AND THE SURVEY SAYS........

We polled 100 people and asked “what ARE the craziest things that HAVE happened to Nathan and Leslie in Mongolia.” OUR SURVEY SAYS!

10 – Having to bathe in a tumpun for 2 years

20 – Having Leslie’s schedule changed 4 times and never being informed

25 – Spending the first 4 days at site without any of bags

40 – Being left at the ger camp by the families for several hours after the “storm of the century!”

And THIS GUY SAID:

So there we were last friday, preparing for our first Mongolian party. We waited this long because we ran into a few snafus with our landlord. The short story is that we have been caught in the middle of a real live family feud!! Two families built our building and it became a battle of who should own it. The former landlord and his family lost out. Therefore, as of October 1^st we had a new landlord. Now it’s Friday, October 10. We figured we were in the clear. Sadly, the feud had not yet ended.

I arrived for work at the children’s center at 10am. At approximately 11 my coworker, who speaks a little English, informed me that the former landlord would be arriving to my apartment at 1pm to pick up “all his capital,” or property, if you will. No real proof on this, but it seems the former landlord waited until just before the election, in which the new landlord was running, to pick up all of his “capital.” In this case, the new landlord needed to take time out of his election to provide us with an entire apartments worth of new property! I asked my coworker, which items in the apartment belong to the former landlord? She didn’t know. She also didn’t seem to think it was a big deal. I informed her I needed to call Nathan. She thought that was unnecessary.

The next step was going back to the apartment. I texted the former landlord and asked for him to list his items so we could prepare them for him. Rather than respond in text, his wife arrived at our door. In her nearly perfect English she informed me, “Everything that is not the BUILDING *as she smacks the walls* is ours! THIS *pointing to the carpet* THIS *pointing to the faux wood laminate*! We will be back at 1pm to pick it up!”

With this new helpful information we began cleaning the apartment! We swiftly removed everything we had spent the last month arranging out of the dresser, desk, shelves, and refrigerator. We moved everything, including the food in tumpens, into half the second room where we had taken up half the floor so people would not take those things.

Some of my favorite moments of the day included a moment we called , “REALLY? The curtains? You’re taking the CURTAINS?”

Another moment entitled “So, you’re going to roll up the pre-cut-to-fit-the-room laminate?”

Or the moment where Tysen said goodbye to our kitchen.

KITCHEN BEFORE

AFTER

And my personal favorite, “please tell me he’s not really taking the door nob!”

On the up side they did NOT take the doorknob. They simply removed it so they could take the fabric off the door, which is there to keep the apartment warm. Also, fabric that was precut for the door, and they will probably never use it!

Please enjoy the tour! Please notice how they didn’t take the photos of our family we hung up behind Nathan! Thanks!