The Garden

I have finally made it to my site. Tsetserleg is beautiful. There are mountains surrounding the town, and there are trees everywhere. It is a pretty small town, my apartment is on the edge, and from my balcony I can see the other side. Getting here was quite an adventure. We swore in on Saturday, and then Sunday morning my supervisor, Dashzeveg, and I left. He called me at 9:30 (I have a cell phone now!) and arrived at the dorms to pick me up about half an hour later. We got in a taxi and drove to the micr stand. At the time I wasn’t sure if we were taking the taxi all the way here, because Dashzeveg had told me that he would find a car and then pick me up. I was a little scared about the taxi, because we had been driving for about 4 minutes when it died. It was raining really hard, and we were just stuck there in the middle of the road in UB for like 15 minutes while the driver got out and looked and the engine, then tried to start the car over and over again. Finally it started, and I was quite happy when we arrived at the Micr stand and got out of the dysfunctional taxi. We were some of the first people in the Micr. They wait until it is full before they leave. We packed it pretty full. There were 16 people in it by the time we were on our way, not including the driver. But that number did include about 3 small children, and they don’t really count apparently. I was squished in the very back seat with three other people. There were two other foreigners on the Micr, a couple who is touring Mongolia for three weeks. One was from Germany, and one from France. They seemed a little perturbed by the Mongolian way of doing things, and they spoke no Mongolian at all, which meant they had a hard time. They kept asking the driver “what time will we leave,” and it was all I could do not to laugh. Mongolian drivers never have a set time of departure, they may give a time, but basically it’s when the car is full.
We finally got on our way, only to get stuck in the mud after about 20 minutes. We weren’t really even out of UB yet, we were still in the far out Ger district. They are doing a lot of road work in Mongolia right now, which basically means they tear up the existing dirt roads, and people drive around in the field. And they don’t do it in sections, they tear up miles and miles of road and maybe it will be completed sometime in the next few years… The driver spun the wheels for awhile, and then made all the men pile out, and with the lightened load was able to get us out of the mud. So then we were REALLY on our way. We actually left UB at around noon, and were on the paved road for maybe half an hour. Then it was the dirt road. Being in a packed Micr on a bumpy dirt road is not exactly what I would call “fun.” I may have suffered a slight concussion from the numerous times I banged my head on the roof, and I’m a bit bruised on my left side from smashing into the side. I have always been to sleep anytime, anywhere, but in that Micr it was nearly impossible. I would doze off for a few minutes only to be thrown against the side of the Micr when we hit a bump. We stopped once at about 4 pm on the side of the road for a “bathroom” break. Basically everyone scattered and tried to find a bush (or not if they were men) and almost immediately the driver herded us back in the micr and we were off. Around 7 pm we stopped for dinner. There was a little strip of Delguurs and Guanzes (Canteens) along the side of the road, so we all had a quick bite. I had hoshor, I was a little worried that I was going to get the Gehdis Mo, because I hadn’t really eaten anything all day and who knows what the quality of the meat they used in the Hoshor was.
After dinner it was back in the Micr and on to Kharkhorin (that was where the European couple was going). We didn’t get there until about 10:30, and we had to drive around for awhile before we found a hotel. Then we were off again toward Tsetserleg. We got stuck in the mud again, and this time the driver made everyone get out. And they had tied a rope to the front of the Micr and everyone lined up and pulled. I didn’t really realize what was going on, I had sort of been dozing, and had been in the micr for about 12 hours at that point, so I got out and I was kind of stretching, then I started to notice that everyone was standing in a line in front of the micr. By the time I realized everyone was pulling, it was too late. I felt kind of bad, and one of the Mongolian men in the Micr was giving me a hard time about it. They had all warmed up to me at that point, because I was helping translate for the European couple. Mongolians love you if you know some Mongolian.
Finally we started getting closer to Tsetserleg, and we started dropping people off at their respective houses or gers along the way. The last 30 minutes of the trip were pretty nice, because there were only three people in the back seat, so I wasn’t squashed up against the window. About 20 minutes outside of Tsetserleg we met up with the Mercy Corps driver in the office’s Russian jeep, so we transferred all our stuff over and then went to my apartment. We finally got here about 4 am. We carried all my stuff up and then Dashzeveg and the driver left. Dashzeveg told me he would come and pick me up for work at 11 am on Monday.
My apartment is pretty nice. It is small. It’s just one room, then a little kitchen nook and a bathroom. There are a few issues though. First of all, I don’t have a bed, again. I don’t know what it is with me and beds; apparently I’m not supposed to have one. All I have this time is a pile of blankets on the floor. I think it will get worked out though. A bed is definitely one the list of minimum housing requirements, and it specifically says “bed and mattress,” so I will get one.
Monday morning my two counterparts, Unenbat (the Admin Officer) and Hongoroo (the translator), picked me up at 11. We walked over to the office and then we along with Dashzeveg piled into the Jeep and the driver drove us around town. They showed me the post office, police station and some other important places. They also drove me up on top of a hill that is right across the road from my apartment building where there is a statue of Buddha. There is a Monastery right there, which used to be a really big one, but now has 2 lamas. Then we went to the bank so I could open up an account, which took forever. Mongolian banks don’t move very quickly, and Mongolians aren’t really that great at lining up and waiting their turn. By the time we were done there it was time for lunch. The whole office went to Fairfield’s, which is the café run by the British ex-pat couple. I was really excited to see that they serve breakfast there. It’s nearly impossible to find a normal American breakfast in Mongolia, and I’ve been craving some eggs and hashbrowns.
After lunch we went back to the office. I was exhausted, and really just wanted to go home and go to sleep. But I read through some of the past few months’ monthly reports, and played on the internet a little bit. Then Hongoroo asked me if I could go through the monthly reports and check them for grammar mistakes, so I worked on that for awhile. Then Unenbat called a coffee break, so we had coffee and tea and chatted for about half an hour. After that they asked me if I needed to go shopping for some food, which of course I did. So they took me to the market and I got some meat and veggies and other necessities. Buying meat here is scary. It’s really hard to tell if it’s fresh, and it’s not trimmed at all. So you pay for a lot of fat and gristle, which the Mongolians don’t mind because they eat that, but it kind of irritates me because I don’t want to eat it. I wish I could have a dog to feed it to. I’ve been contemplating having a dog. But I don’t know if I’m even allowed to in my apartment, and I would feel bad for it being home alone all day locked up. That’s one thing that makes me really wish I were in a Ger, because then I could have animals. I could have a cat, but I just really don’t like cats.
After shopping Unenbat and Hongoroo brought me back to my apartment and we did a walk through. Unenbat was making an inventory of everything that was in my apartment, which provided a great opportunity for me to talk to her about the fact that I don’t really have a bed, or a kitchen table and chairs, or a bookshelf. So supposedly on Tuesday I will be getting those things. I’m also supposed to have a carpet, and technically I do have one, but it is hanging on the wall. I asked them if we could put it on the floor, and they said no. So I guess I am going to have to buy my own carpet, or just get along without one. I’ll have to price them at the market.
My last day in UB was really fun. We had swearing in in the morning, and then after that a lot of us and a lot of M17s went to pub next door and had a beer. Once we swore in all the M17s who had trained us were allowed to drink with us, which was fun. That night we all went to Oasis, which is a dance club. It’s kind of an ex-pat hangout, and you can get in free with a Peace Corps ID. It was really fun. I was really sad to leave on Sunday, a lot of people were staying a few more days. But UB was really expensive, and it was easy to spend way too much money there, so I’m kind of glad I left.