The Neighbourhood and some Temples

The mountain, as seen from the apartment.

Mongolia, so far, has been one of the coolest experiences I have ever had. Since I arrived I've had a little bit of an opportunity to explore with some of the staff that has been here for a little while. On Saturday, I had planned to go out and get a cell phone. About 20 min. before I was going to go, Dan and Terry asked me if I wanted to go for a hike up the mountain that leads to Bogd Khaan National Park. The initial climb was much more difficult than I expected, but fear not, I made it to the top. From there, we walked along the ridge for about an hour or so. As we walked along the ridge, we got a great view of the President's mansion (yes, he lives in my neighbourhood), and stopp to contributed to an ovoo (pronounced o-vo). This is best described as a sacred site marked by a pile of rocks. We added a rock each, and a prayer stick, before making the mandatory 3 clock-wise navigations to make a wish.

Our ovoo

Terry and Dan, with UB in the background

After we wandered for a bit, we found ourselves suddenly at the top of the hill overlooking an exquisite forested valley, complete with rocky outcroppings, and golden eagles flying overhead. After a handful of perfect photo-ops, Terry surprised us with some tuna, bread, cheese, some dried figs and apricots he brought from Istanbul, and a nice bottle of Port. We found a nice little grassy patch at one of the peaks with an amazing view. After our wonderful lunch, and pleasant conversation, we decided to make the trip back down the mountain to go home. We passed through a ger camp that had a 2-humped camel, and down the main road. As we passed the neighbourhood bar (we call it Hotel), we stopped in for a couple drinks and some food. The waitress was very helpful. We each drank a few Altan Gobis, and asked her to pick some food for us. I'm not sure what it was, but it was delicious. It had beef, noodles, peppers and some kind of sauce. I have found the ladies at Hotel have been great about teaching us Mongolian, and we have been trying to teach them a little English. After a couple hours, we decided we wanted more company, so Dan called his wife, Tina, as well as Cat and Maureen. At this point I had only met each for a maximum of 3 minutes. They came down, we had some more, headed back home, and decided to drink on the roof.

At Hotel, Maureen, Cat,
Me, Dan.

The next day, we went on a walking tour of some of the local Monasteries and Temples. The first set contained the house in which the 13th Dalai Lama was born, and where the current one (the 14th) stayed last year on his visit. We also saw a 60 foot statue of a standing Buddha, which is one of the largest in the world, although it was a replica because the original had been removed by Stalin during his purges in the 1930s. We then walked through the back allies of Ulaanbaatar, bought some incense, and decided to document as many stray dogs as possible this year. We stopped at Korean style Chinese restaurant (??) run entirely by Mongolians. The soup was the spiciest thing I have ever eaten. Somehow, Maureen got more seafood in her vegetarian soup than I got in my seafood soup. The octopus was delicious. We walked through downtown, past Ulaanbaatar Square, and on to the most disturbing temple of all. This one was dedicated to showing you how you will be torn apart and burn in hell if you do not give your faith to Buddha. If that sounds kinda creepy/scary, you should have seen this place. The 2500 tugrug entry was worth it, because I'm sure the memories will haunt me for years.

Some other pics for your enjoyment.

In Mongolia, it's always "safety first"

Chinngis Khaan on his throne in Ulaanbaatar Square

Makes the Hollywood sign look like nothing.

I love my neighbourhood

Random Mongolia Observations

Here are the top 10 bizzare observations about Mongolia.... so far.

1. The speed limit in Ulaanbaatar is no more than 30 km/hr. This is not because there is any sort of posted speed limit; rather there are just enough potholes and speedbumps to prevent any vehicle from picking up any more speed than that.

2. Things have different names. There are 3 reasons behind this, a) they are in a diffrent language, b) They are translated from English, and then back into English, but somehow different, c) car companies decided it's easier to call their cars something different, but still use English.

3. It's not uncommon for people to try to drive up a mountain.

4. There are thousans of dogs, yet no dog owners.

5. The ground often throws rocks at your feet.

6. When soething is put somewhere, that is ow the way it was originally supposed to be.

7. If there is an inch available, you must take it.... NOW!!!! (This includes driving and park benches)

8. "Common" sayings in Mongolian are not things we would ever expect to have the opportunity to use.
Quotes from my incredibly "useful" phrase book (English portion only).....
a) "Can I shoot with ankle?"
b) "Before,I never had ridden a yak."
c) "When can I have a denture made?"
d) "He's a middle aged."
e) "I like food that is not too fat."
f) "Please tel me how to get o the haberdashery's section?"
g) "Can ou amend this a rig?"
h) "I'd like to buy the best English-Mongolian phrase book." (yes, this was in my phrase book)
i) " The archers are wise today."
j) "Where must a sign?"
k) "Have you been a good wintering?"
l) "May I pasture the livestock today?"
m) "Please dismount me from a camel."
n) "Cuckold someone."
o) "To fall into fangs."

9. P = R

10. A line is another way of saying, cram as manypeople into the same space a possible, otherwise known as the 'Mongolian lineup."

The Adventure Begins!!!!

So, I'm here. You could say I got here safe and sound, but I wouldn't. Both were tested on the journey, which I can only hope is an indication of what I've gotten myself into.

To start, I decided that a 6:25 am departure (which means that I had to get to Pearson by 4 or so) meant that I should stay up all night, as I tend to have difficulty getting up very early in the morning. Since Mom drove me to Kitchener early in the day, Graham kindly offered to drive me to the airport from there. We arrived around 3:30, so I just chilled out for a little while. Thankfully it wasn't a long wait to get on the plane. As I was preparing to sit in my assigned seat, I was asked by a lovely couple if my name was Colin. I turns out that John and Christina are the middle school P.E. teacher and the school nurse. (If you were wondering, the guy at the check-in station told them about me, since it is rather uncommon to find 3 people going to Ulaanbaatar together from Toronto.) After an uneventful hour on the plane, we landed in Chicago for a 5 hour layover.

Chicago proved to be one long attempt to prevent ourselves from dying of boredom. It was mostly filled with taking turns walking around the airport to find that it held nothing of interest. I think that the breakfast from McDonalds qualifies as the highlight. After those dreadfully boring 5 hours, we got to sit through a 13 hour flight. If I can offer any advice, it would be this - don't do it. It was made tolerable by their selection of adequate movies, my MP3 player and the 2 empty seats beside me, that allowed me to lay down, although I really only slept for a total of 2.5 hours, and never more than 45 min. at any time. I must admit it was pretty cool to look down and see the Arctic Ocean. And if I fly over a country, does that count as having been in it?

We arrived in Beijing at 4:00 pm local time. John and Christina decided to spend the available 3.5 hours checking out the inside of a hotel room. I decided to be a little more adventurous, and took a bus downtown to see Tien'anmen Square and the Forbidden City. Maybe going into a city that I don't know, have no map for and can't communicate with any of the people sounds like a bad idea, but I survived, and got some pretty good pictures. I took a little longer than expected, and found myself getting back to the airport a little after 8:00, with my plans set to depart at 9:10. I ran frantically through the airport, making several wrong turns in the process. I got to the counter around 8:30 to find that the flight was delayed. It remained delayed for another 2.5 hours..... and then it was cancelled. It seems that they forgot to fly the plane TO Beijing, so there was no plane for us to board. The only 2 international planes MIAT has were in Seoul and Yakutsk, Russia. Finally, the airline decided to put us up in a hotel.

As we're all aware, Beijing is preparing for the 2008 Olympics. This means that there is a lot of construction. Someone forgot to tell the country they don't have to build 4000 new office buildings to host them. The city is going to double in size in the next 6 years at the rate they are building. Included in this construction is the building of about 4000 new hotels. Of course, the hotels take guests, desipte not being totally built. I had to share a room with a kind gentleman in his 40s or 50s, who did not speak a word of English. Thank God I'm good at charades. we managed to communicate somehow. My first order of business was to have a nice, hot shower. Nothing doing. I took a shower, but the water was a few degrees below the temperature of icewater. The washroom was an interesting situation. It was preceded by a small dressing room, and was itself the same size as the bedroom. The shower was merely attached to the wall, with a curtain to separate itself from the toilet and sink. What is odd about this is that they had a room that looks like it was designed to be a shower on the other side of the shower. Instead, they have an empty room surrounded in frosted glass. Also I found it convenient that they put the drain in the highest point on the floor. I can only guess this is because physics don't work the same way in China. I finally got some sleep in an amazingly comfortable bed, only to get a call at 3:30 am to tell us we need to go to the airport to board the plane so it could depart at 6:05. They lied again. The plane didn't get to Beijing until 6:30. After waiting for 3 hours, at 3 different gates, the finally boarded the plane. We lifted off at 8:00, and set out on a beautiful 2 hour flight. I mean it. I was given a window seat, and the scenery was fantastic. First mountains, then desert, then mountains again.

We got here at 10:00, and I was given the day to get settled. After some unpacking, John, Christina and I went out to buy some food. Apparently, you are required to speak English, French, Korean, Mongolian, Mandarin Chinese, Russian and Japanese in order to do your grocery shopping. That is, if you want to know what you are buying. I took some random guesses (such as deciding what kind of milk to buy. It comes in 1.5%, 2.5%, 3%, 4% and 6%), and a few educated ones (I figure that the pickles labelled Ogorki are probably Gherkins), plus some helpful advice. I was rather impressed that most of the foods I wanted were available at the markets.

Last Post From Canadaland

So, this is it. I have just two days left before I leave for the great land of the Mongols. I quit my job last Friday, and took the past week to get some serious packing done, well... I took 3 days for that, and spent the past 5 helping out Kyle and Mel with their wedding.
The wedding was wonderful. Congratulations to the two of you, I'm so happy to see that you both swallowed your pride and decided each other was good enough. The ceremony and the reception were absolutely appropriate for the two of them -- chaotic and lovely.

Nonetheless, I just want to take this opportunity to say goodbye to anyone I didn't get the chance to say it to in person. I've had many incredible and memorable experiences here in Canada, but it's time to experience the rest of the world. I want to be able to be here a year or two or four from now, and to be able to fully appreciate this lifestyle in way that I can't until I've experienced something else.

Postcards

It has been mentioned to me (a number of times) that there are some people who would like to receive a postcard from Mongolia during the year sometime. There is a small problem -- I don't have most of your addresses. I have no problem sending some postcards, since postage is only about $0.40. If you would like me to send you one of these postcards, leave your complete mailing address in the comments for this post.

This is not a guarantee that I will get around to mailing everyone a postcard. All I am promising is that I will try to send you one. If you don't receive one, I apologize in advance, as I will be awfully busy, and may end up with many of them to send out.

P.S. for those of you unfamiliar with blogs, to leave a comment, click on the hyperlink that says "comments" below this post. A pop-up window will appear. Select "Anonymous," and leave your message. The reset should be pretty straight forward.