Thursday, November 29, 2007
What Was Lost Has Now Been Found
I had the most amazing experience today that reaffirmed my absolute love of this country. My cell phone and the bag I left in the mikr last night have been returned to me. I went into the office to tell Uunee what had happened, and she was so helpful. She immediately got on the phone and started calling people, asking me what the driver and car looked like and eventually she walked with me to the delguur in my apartment. We spoke with the woman there and found out that the wife of the driver has a delguur over near the hospital, so we went there. The delguur was closed but we walked around and peered through the hashaa fence, and while the dog was giving a very good shot at mauling us through the fence, we saw the mikr!! So we Mongol-style pounded on the gate and eventually one of the little girls came out, then her mom came out holding my bag!! I was so excited. I told her I thought my phone might be in the mikr, and we looked and there it was! This country is so amazing; everyone was trying really hard to help the stupid American who left her stuff in the mikr. And I'm convinced that my chat with Buddha that morning was also helpful.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Happy Thanksgiving and Mongolian Independence Day
Last week I traveled to Ulaanbaatar for the Peace Corps Thanksgiving party, and also to get Sophie spayed. It seems that in Mongolia the only place to take care of a small animal is in UB. Wednesday morning Jeff and I walked through the first inkling of sunrise to the bus. I was really worried they wouldn’t let Sophie on the bus, but it turned out our only worry was actually the fact that the guy was going to charge us to bring on our backpacks. That didn’t happen last time I was on the bus, but apparently the system isn’t exactly organized and each bus ride is the sole domain of the driver, who can do whatever he pleases. So eventually we paid up, and Sophie, Jeff and I were off to the city.
The bus ride is always an interesting experience. We eventually filled it to 36 people plus one dog. And it’s really hot, so there is always a war about whether or not the vent in the roof is open or closed. For about 3 hours it went something like this: the guy sitting in the aisle would stand up and open it and everyone would breath a sigh of relief. Then about 10 minutes later the guy sitting next to the vent would stand up and close it. Repeat repeat repeat.
Probably about half of the total PVCs in the country were in UB for Thanksgiving and the M17s to get their flu shots. That basically meant it was a 3-4 day party, all of us acting ridiculously. It was fun to see a lot of people I haven’t seen in almost 4 months, and we celebrated accordingly. Our Thanksgiving wasn’t until Saturday, but the Peace Corps put on a really awesome party for us. PC got 6 turkeys and then everyone brought a dish. And Ambassador Minton generously provided several kegs and bottles of wine. We all had a great time and the turkey was almost as good as my Mom’s. Not quite though.
Being in UB in the winter was kind of a depressing experience. The air is so bad there some times you can hardly see in front of your face. One day I went to the black market with a couple other girls and driving back into the city the smog was so bad you could only see about 5 cars ahead. Just being there for four days was enough to give me a bad cough. My big Thanks for this Thanksgiving is that I do not live in the city. I love Arkhangai. From UB Mongolia seems like such a sad, depressing place. You don’t get to see the beautiful Mongolian sky very often, and the traffic is awful. There are over a million people living in a very poorly planned city. There are street children who have nowhere to live but in the sewers, families in the ger districts who can't afford coal or wood to burn, and sometimes freeze to death. There is also rampent domestic violence and child abuse that no one can do anything about because the government doesn't have a system for dealing with things like that. Many children have to put up with abuse so they can eat, because a lot of times the only place they can get food is from the man abusing them. It’s also sad because so many Mongolians want to move to UB. It has the sort of gold-paved streets draw that America has to so many. But the streets in UB are paved with trash and open sewer holes because people steal the metal to sell to China. There are many people working in restaurants that speak excellent English and hold four year degrees, because there are no jobs. It’s sad that they all want to live in UB, because anyone who speaks English has great opportunities in the countryside, many English teachers out here don’t speak any English, and there are jobs for translators that are filled with very under qualified people because no one wants to live in the countryside.
I don’t understand the rush to live in the city. Mongolia is such a beautiful country. People in the countryside are really friendly. Sure, sometimes they are rude and living here has made me take a sick pleasure out of shoving people. But people are always willing to help. If you speak any Mongolian people constantly compliment you on how great your language is. It’s nice to be flattered like that, and it helps motivate me to study.
They say that it’s a small world, but Mongolia gives a new meaning to that phrase. Mongolia is a huge country geographically, but it’s not at all uncommon to randomly run into someone you know on the street. While I was in UB I ran into Nabaa, who was Cady’s host brother over the summer. One of the Peace Corps program directors went to university at the same school in America where my sister goes. The strangest experience I had was the morning I drove out to the Dragon center to buy my bus ticket. My taxi driver was really nice and he spoke quite a bit of English. I learned that he is a student at the Police Academy, and his parents live in Darkhan and his grandparents live in Arkhangai. He was a really nice guy, I asked him to wait for me when I went in to buy the ticket, but the ticket office wasn’t open yet so I had to wait like half an hour, and he waited for me the whole time. Then when we were driving back into town he asked me if I wanted to drink some coffee with him. Sure, why not? So we stopped at a little guanz, and of course they didn’t have coffee so we drank tea. And he ordered some food which I didn’t really want, but ate anyway. After we were finished he wouldn’t let me pay, and then he drove me back to the Peace Corps office and wouldn’t let me pay for my taxi ride. Mongolian men are a lot different than American men. Anhaa (my taxi driver) said that he had a girlfriend, and while we were eating he said “I only love my girl.” But then he wanted to have dinner with me that night too, and I gave him my phone number. He said he would call me later in the evening, or maybe he wanted me to call him I’m not really sure but I wanted to have dinner with Cady since I never get to see her anyway. When I was telling another PCV the story I told him the guy had a girlfriend, and the PCV said that that doesn’t really matter to Mongolian men. It wouldn’t matter if they were married and it certainly wouldn’t matter if they only had a girlfriend. Oh well. I’m going to stick with the idea that he just wanted to practice his English.
My trip back from UB was an awful experience. When I got to the bus they wouldn’t let me on with the Sophie. Even though I had taken her on the bus a few days ago…. But like I said each driver is a King. I tried to tell him that she had taken medicine and would just sleep; she was really good on the first ride. I gave her some benedryl which helped her sleep and it also kept her from getting sick. Luckily Rob was there and he speaks really good Mongolian, and after arguing with the guy for awhile to no avail he helped me find a Mikr. We eventually found a driver going to Arkhangai, he didn’t have a mikr but he had a really nice car and he said we just had to wait for three other people. So we waited for awhile, then another guy got in the car and we drove a little ways off to where there was a mikr that just needed one more person. So I got on and we actually left RIGHT THEN, which is an amazing and delightful experience that is very rare in Mongolia. We actually picked up two more people, so it was four adults in the one back seat, three kids sitting on the box in the middle and then the driver and his wife up front. It was a little crowded, but Sophie and I both enjoyed our benedryl- induced happiness and we were on our way. The thing with mikrs that sucks so badly is that they will just stop randomly and wait. About an hour or two outside UB we stopped and waited for almost an hour to meet another car. I didn’t see any exchange of people or things, so I’m not sure what was going on. We stopped a few more times and there was something minor wrong with the mikr so the driver kept messing with the engine. It was really really cold too. UB is much colder than Arkhangai, so it was really miserable for me when we stopped. Sophie wanted to be outside checking things out and all I wanted to be to cuddle up in my coat and shiver inside the mikr. Finally we got to the guanz stop at around 8 (the bus arrives at that place around 12:30, and we left only half an hour after the bus…). We had to wait there for a really long time while the driver messed with the engine and then FINALLY we were back on our way. By that time I was so tired and had taken more benedryl and I began with the Mongolian-style sleeping on a stranger’s shoulder. I was sitting between two men and they both had very comfortable shoulders to sleep on. I think at one point one of them pushed me off, so I immediately moved on to the other. They didn’t seem to mind too much. I also had a kid sleeping on the knee, and Sophie on my lap so there wasn’t really anywhere else for me to go… I think at some point in the night we got a flat tire, which was frustrating because we were only a couple hours from home. We eventually reached my apartment at midnight. Luckily I had had a conversation with the driver’s wife. Once I told her I lived in the Goi Bashen she told me that she makes the buutz they sell in the delguur in my apartment building. When they dropped me off, in my exhaustion induced stupidity I left one of my bags on the mikr. My cell phone also somehow fell out of my pocket. I was so upset, when I got into my apartment I realized I was missing my cell phone and ran back downstairs but they were already gone. I cried. The things in the bag I left were the really nice pillow, some cheese and a piece of fresh ginger that I bought in UB. Sophie’s last set of vaccinations was also in there. Nothing irreplaceable but it’s going to cost a lot of money I don’t have to replace them. The cell phone is the worst thing. Peace Corps gives us a cell phone but if something happens to it we have to replace it on our own dime, and cell phones are expensive!!! But, I do know that they sell buutz in my delguur, so this morning I got Rob to go with me and asked the woman who runs the delguur is she knew them. She tried to call them but there phone was off or out of service, but I have the phone number now and the lady at the Delguur said I could go back later and she’d try again. I hope it works out. I took a walk up the path of Enlightenment to the Buddha statue this morning in the hopes that would give me some good karma…
The bus ride is always an interesting experience. We eventually filled it to 36 people plus one dog. And it’s really hot, so there is always a war about whether or not the vent in the roof is open or closed. For about 3 hours it went something like this: the guy sitting in the aisle would stand up and open it and everyone would breath a sigh of relief. Then about 10 minutes later the guy sitting next to the vent would stand up and close it. Repeat repeat repeat.
Probably about half of the total PVCs in the country were in UB for Thanksgiving and the M17s to get their flu shots. That basically meant it was a 3-4 day party, all of us acting ridiculously. It was fun to see a lot of people I haven’t seen in almost 4 months, and we celebrated accordingly. Our Thanksgiving wasn’t until Saturday, but the Peace Corps put on a really awesome party for us. PC got 6 turkeys and then everyone brought a dish. And Ambassador Minton generously provided several kegs and bottles of wine. We all had a great time and the turkey was almost as good as my Mom’s. Not quite though.
Being in UB in the winter was kind of a depressing experience. The air is so bad there some times you can hardly see in front of your face. One day I went to the black market with a couple other girls and driving back into the city the smog was so bad you could only see about 5 cars ahead. Just being there for four days was enough to give me a bad cough. My big Thanks for this Thanksgiving is that I do not live in the city. I love Arkhangai. From UB Mongolia seems like such a sad, depressing place. You don’t get to see the beautiful Mongolian sky very often, and the traffic is awful. There are over a million people living in a very poorly planned city. There are street children who have nowhere to live but in the sewers, families in the ger districts who can't afford coal or wood to burn, and sometimes freeze to death. There is also rampent domestic violence and child abuse that no one can do anything about because the government doesn't have a system for dealing with things like that. Many children have to put up with abuse so they can eat, because a lot of times the only place they can get food is from the man abusing them. It’s also sad because so many Mongolians want to move to UB. It has the sort of gold-paved streets draw that America has to so many. But the streets in UB are paved with trash and open sewer holes because people steal the metal to sell to China. There are many people working in restaurants that speak excellent English and hold four year degrees, because there are no jobs. It’s sad that they all want to live in UB, because anyone who speaks English has great opportunities in the countryside, many English teachers out here don’t speak any English, and there are jobs for translators that are filled with very under qualified people because no one wants to live in the countryside.
I don’t understand the rush to live in the city. Mongolia is such a beautiful country. People in the countryside are really friendly. Sure, sometimes they are rude and living here has made me take a sick pleasure out of shoving people. But people are always willing to help. If you speak any Mongolian people constantly compliment you on how great your language is. It’s nice to be flattered like that, and it helps motivate me to study.
They say that it’s a small world, but Mongolia gives a new meaning to that phrase. Mongolia is a huge country geographically, but it’s not at all uncommon to randomly run into someone you know on the street. While I was in UB I ran into Nabaa, who was Cady’s host brother over the summer. One of the Peace Corps program directors went to university at the same school in America where my sister goes. The strangest experience I had was the morning I drove out to the Dragon center to buy my bus ticket. My taxi driver was really nice and he spoke quite a bit of English. I learned that he is a student at the Police Academy, and his parents live in Darkhan and his grandparents live in Arkhangai. He was a really nice guy, I asked him to wait for me when I went in to buy the ticket, but the ticket office wasn’t open yet so I had to wait like half an hour, and he waited for me the whole time. Then when we were driving back into town he asked me if I wanted to drink some coffee with him. Sure, why not? So we stopped at a little guanz, and of course they didn’t have coffee so we drank tea. And he ordered some food which I didn’t really want, but ate anyway. After we were finished he wouldn’t let me pay, and then he drove me back to the Peace Corps office and wouldn’t let me pay for my taxi ride. Mongolian men are a lot different than American men. Anhaa (my taxi driver) said that he had a girlfriend, and while we were eating he said “I only love my girl.” But then he wanted to have dinner with me that night too, and I gave him my phone number. He said he would call me later in the evening, or maybe he wanted me to call him I’m not really sure but I wanted to have dinner with Cady since I never get to see her anyway. When I was telling another PCV the story I told him the guy had a girlfriend, and the PCV said that that doesn’t really matter to Mongolian men. It wouldn’t matter if they were married and it certainly wouldn’t matter if they only had a girlfriend. Oh well. I’m going to stick with the idea that he just wanted to practice his English.
My trip back from UB was an awful experience. When I got to the bus they wouldn’t let me on with the Sophie. Even though I had taken her on the bus a few days ago…. But like I said each driver is a King. I tried to tell him that she had taken medicine and would just sleep; she was really good on the first ride. I gave her some benedryl which helped her sleep and it also kept her from getting sick. Luckily Rob was there and he speaks really good Mongolian, and after arguing with the guy for awhile to no avail he helped me find a Mikr. We eventually found a driver going to Arkhangai, he didn’t have a mikr but he had a really nice car and he said we just had to wait for three other people. So we waited for awhile, then another guy got in the car and we drove a little ways off to where there was a mikr that just needed one more person. So I got on and we actually left RIGHT THEN, which is an amazing and delightful experience that is very rare in Mongolia. We actually picked up two more people, so it was four adults in the one back seat, three kids sitting on the box in the middle and then the driver and his wife up front. It was a little crowded, but Sophie and I both enjoyed our benedryl- induced happiness and we were on our way. The thing with mikrs that sucks so badly is that they will just stop randomly and wait. About an hour or two outside UB we stopped and waited for almost an hour to meet another car. I didn’t see any exchange of people or things, so I’m not sure what was going on. We stopped a few more times and there was something minor wrong with the mikr so the driver kept messing with the engine. It was really really cold too. UB is much colder than Arkhangai, so it was really miserable for me when we stopped. Sophie wanted to be outside checking things out and all I wanted to be to cuddle up in my coat and shiver inside the mikr. Finally we got to the guanz stop at around 8 (the bus arrives at that place around 12:30, and we left only half an hour after the bus…). We had to wait there for a really long time while the driver messed with the engine and then FINALLY we were back on our way. By that time I was so tired and had taken more benedryl and I began with the Mongolian-style sleeping on a stranger’s shoulder. I was sitting between two men and they both had very comfortable shoulders to sleep on. I think at one point one of them pushed me off, so I immediately moved on to the other. They didn’t seem to mind too much. I also had a kid sleeping on the knee, and Sophie on my lap so there wasn’t really anywhere else for me to go… I think at some point in the night we got a flat tire, which was frustrating because we were only a couple hours from home. We eventually reached my apartment at midnight. Luckily I had had a conversation with the driver’s wife. Once I told her I lived in the Goi Bashen she told me that she makes the buutz they sell in the delguur in my apartment building. When they dropped me off, in my exhaustion induced stupidity I left one of my bags on the mikr. My cell phone also somehow fell out of my pocket. I was so upset, when I got into my apartment I realized I was missing my cell phone and ran back downstairs but they were already gone. I cried. The things in the bag I left were the really nice pillow, some cheese and a piece of fresh ginger that I bought in UB. Sophie’s last set of vaccinations was also in there. Nothing irreplaceable but it’s going to cost a lot of money I don’t have to replace them. The cell phone is the worst thing. Peace Corps gives us a cell phone but if something happens to it we have to replace it on our own dime, and cell phones are expensive!!! But, I do know that they sell buutz in my delguur, so this morning I got Rob to go with me and asked the woman who runs the delguur is she knew them. She tried to call them but there phone was off or out of service, but I have the phone number now and the lady at the Delguur said I could go back later and she’d try again. I hope it works out. I took a walk up the path of Enlightenment to the Buddha statue this morning in the hopes that would give me some good karma…
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
A Fun-Filled Fall Weekend
When Tuul and Andrea mentioned that their idea for the next big adventure was to find some camels to ride, I immediately agreed whole-heartedly. I texted Rob, who lives in Battsengal where there were rumored to be some camels. He in turn found a herder who has three, so we planned to make a day of it. Three weeks later, when all of our schedules allowed it, Tuul found a driver to take us to Battsengal and Rob’s counterpart talked to the herder and it was all set up. We added a Korean tourist who was staying at Fairfield’s, who was also looking for something interesting to do. The five of us, representing four different countries of origin, piled into the Russian Jeep early Saturday morning (Andrea and I commenting that we really could have used another hour of sleep…) and headed to the countryside. After a somewhat bumpy two hour drive we arrived at Rob’s ger and added him to the jeep, then proceeded to his counterpart’s house where we were fed delicious currytae hoshur (hoshur with curry) and, of course; aireg, milk tea, coffee, and Mongolian milk vodka. About an hour and slight decrease in our level of sobriety later, we headed out to the herder family.
Once we arrived there seemed to be some confusion, the camels were nowhere to be seen and it turned out that they only had one available, which was currently being watered. So we gathered in one of the gers and enjoyed more milk tea, aireg and milk vodka. It then seemed that there might not be enough saddles for all of us. Eventually we went outside to see if we could speed things along a bit,and in the distance we spotted the camel coming back, loaded down with a cart of wood. We also solved the saddle problem by Andrea and Rob riding bareback. Our hosts were a little uncertain of this idea, but eventually we convinced them. I was elected to be the first to ride the camel, so once they "saddled" it up (tied a folded up blanket to it's back) and made it sit down with a slight tug on it's nose ring(?) and a firm "suk, suk" I climbed on.
Sitting on a camel while it stands up is a very strange experience. Luckily they have a hump that you can wrap your arms around and hold on tight. They stand up on their hind legs first, making you feel like you are about to be pitched over their head, followed by one front leg and then the other. Once he was standing, it felt very safe and secure sandwiched between his two humps. It took a couple minutes to figure out how to steer and make him go forward, and after one accidental sitting-down (The word for go, which is "choa" and "suk" apparently sound very similar, and we were close to the hitching post and I was trying to turn him... So I guess I can't blame him for being a bit confused) we were off. Camels seem to have about two speeds, meander and jog. To get him to "jog" took continual thumping with my legs and a constant stream of "choa, choa, choa." I'm pretty sure it was as much work for me as for him.
We headed off across the field, me quite a bit in front of the others. The horses were scared of the camel, so we had to keep them separated. After awhile Andrea took a turn on the camel. I rode her horse, which was possibly the shortest Mongolian horse I've seen, which is saying a lot. I think he was slightly bigger than a Shetland pony. But that made it easy to get up, and I could jump on him from the ground. They had put a pad on him, so riding bareback actually turned out to be much more comfortable than riding in a Mongolian saddle. Now that I was on a horse I could go faster than a meander, and so with my legs wrapped practically all the way around him we galloped ahead a for a bit.
We continued on our ride and eventually came to the river, I think the North Tamir. Even though all the grass is dead and the leaves are off the trees, it was still a beautiful sight. We rode along side a mountain, and passed where two rivers meet. We all took turns riding the camel, I'm sure he was pretty sick of sitting down and getting up over and over again. Tuul was the most determined of all of us to get him to run, and actually accomplished it for about five steps. I was laughing so hard I almost fell off my horse, she was kicking him so hard, it looked like a scene from a Thelwell Pony cartoon.
We rode for about three hours and eventually circled back around the mountains to the gers. By the end we were all pretty tired and sore, and worried about our ability to walk the next day. After we arrived back at the family's gers we drank some more aireg and milk vodka, and of course had some photo ops with the family. Eventually we piled back into the jeep and Rob's counterpart's car and headed back to Battsengal. Lee, the Korean tourist who came with us decided to stay in Battsengal and go fishing the next day, but Rob came back to Tsetserleg with us. The ride back was filled with constant laughter. Tuul loves to tell jokes and riddles, and for nearly the entire two hours we heard jokes and took turns telling riddles.
On Sunday morning we met up again to watch the opening ceremony of the "Pathway to Enlightenment." There is a large Buddha statue about halfway up Bulgan Mountain, which has been there for several years, but they recently completed a large stairway leading up to it. I took Sophie along, which turned out to be a great idea. There was a huge crowd of Mongolians, and everyone was gathered around the statue where there were speeches, musical performances and a traditional Buddhist dance. Being in a crowd in Mongolia is always a bit of an ordeal, and being foreigners pretty much made us a target for people to shove out of the way. Luckily we are all pretty used to that by now, and know how to stand our ground. I was holding Sophie, and most of the adults would back down once they saw a dog. It was great. The kids loved Sophie, but I think they were just as interested in the retractable leash that I have now (thanks Mom!!).
The traditional Buddhist dance was an awesome sight. The costumes and masks were impressive and brightly colored. There was also a man dressed up as the Old Man on the Mountain, who at one point walked around the statue throwing candy into the crowd. He had to have a Lama as a sort of body guard because there was a swarm of children following him, and it seemed pretty likely that if they got the chance they would mug him for the candy hidden in his del.
Pictures
Once we arrived there seemed to be some confusion, the camels were nowhere to be seen and it turned out that they only had one available, which was currently being watered. So we gathered in one of the gers and enjoyed more milk tea, aireg and milk vodka. It then seemed that there might not be enough saddles for all of us. Eventually we went outside to see if we could speed things along a bit,and in the distance we spotted the camel coming back, loaded down with a cart of wood. We also solved the saddle problem by Andrea and Rob riding bareback. Our hosts were a little uncertain of this idea, but eventually we convinced them. I was elected to be the first to ride the camel, so once they "saddled" it up (tied a folded up blanket to it's back) and made it sit down with a slight tug on it's nose ring(?) and a firm "suk, suk" I climbed on.
Sitting on a camel while it stands up is a very strange experience. Luckily they have a hump that you can wrap your arms around and hold on tight. They stand up on their hind legs first, making you feel like you are about to be pitched over their head, followed by one front leg and then the other. Once he was standing, it felt very safe and secure sandwiched between his two humps. It took a couple minutes to figure out how to steer and make him go forward, and after one accidental sitting-down (The word for go, which is "choa" and "suk" apparently sound very similar, and we were close to the hitching post and I was trying to turn him... So I guess I can't blame him for being a bit confused) we were off. Camels seem to have about two speeds, meander and jog. To get him to "jog" took continual thumping with my legs and a constant stream of "choa, choa, choa." I'm pretty sure it was as much work for me as for him.
We headed off across the field, me quite a bit in front of the others. The horses were scared of the camel, so we had to keep them separated. After awhile Andrea took a turn on the camel. I rode her horse, which was possibly the shortest Mongolian horse I've seen, which is saying a lot. I think he was slightly bigger than a Shetland pony. But that made it easy to get up, and I could jump on him from the ground. They had put a pad on him, so riding bareback actually turned out to be much more comfortable than riding in a Mongolian saddle. Now that I was on a horse I could go faster than a meander, and so with my legs wrapped practically all the way around him we galloped ahead a for a bit.
We continued on our ride and eventually came to the river, I think the North Tamir. Even though all the grass is dead and the leaves are off the trees, it was still a beautiful sight. We rode along side a mountain, and passed where two rivers meet. We all took turns riding the camel, I'm sure he was pretty sick of sitting down and getting up over and over again. Tuul was the most determined of all of us to get him to run, and actually accomplished it for about five steps. I was laughing so hard I almost fell off my horse, she was kicking him so hard, it looked like a scene from a Thelwell Pony cartoon.
We rode for about three hours and eventually circled back around the mountains to the gers. By the end we were all pretty tired and sore, and worried about our ability to walk the next day. After we arrived back at the family's gers we drank some more aireg and milk vodka, and of course had some photo ops with the family. Eventually we piled back into the jeep and Rob's counterpart's car and headed back to Battsengal. Lee, the Korean tourist who came with us decided to stay in Battsengal and go fishing the next day, but Rob came back to Tsetserleg with us. The ride back was filled with constant laughter. Tuul loves to tell jokes and riddles, and for nearly the entire two hours we heard jokes and took turns telling riddles.
On Sunday morning we met up again to watch the opening ceremony of the "Pathway to Enlightenment." There is a large Buddha statue about halfway up Bulgan Mountain, which has been there for several years, but they recently completed a large stairway leading up to it. I took Sophie along, which turned out to be a great idea. There was a huge crowd of Mongolians, and everyone was gathered around the statue where there were speeches, musical performances and a traditional Buddhist dance. Being in a crowd in Mongolia is always a bit of an ordeal, and being foreigners pretty much made us a target for people to shove out of the way. Luckily we are all pretty used to that by now, and know how to stand our ground. I was holding Sophie, and most of the adults would back down once they saw a dog. It was great. The kids loved Sophie, but I think they were just as interested in the retractable leash that I have now (thanks Mom!!).
The traditional Buddhist dance was an awesome sight. The costumes and masks were impressive and brightly colored. There was also a man dressed up as the Old Man on the Mountain, who at one point walked around the statue throwing candy into the crowd. He had to have a Lama as a sort of body guard because there was a swarm of children following him, and it seemed pretty likely that if they got the chance they would mug him for the candy hidden in his del.
Pictures
Thursday, November 1, 2007
9 Hour Bus Rides and Unexpected Visitors
Last week was my first trip back to UB since I came to site in August. It was interesting and full of the usual unexpected frustrations of traveling in Mongolia. It was nice to be back in a city, with sidewalks and taxis. And the abundance of good places to eat and things to buy was amazing, though a bit frustrating with my severely limited budget. UB is the only place in Mongolia where you can find just about anything you want, from the extensive Black Market, the State Department Store and all the various food markets that have things like ginger and real cheese.
There is a bus that goes to and from UB every day from Tsetserleg, which is really nice because the Mikrs are miserable and take forever. The bus is much faster, we actually made the trip in 9 hours (compared to the 18 it took me by Mikr when I came to site…) They have also done quite a bit of work on the road to UB since last I traveled it. The road is an interesting story. They are currently working on paving the entire road to UB. Once that is completed it will be amazing, as the difference between driving on pavement and driving across a field is vast. When I say they are currently working on paving the road, what I mean is they have been working on it for the past two years and are a little more than half-way finished. Things in Mongolia don’t generally follow what Westerners would consider “logical.” Before they began paving this road they tore up the entire 500 kilometers of existing dirt/gravel road, leaving travelers for the past two years to take the bone-jarring driving-across-the-field option. The only reason for this I could come up with is that it’s possible there are only about two road-tearing-up machines in Mongolia, and they are also working on roads elsewhere…
I went to UB for a Mercy Corps training. We are going to start value chain analyses, which is apparently the new big thing in development work, of Yak wool and meat production in Arkhangai. We attended a three day training on how to do a value chain analysis. The training was, of course, all in Mongolian and I was the only American attending (except for one morning when Meaghan, a Fellow at the UB Mercy Corps office also attended). I struggled to really get much out of the training because my translator has, at best, weak English. The first day I understood almost nothing, but then the second day a translator from the UB office was there and she did a great job translating. And then the third day I found a woman who works at a Mercy Corps office in a different Aimeg who speaks nearly fluent English and she also did a great job translating for me. I was actually able to participate in the activities and understand what was going on, which made it a lot more worthwhile for me to be there.
I also got to see several other volunteers who either live in UB or were visiting for various reasons. I was hoping that I would see Cady, as CHF is also doing a value chain training this month. At first we expected to be there at the same time, but CHF kept changing the dates and we ended up missing each other by one day. Oh well. I did manage to finally (after several tries and calls to various people) find the veterinary clinic that is run by an American to buy shots for Sophie. Mongolians outside of UB generally don’t immunize their dogs, so it is impossible to buy shots out in the countryside. I’m a little nervous about giving Sophie her shots myself, but I think I’ll be able to handle it.
During my stay in UB I learned from another PCV in Arkhangai that he was under a Plague and Anthrax warning... I think Mongolia is one of, if not the only, place in the world where plague is still an actual threat. And anthrax occurs naturally. This past August a boy died from plague in another Aimeg, and the current plague scare was caused by a boy in Arkhangai who got sick after, I think, butchering a marmot. Not to worry though, the plague is now completely curable, and I actually have the necessary medicine in my handy Peace Corps-issued Medical kit. I think it might actually be kind of cool to get the plague. But I was a little worried that Arkhangai would be put under a quarantine, and I wouldn't be able to go home. Luckily that didn't happen.
My trip got interesting on Thursday. After finishing our training I asked Uunee when we would go to buy our bus tickets. You have to buy the ticket the day before, and you have to go in the morning or they sell out. I had been told we would leave on Saturday, and Mercy Corps had only given us a per diem through Saturday, so I was a bit shocked when Uunee said “on Sunday.” I then asked her “But aren’t we leaving on Saturday??” and she said no, that since it was the weekend we didn’t have to go back yet. When I asked her where we were supposed to stay (as Mercy Corps would not pay for our hotel longer than Friday night) she said she would stay with family. Well, thanks for thinking of me…. So I told her that was fine, but I was going back on Saturday. I could have stayed with another PCV, but wouldn't have had the Mercy Corps per diem to pay for my meals, and I was expected back on Saturday to pick up Sophie. Then a few minutes later Uunee said she had changed her mind and would also go back on Saturday, and that we would go buy our tickets the next morning at 9. I told her that if she wanted to stay that was fine, I could take the bus back by myself, but I would really appreciate if she would go with me to buy the ticket because I didn’t know where to go. She said she would.
So the next morning, at 5 till 9:00 I knocked on her door, only to find her bleary-eyed and still in her pajamas. Obviously having just woken up. So I asked if we were, in fact, going to buy the bus tickets. And she sort of nodded and closed the door. Then about two minutes later she sends me a text message saying she changed her mind and was going to buy her ticket on Sunday. So I knocked on her door again and reminded her that she had told me she would go with me… She seemed very confused by that and eventually I ended up calling the Peace Corps office where the receptionist explained to me where to buy the ticket. So I went on my own. After paying 4,000 Tugrik for the taxi ride out to the bus stop, I decided to walk back into the city center. As I was walking I got a text from Uunee saying that the hotel said we had to be out by noon, followed almost immediately by another asking if I had bought my ticket. I don’t know if she doesn’t think about what is going on, or just doesn’t care. So I called her and told her that Mercy Corps would obviously need to pay for another night in the hotel for me, since the earliest I could leave was Saturday.
The next morning I got a cab to take me to the bus stop. Since it was early in the morning I took a registered cab, because sometimes the unregistered ones are a little shady at off-hours. I thought everything would be fine, and the taxi driver and I even had a little conversation. Then we got to the bus stop and he tried to charge me 10,000 Tugrik for the drive. I told him that was too expensive, one kilometer is 300 Tugrik and it’s about 14 kilometers. He hadn’t reset his odometer, so didn’t know how many kilometers it was, but tried to tell me it was more. I told him that just the day before I had paid 4,000 Tugrik, and he said that was a bad taxi. We went round and round in my broken Mongolian. Finally I slyly pulled out all the money in my wallet except my last 5,000 tugrik bill (which amounted to about 6,000) and said "bi arlove miank bakgue" (I don't have 10,000), gave him 6,000 and got out. They always want to scam the foreigner, and it’s not even tourist season anymore.
The bus ride home wasn’t too terrible. On the way to UB I was sitting over the wheel well, so my legs were all scrunched up and the heater was on overdrive and blowing hot air all over my feet the whole time. Not only that but I had the two inevitable drunk guys sitting right behind me ashing their cigarettes all over me. They thought they were pretty clever, putting their vodka into water bottles, unfortunately they effectively blew their cover by giggling like schoolgirls when they passed it to their friend a few seats ahead saying "os" (water). That and the fact that they were completely wasted by the end of the trip, and getting progressively louder and louder.
On the way back I had figured out the little trick of asking for a good seat, and I got a fairly good one. Unfortunately, I found out that the overactive heater runs the whole length of the bus, so it was still ridiculously hot. And we couldn’t open the vents in the roof because of the four small children, who were also taking turns screaming their lungs out (probably because they were hot). But 9 hours of such misery is a whole lot better than 18, so I’m not complaining. The bus is actually the Post Bus, which is apparently how I get my mail. It has seating for about 25 people, but since (I presume) the luggage compartment is filled up with mail, all luggage goes under the seats or in the aisle. That arrangement can easily lead to a bit of claustrophobia, especially when it’s about 95 degrees on the bus. There isn’t really a limit on baggage, so though most Mongolians travel extremely light, when they are coming back from the city they have inevitably bought several things, or have 10 empty aireg jugs they are bringing home with them. So getting on and off the bus is a precarious adventure, involving climbing over seats and luggage and hoping the old lady in the del can make it.
I had assumed that when we arrived in Tsetserleg there would be a swarm of taxis waiting at the bus stop, as it is obviously a good opportunity to make some money. Much to my disappointment, there were only two, and I was not off the bus quickly enough to snatch one. And you can't just stand on the side of the street and stick your hand out to get a taxi here, like you can in UB. Since I don't have any drivers' numbers, I had to walk home, which is normally about a 10 minute walk, but as I had brought a good 20-30 pounds of books back with me from the Peace Corps office, it was actually a quite miserable 20 minute walk. But then I got to go pick up Sophie from Andrea and Konrad, who were kind enough to watch her while I was away. Sophie had some sort of amazing growth spurt last week, and is now quite a bit bigger. And is starting to put on some weight and has a cute little puppy belly now, instead of looking emaciated.
Yesterday I had the unexpected pleasure of some visitors. There are a few girls who live in my building who I've become friendly with (mostly over Sophie), and every now and then they will knock on my door and say hello. Yesterday Ako and Bukee knocked on my door, and after a few minutes of chatting, asked to come in. So I invited them in, and apologized for the messy state of my apartment. They quickly said that was OK and that they would clean it for me. Many TEFL volunteers have this experience, students come over and are appalled by the state of their ger, so quickly begin a thorough cleaning. As a CED volunteer, I don't have students to do my chores, so have not yet encountered this aspect of Mongolian generosity. Ako quickly set about washing my dishes and scouring my sink and counter top, while Bukee quickly organized all my various papers and things. I felt awkward, and bad that my apartment was not up to Mongolian cleanliness standards, so I fed them some left over spaghetti, which they loved. Jeff was in town for some sort of teaching thing, and he came back to my apartment while Ako and Bukee were teaching me Mongolian Hutzer (cards), so we all played a couple games. Then Jeff left and the three of us had an impromptu dance party to various poppy American music on my computer (all Mongolian teenagers know Beyonce, Snoop Dog, Akon and Fergie and absolutely love them).
There is a bus that goes to and from UB every day from Tsetserleg, which is really nice because the Mikrs are miserable and take forever. The bus is much faster, we actually made the trip in 9 hours (compared to the 18 it took me by Mikr when I came to site…) They have also done quite a bit of work on the road to UB since last I traveled it. The road is an interesting story. They are currently working on paving the entire road to UB. Once that is completed it will be amazing, as the difference between driving on pavement and driving across a field is vast. When I say they are currently working on paving the road, what I mean is they have been working on it for the past two years and are a little more than half-way finished. Things in Mongolia don’t generally follow what Westerners would consider “logical.” Before they began paving this road they tore up the entire 500 kilometers of existing dirt/gravel road, leaving travelers for the past two years to take the bone-jarring driving-across-the-field option. The only reason for this I could come up with is that it’s possible there are only about two road-tearing-up machines in Mongolia, and they are also working on roads elsewhere…
I went to UB for a Mercy Corps training. We are going to start value chain analyses, which is apparently the new big thing in development work, of Yak wool and meat production in Arkhangai. We attended a three day training on how to do a value chain analysis. The training was, of course, all in Mongolian and I was the only American attending (except for one morning when Meaghan, a Fellow at the UB Mercy Corps office also attended). I struggled to really get much out of the training because my translator has, at best, weak English. The first day I understood almost nothing, but then the second day a translator from the UB office was there and she did a great job translating. And then the third day I found a woman who works at a Mercy Corps office in a different Aimeg who speaks nearly fluent English and she also did a great job translating for me. I was actually able to participate in the activities and understand what was going on, which made it a lot more worthwhile for me to be there.
I also got to see several other volunteers who either live in UB or were visiting for various reasons. I was hoping that I would see Cady, as CHF is also doing a value chain training this month. At first we expected to be there at the same time, but CHF kept changing the dates and we ended up missing each other by one day. Oh well. I did manage to finally (after several tries and calls to various people) find the veterinary clinic that is run by an American to buy shots for Sophie. Mongolians outside of UB generally don’t immunize their dogs, so it is impossible to buy shots out in the countryside. I’m a little nervous about giving Sophie her shots myself, but I think I’ll be able to handle it.
During my stay in UB I learned from another PCV in Arkhangai that he was under a Plague and Anthrax warning... I think Mongolia is one of, if not the only, place in the world where plague is still an actual threat. And anthrax occurs naturally. This past August a boy died from plague in another Aimeg, and the current plague scare was caused by a boy in Arkhangai who got sick after, I think, butchering a marmot. Not to worry though, the plague is now completely curable, and I actually have the necessary medicine in my handy Peace Corps-issued Medical kit. I think it might actually be kind of cool to get the plague. But I was a little worried that Arkhangai would be put under a quarantine, and I wouldn't be able to go home. Luckily that didn't happen.
My trip got interesting on Thursday. After finishing our training I asked Uunee when we would go to buy our bus tickets. You have to buy the ticket the day before, and you have to go in the morning or they sell out. I had been told we would leave on Saturday, and Mercy Corps had only given us a per diem through Saturday, so I was a bit shocked when Uunee said “on Sunday.” I then asked her “But aren’t we leaving on Saturday??” and she said no, that since it was the weekend we didn’t have to go back yet. When I asked her where we were supposed to stay (as Mercy Corps would not pay for our hotel longer than Friday night) she said she would stay with family. Well, thanks for thinking of me…. So I told her that was fine, but I was going back on Saturday. I could have stayed with another PCV, but wouldn't have had the Mercy Corps per diem to pay for my meals, and I was expected back on Saturday to pick up Sophie. Then a few minutes later Uunee said she had changed her mind and would also go back on Saturday, and that we would go buy our tickets the next morning at 9. I told her that if she wanted to stay that was fine, I could take the bus back by myself, but I would really appreciate if she would go with me to buy the ticket because I didn’t know where to go. She said she would.
So the next morning, at 5 till 9:00 I knocked on her door, only to find her bleary-eyed and still in her pajamas. Obviously having just woken up. So I asked if we were, in fact, going to buy the bus tickets. And she sort of nodded and closed the door. Then about two minutes later she sends me a text message saying she changed her mind and was going to buy her ticket on Sunday. So I knocked on her door again and reminded her that she had told me she would go with me… She seemed very confused by that and eventually I ended up calling the Peace Corps office where the receptionist explained to me where to buy the ticket. So I went on my own. After paying 4,000 Tugrik for the taxi ride out to the bus stop, I decided to walk back into the city center. As I was walking I got a text from Uunee saying that the hotel said we had to be out by noon, followed almost immediately by another asking if I had bought my ticket. I don’t know if she doesn’t think about what is going on, or just doesn’t care. So I called her and told her that Mercy Corps would obviously need to pay for another night in the hotel for me, since the earliest I could leave was Saturday.
The next morning I got a cab to take me to the bus stop. Since it was early in the morning I took a registered cab, because sometimes the unregistered ones are a little shady at off-hours. I thought everything would be fine, and the taxi driver and I even had a little conversation. Then we got to the bus stop and he tried to charge me 10,000 Tugrik for the drive. I told him that was too expensive, one kilometer is 300 Tugrik and it’s about 14 kilometers. He hadn’t reset his odometer, so didn’t know how many kilometers it was, but tried to tell me it was more. I told him that just the day before I had paid 4,000 Tugrik, and he said that was a bad taxi. We went round and round in my broken Mongolian. Finally I slyly pulled out all the money in my wallet except my last 5,000 tugrik bill (which amounted to about 6,000) and said "bi arlove miank bakgue" (I don't have 10,000), gave him 6,000 and got out. They always want to scam the foreigner, and it’s not even tourist season anymore.
The bus ride home wasn’t too terrible. On the way to UB I was sitting over the wheel well, so my legs were all scrunched up and the heater was on overdrive and blowing hot air all over my feet the whole time. Not only that but I had the two inevitable drunk guys sitting right behind me ashing their cigarettes all over me. They thought they were pretty clever, putting their vodka into water bottles, unfortunately they effectively blew their cover by giggling like schoolgirls when they passed it to their friend a few seats ahead saying "os" (water). That and the fact that they were completely wasted by the end of the trip, and getting progressively louder and louder.
On the way back I had figured out the little trick of asking for a good seat, and I got a fairly good one. Unfortunately, I found out that the overactive heater runs the whole length of the bus, so it was still ridiculously hot. And we couldn’t open the vents in the roof because of the four small children, who were also taking turns screaming their lungs out (probably because they were hot). But 9 hours of such misery is a whole lot better than 18, so I’m not complaining. The bus is actually the Post Bus, which is apparently how I get my mail. It has seating for about 25 people, but since (I presume) the luggage compartment is filled up with mail, all luggage goes under the seats or in the aisle. That arrangement can easily lead to a bit of claustrophobia, especially when it’s about 95 degrees on the bus. There isn’t really a limit on baggage, so though most Mongolians travel extremely light, when they are coming back from the city they have inevitably bought several things, or have 10 empty aireg jugs they are bringing home with them. So getting on and off the bus is a precarious adventure, involving climbing over seats and luggage and hoping the old lady in the del can make it.
I had assumed that when we arrived in Tsetserleg there would be a swarm of taxis waiting at the bus stop, as it is obviously a good opportunity to make some money. Much to my disappointment, there were only two, and I was not off the bus quickly enough to snatch one. And you can't just stand on the side of the street and stick your hand out to get a taxi here, like you can in UB. Since I don't have any drivers' numbers, I had to walk home, which is normally about a 10 minute walk, but as I had brought a good 20-30 pounds of books back with me from the Peace Corps office, it was actually a quite miserable 20 minute walk. But then I got to go pick up Sophie from Andrea and Konrad, who were kind enough to watch her while I was away. Sophie had some sort of amazing growth spurt last week, and is now quite a bit bigger. And is starting to put on some weight and has a cute little puppy belly now, instead of looking emaciated.
Yesterday I had the unexpected pleasure of some visitors. There are a few girls who live in my building who I've become friendly with (mostly over Sophie), and every now and then they will knock on my door and say hello. Yesterday Ako and Bukee knocked on my door, and after a few minutes of chatting, asked to come in. So I invited them in, and apologized for the messy state of my apartment. They quickly said that was OK and that they would clean it for me. Many TEFL volunteers have this experience, students come over and are appalled by the state of their ger, so quickly begin a thorough cleaning. As a CED volunteer, I don't have students to do my chores, so have not yet encountered this aspect of Mongolian generosity. Ako quickly set about washing my dishes and scouring my sink and counter top, while Bukee quickly organized all my various papers and things. I felt awkward, and bad that my apartment was not up to Mongolian cleanliness standards, so I fed them some left over spaghetti, which they loved. Jeff was in town for some sort of teaching thing, and he came back to my apartment while Ako and Bukee were teaching me Mongolian Hutzer (cards), so we all played a couple games. Then Jeff left and the three of us had an impromptu dance party to various poppy American music on my computer (all Mongolian teenagers know Beyonce, Snoop Dog, Akon and Fergie and absolutely love them).
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