transverse arrangement of sleeping berths, the seats in the new train are located in the direction of travel. Thanks to this, the corridor is noticeably wider, and passengers have much more personal space.

The ticket price includes a set of bed linen and even disposable slippers. The pillows on the new train are filled with environmentally friendly buckwheat material. There is an orthopedic pillow on the wall in each compartment to ensure a comfortable sitting position.

Thanks to the innovative organization of space, each passenger has a separate table and legroom. Thanks to the thoughtful organization of internal zones, engineers managed to design a train with 880 seats.

On the new reserved seat train, you can easily isolate yourself from other passengers using a corrugated curtain. Each compartment has individual lighting that does not blind other passengers, as well as USB connectors, clothes hangers and universal sockets with European, Chinese and American plugs. If necessary, the personal window can be closed with an opaque curtain.

When designing the new train, engineers paid special attention to noise insulation and smooth running. By the way, the double-decker train covers the 1,318-kilometer route between Beijing and Shanghai in just 11 hours. The maximum speed of the train is 250 km/h.

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Chinese coupe car

Here we are! We go in and look for our compartment. I was so focused on everything around me that I simply flew through the entire carriage and didn’t notice our seats. But it’s not scary, the tickets are in hand, so we’ll all go to our places. We open the door, places 7 and 5 (lower), go in and…. I can’t believe my eyes, everything is very good! Clean linen has already been laid, a wonderful fresh smell, not a drop of tobacco smoke (this is unique to China), spacious and sleeping area much wider than in Russian carriages.

There is a liter thermos on the table, still empty. The table is very small, of course you can’t eat chicken on it! The maximum that can fit on it is two glasses of tea and two plates of instant noodles, a kind of “China-style”.

Also in the compartment there are hangers, a bunch of hooks for everything, disposable slippers, wi-fi and a Chinese radio. But this is a pleasure for amateurs; 2 minutes of listening was enough for us.

Having settled in, putting on white slippers, we set off to explore the expanses of the carriage. We visited the washroom for three people. Not a particularly clean room, cold water, but a bonus - a huge mirror. This is a note for lovers of selfies in unusual places.

The toilet room pleased me with its relative cleanliness and the absence of the smell inherent in this place.

Opposite the toilet room there is another washbasin in which, next to it, there is a tank with boiling water. By the way, boiling water is available in all public places in China. That's why they always have a thermos of tea with them. Such a culture!

Along the corridor of the compartment car near the windows there are comfortable folding seats where you can sit and think about everything, because there is more than enough time. And of course, there are 220 V sockets.

We drove to Hailar alone, in a romantic atmosphere. But this is China, there are still not enough people to enjoy being alone. In Hailar, the cutest adult Chinese couple sat down with us. A very nice woman and an interesting talkative man.

This is where the fun began! As you already know, we have been living in Manchuria for quite some time and this city borders on Russia. Many Chinese know Russian to one degree or another, so it is extremely difficult to apply their knowledge of the language in practice. Because if you start speaking Chinese, and the Chinese don’t understand the first time, then it’s easier for them to switch to Russian. This is where all language practice ends. But here it’s another matter, our neighbors in the compartment do not understand Russian at all. And this plays into our hands - a great opportunity in an emergency situation to activate all our knowledge. It was incredibly interesting for us, because if we didn’t understand the first time, they repeated it to us again and again until we fully understood. We also had the opportunity to repeat everything in several interpretations, pronouncing the correct tone, observing all the rules of pronunciation of sounds and being understood. It's amazing to know that your training was not in vain and you can speak and understand what is being said.

As the conversation progressed, it turned out that our fellow travelers had been to Russia and liked our country (all Chinese like Russian open spaces). This is a wonderful married couple who own 4 hotels that are scattered throughout China, from Hailar and Beijing to the Chinese coast. The hotels have the style of such nice cozy villas, with large quantity parks and fountains in oriental style. They promoted these travelers' havens to us in all their glory.

You probably, like us then, are wondering: what are such wealthy gentlemen doing on the train? After all, an airplane is a much more comfortable way to travel.

Despite financial well-being and access to all the benefits of civilization, people may have problems that are not so easy to solve. A talkative man has two ailments: a fear of heights (acrophobia) and a fear of closed spaces (claustrophobia). So they travel thousands of kilometers by train, monitoring the operations of their hotels as needed. Now it became clear to us why the man often went out into the corridor without the harmful habit of smoking.

Night came unnoticed. The voices died down, the corridor was empty, everyone scattered to their shelves, the lights went out. Only the rhythmic sound of the wheels lulled me to sleep, but prevented Artyom from falling asleep. The fireman lit the train's stove. Dry air whistled into the lungs and came out of them with heavy pressure. Lounging on a spacious bed like a starfish, wrapped in a light synthetic blanket like the foam of salty waves, I peacefully fell into the deepest sleep.

Chinese reserved seat car

After a quickly flown journey, we headed back to the station. But now we had to spend the evening and night in a spacious six-seater section. Yes yes, that's right. Each section of the reserved seat car has three sleeping berths on each side, for a total of six seats. Where there is a luggage rack on Russian trains, here is the third level. But there is a free corridor, the same as in a compartment car. And instead of side shelves, folding seats.

Having flown into the carriage first, we found our seats, or rather section number 3 - 4. And we were pleasantly surprised that the section was closed. I'll explain now. Everything looks the same as in a regular compartment, with the only difference that there is no door, but there are walls that isolate it from the corridor. This is brilliant! Moving around the carriage, you don’t need to hold your breath while passing the “fragrant” feet of passengers, who, like zombies from horror films, pounce on you from around every corner. The same wide berths, a made bed and the same table as in the compartment.

The restroom is made in a traditional railway style, I think it’s the perfect “hole in the floor” for public places. The washrooms are ascetic and spacious.

The corridor is just as spacious and lively, because the necessary energy resources in the form of 220 V sockets are located in the walls.

Of course, we are incredibly lucky with our neighbors. He was a young, tall Asian man with aristocratic glasses. A middle-aged woman who sat in the hallway until late at night. And a man who quietly slept the whole way.

After busy days in Harbin, the train ride turned out to be not such a useless pastime. As soon as the opportunity to lie down presented itself, I pulled the mask over my face and instantly passed out. I woke up only the next morning, when we were already approaching Manchuria. I have never spent 13 hours so quickly and forgetlessly.

I can summarize the following: the Chinese reserved seat car is a decent way of transportation at a minimal cost.

Travel by different transport, in different places, try new food, study the features of the territories you visit, always look at the world with a smile and joy.

All the best and happiness, Your Alena A.

They accelerate to 300 km per hour and allow you to quickly and expensively travel around the country. By the end of 2015, the length of high-speed railways in China was more than 19,000 km, and by 2020 the Chinese are going to build another 23,000 km (spending 2.8 trillion yuan on this) and connect everything big cities countries.

Last year, the Chinese even proposed building a high-speed railway to Vladivostok, but this idea is still stuck at the negotiation level. Apparently, the Chinese do not want to invest their own funds in the corridor for our shuttles, demanding also Russian participation, and this is difficult now. By the way, in China itself, what the PRC leadership spends on railways a lot of money.

It is not yet possible to cover the entire country with local copies of Siemens and Bombardier. Most Western China, where there are mainly mountains and deserts, has not yet been conquered. In the south, there are also branches that are not duplicated by high-speed ones. So in China there are ordinary trains with compartment cars, lace curtains on the windows and tea in the cup holders. I took one of these trains from Dali to Kunming - only 250 km, but the journey took 7 hours!

01. Chinese train stations are huge multi-storey buildings with offices and shops.

02. Station Square

03. The parking lot is a complete mess, it’s impossible to approach with a suitcase.

04. Everything is crowded with cars very tightly.

05. Police booth on station square. To prevent anyone from bothering the policeman with questions, he fenced himself off with a ribbon.

06. There is a paid waiting room at the station! Costs 20 yuan (220 rubles).

07. For this money they will pour boiling water and take your luggage for storage.

08. This is what the hall looks like.

09. Luggage storage at the station. Storage cost is 15 yuan (160 rubles) for two suitcases. All items are checked on a scanner.

10. There are no elevators at the station; instead, there are these ramps in the middle of the stairs, it is impossible to use them.

11. Store

12. You can buy alcohol for the trip.

13. Only passengers with tickets are allowed into the station; at the entrance everyone is checked with a passport and entered into a computer, things are scanned, passengers are searched. Everything is like at the airport.