Leslie & Nathan in Mongolia

Off the Steppe, and on With the Next Steps

2010-08-04T19:25:00.010+08:00

Sitting in a comfortable bus from Brighton on the southern coast of England as we travel back to London, we now know that at least for the foreseeable future, our lives will be divided into two epochs: Pre-Mongolia and Post-Mongolia. Pre-Mongolia Leslie and Nathan experienced things much differently than Post-Mongolia Leslie and Nathan.

The 2 Epochs: Pre-Mongolia and Post Mongolia
The main areas we think we’ll be most affected are in travel and living conditions. For example, we flew for a whole day from Ulaanbaatar to Moscow to London, and since it was in a plane with a bathroom and a helpful staff, it was like a dream in a seat compared to the long, dusty bus trips in Mongolia. We didn’t have a complaint in the world. Also, for two years we mostly lived in one room of a small apartment that lacked a shower and was prone to electrical fires. Now, houses with dining rooms and living rooms that go unused most of the time, or complaining that the hot water is all used up seems a bit ridiculous. We know we can live without a great deal of things we’ve taken for granted – not that we necessarily prefer to live in squalor, mind you.

It will be those comparisons that dominate our conversations with each other for a while as we adjust to each place we travel around Europe until Christmas 2010. Hopefully by then the shock of soap in the restrooms, deliciously organized lines for things like the post office or bank, and feeling more like a guest than an nuisance at restaurants will have worn off so that we can spare our friends and families the annoyance of surprise at the site of potable water.

Mongolia was a wonderful place to visit, and we met a lot of wonderful new friends who are warm and caring. These friends enriched our lives with their smiles, hugs and generosity. When we needed help, they helped willingly and often without being asked. And we did the same. We will never forget them and wish them all the best in coming to visit us in the States.

Even still, we will probably reference our time in Mongolia as the benchmark for so many milestone trying moments and fish -out-of-water moments. Because we lived they way we did, where we did, for so long, we didn’t understand how incredibly stressful it was until we left. In many ways we’re more the same also because we hardly know what a Justin Bieber, we don't know what LiLo is up to is, and we’ve never seen a Kindle or an iPad.

We have changed in many fundamental ways we can’t really even put our fingers on yet. One thing we know for sure though is that we will always, always treat foreigners in America with more consideration because we know that some days just a helpful point in the right direction or a warm smile can change your whole life for the better. We hope you’ll do the same.

Future Resources Including our Forthcoming Book
So we close our Peace Corps blog and hope that if you want to travel to Mongolia or join the Peace Corps, you’ll look up these resources to help you on your way, especially the travel guide we’re writing with Andrew Cullen and Ashlee Christian, both former volunteers in Mongolia. Hopefully we’ve done the hard work for you already.

Other Places Publishing: Mongolia (February 2011)
Nathan Chamberlain, Leslie Ann Shaffer Chamberlain, Ashlee Christian, Andrew Cullen
Online with major retailers like Amazon.com and with most local retailers by order.
URL: http://www.otherplacespublishing.com/mongolia.html

The Unofficial Guide to Peace Corps (NEW!)
Travis Hellstrom
"Peace Corps may be "the toughest job you'll ever love" but you don't always have to learn that the hard way. This is the handbook we wish someone would have given us, something no one has provided before..."
URL: http://www.peacecorpshandbook.com/order

Ghengis Khan and the Making of the Modern World (2004)
Jack Weatherford

Modern Mongolia (2005)
Morris Rossabi

Afternoon at the River

2010-06-12T17:15:00.010+08:00

As we wait out our last few weeks in Bayankhongor, the sun has finally come out - albeit intermittently. It's June 12. It snowed just a few days ago. Snow in June is not as fun as it sounds. Longest... winter... ever.

To celebrate the new-found sun, we walked to the nearby river with our site mates Tysen and Wally. It was the perfect day with temps at 70F (20C) and a clean breeze. Oh, yeah!

We went to our local Ching Hai restaurant, whose spiritual movement invites vegetarianism. They attract followers through small restaurants, and though we have not adopted her particular philosophy, we have been eating there almost every day since it opened late last year. On the menu were steamed rolls with tofu and cucumber, and cookies. We brought our own mustard, honey mustard, hot sauce and soy sauce because the flavor of the "oroomog" rolls is not exactly overwhelmingly strong, though clean and fresh.

With a blanket, Coke and condiments in hand, we made the 10-15 minute walk eastward from the Bayankhongor town center toward the Tuin River (pr. 2-een). The wind was in our hair and sun on our faces. As we sat down for our little feast, we were overwhelmed by the sweet perfume of flowers aggressively wafting past.

Leslie, Tysen and Wally lounge by the Tuin River. What a day for a picnic.

There is a bit of a problem with pollution around these parts. Mongolians usually just throw trash on the ground even when they are at the river for the purpose of communing with nature. Because the wind often blows east toward the river, trash from Bayankhongor winds up in the river too. Plastic bags, plastic bottles, beer bottles, and wrappers fill the slower points and bends in the river.

It's a bit depressing to see all the trash in the river next to such beautiful natural wonders.

After our lovely picnic, we walked past the sports center across the street from our apartment. Apparently, World Cup FEVER has taken hold. The sports center recently got a hold of some artificial turf, and on this Saturday, the field was put to good use.

Mongolia is not in the World Cup, but that doesn't stop them from a little practice.

18 days left before we move out of Bayankhongor. But who's counting?

Nyamtaivan End of May Update

2010-05-31T08:47:00.005+08:00

With the extraordinary support we've received from family and friends since April, we have now met our minimum goal of $8,000 in cash and in-kind gifts to send Nyamtaivan to the States!

We still need to raise about $1,500 more to help her cover pocket money and incidentals while she studies from September 2010-June 2011. We'll find out where she'll be placed by the end of June.

I wish you could have seen her face when we told her we had enough to cover her tuition, fees and plane ticket. She was extremely overwhelmed and appreciative of the support that she couldn't even talk for a few minutes. I think it's all becoming more and more real for her as we come into the summer break. Now that she finished the year with all 100% in her classes she is ready for new challenges. Though, this isn't new. She has only received less than 100% one time in the last four years.

Not only has the fund raising been extremely successful, but New Voice has also taking a shine to Nyamtaivan's situation. When she met with them at the beginning of May, they partnered with Mongolia's Education Channel to do a 4-part story on her. They filmed the first part then, they'll come to Bayankhongor soon to interview her family and possibly us, they'll film her getting her visa in August, and then the last part will be while she's in the States.

She also had a story in the newspaper Unuudur (Today), which has nationwide distribution. She was so humbled and embarrassed about all the fuss that she didn't get a copy of it. We've asked New Voice to help us get a clipping at least.

To help you get to know Nyamtaivan a little more, we put together a little video of her showing off her ger. Take a look.

For more information about Nyamtaivan and why we're raising money, click here.

Close of Service Conference

2010-05-23T12:37:00.013+08:00

By the end of next week, we'll have been here for 2 full years. It's kind of hard to believe because it's gone so quickly, but then again, 2 years is a long time.

During the three-day conference at a luxury ger camp between Ulaanbaatar and Darkhan, Mongolia's 2nd largest city where we finished our training 21 months ago, we discussed post-Peace Corps topics like insurance, job hunting, resume writing and social readjustment. There was a panel of 3 guest speakers who work in international development in various capacities for various lengths of time. From this, we learned about the many options for employment we hadn't yet considered that now make post-Peace Corps decisions even more difficult.

We spent a few hours a day learning about our different post-Peace Corps options and discussing our accomplishments over the past two years. Thanks to Kat Pepperted for the photo.

At the cooking competition, Nathan's team one with a trip to the Indian subcontinent. The challenge was to create a salad, an entree, a redesigned Mongolian dish and a dessert. There was a lemongrass curry cole slaw, three curries, sweet and savory samosas with a yogurt sauce (the mod Mongol dish), and a chickpea chocolate surprise. Congrats to Team West for winning best over.

We didn't get any pictures of the competition, but here's a rousing photo of the judges hard at work choosing from the smorgasbord of the best food we've tasted in many a month. Thanks to Kat Pepperted for the photo.

There was also some dancing and general merry making among the 40+ who were there.

On May 31, 2008, 65 of us met in San Francisco. We flew to Seoul, Korea, and then to Mongolia. By our count, 23 terminated their service early either for family, medical, safety, or other reasons. This 35% attrition seems right on par with Peace Corps worldwide according to unofficial statistics at http://www.peacecorpswiki.org/Early_Termination. Those who were missing, especially some recent departures, were missed.

To commemorate our service, Leslie created a slide show. Set to music, the pictures provided by various volunteers showcase highlights of our 2 years from June 2008 to May 2010. Enjoy.

Just after the slide show, we were treated to a magnificent sunset and rainbow. It was quite a majestic site.

The Secret History Ger Camp during our COS and a fiery spring sunset.

Nathan's training group, our Bayankhongor site mates (minus Leila who went to the States unexpectedly and has since returned), and Leslie's training group.

When we returned to UB, we all had our final physicals and dental check-ups. We're both fit and healthy as a horse-head fiddle. Those of you who have been following the weather with some interest, it made it into the high 70s yesterday, got down to freezing overnight, and has settled in about a high of about 47F again today with a stiff breeze. Nonetheless, it's feeling a little bit more like spring now that we can leave off the long underwear.

For now, Leslie and I will travel back to site, finish up some projects, hopefully put on a summer camp, and then we'll return to UB in early July to complete some other pending projects. Our official last day of service is July 22. We have tickets booked for July to London, the first leg on our European tour that will last until late December 2010.

Mongolian Herding and the Harsh Winter (Dzud)

2010-05-13T10:19:00.010+08:00

Mongolia's continental climate with its extreme and sharply fluctuating temperatures can be difficult for herders to weather, and the 2009/2010 winter has proved particularly harsh. According to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the bitter and long winter, which followed a dry summer, killed an estimated 8 million of Mongolia’s 44 million animals (nearly 20%), about a million more livestock than the previously worst winter of 1944. These conditions, known in Mongolian as a “dzud”, also wreaked havoc from 1999-2002 when Mongolians lost an estimated 11 million head over three winters, according to the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) that is among the international NGOs that have been operating in Mongolia since the early 1990s.

In 2003, the dzud conditions caused an urban migration as herders and those supported by herding income scrambled to find work. Now the government is waiting to see how the market will handle such an impact before it really intervenes. The UNDP has been paying herders to bury carcasses to prevent the spread of disease. For more on the latest so-called "Cash for Carcasses," click here for the msnbc.com coverage.

Samuel De Jaegere / AFP - Getty Images from msnbc.com

A cow carcass lying frozen in the snow near the fence of a cattle ranch on the outskirts of the Mongolian district of Sergelen Soum.

The Importance of Herding in Mongolia
Central to their livelihood and the basis of their culture, roughly one-quarter of the country's 3 million people are pastoral nomads who move with their households in search of grasses for their animals. Their movement is seasonal, linked to rainfall and the availability of good forage for their animals, and they usually rotate their herds on roughly the same swaths of land that are close together. They depend on those lands to be free each year, though there are usually no formal agreements among herders as to who may use what land or when, herders know the allowable spots. Even still, many herds overlap, though this does not seem to bother most as it is a professional courtesy and code of the steppe is to share and share alike. Because of this lifestyle, herder families are usually remotely located, sometimes hours from their villages where their children attend schools and live in dorms for part of the year. Others raise livestock in or around villages utilizing slat board barns with angled roofs that typically face south to protect against winds from the north.

In Mongolia, the livestock roam free while the people are fenced in. Without pasture fences, livestock meander through villages, towns and most cities as they forage while people are restricted inside adjoining fenced-in properties (khashaa) with their families’ brick, block or wood houses and gers (or in any combination based on region). This also creates frequent traffic hazards as vehicles on approach honk to persuade livestock to provide a gangway.

For more on herding in Mongolia and the Mongolian economy, click here.
For more on the dzud from Peace Corps volunteers and the BBC, click here.
For a succinct Sky News video of the devastation, watch this:

FAQ: Sending Nyamtaivan to the States

2010-04-06T12:49:00.027+08:00

RELATED ARTICLE: End of May Update

Who is Nyamtaivan?
Nyamtaivan (pr. Nyim-ta-vin) means "Sunday's Calm." Nyam comes from the Tibetan for Sunday, and taivan means calm.

She is 16 years old with a bright affect, hard-working attitude, and is very mature with a sense of wide-eyed optimism. For the past 4 years, she's received perfect 100% grades in nearly every single class, and she has been the top student at her school since 2007.

Not only does she excel at academics, she's also somewhat of a track and field star and enjoys spending time with her many friends. She's a student leader and a glowing an example of politeness, respect and empathy. To know her is to like her.

Since we began our fund raising efforts, her placement agency New Voice has also taken a shine to her. She's been profiled in the Mongolian newspaper "Unuudur" (Today), and the Mongolian Education Channel has begun a 4-part story on her.

Leslie and Nathan pose in the Bayankhongor American Culture Center

with the province's head methodologist [left], Nyamtaivan's mom [center] and Nyamtaivan.

Why Nyamtaivan?
Nyamtaivan came to Nathan in March 2010 and said she wanted to study abroad, but she didn't have any way to pay for it. She explained that the education system in Mongolia is too limited for her, and if she could study abroad it would help her achieve her goal of being a lawyer and interpreter, so she can put her skills to use changing the Mongolia education system.

We want to help for many reasons.

Motivated, hardest working person we know
Wants to be part of education change in Mongolia
Networking in Mongolia and USA
Comes from a poor family, fewer opportunities
Mom is a single parent
Adult sister has a disability

Nyamtaivan has stood out to the Peace Corps volunteers because of her inquisitive nature, her ability to speak English as well or better than most teachers, and her drive to make a difference. We want to help her study in the states because we know she will do great things for herself, her family, and her country if given the opportunity.
Among the motivators she explained to us is that she wants to be a part of education change in Mongolia. She wants to raise the standards and practices of education for the next generation. To do this, she needs to know how other systems work.
Corruption and nepotism rule the workforce, so we want to give her the ability to work around and through the system by getting a good education, becoming connected with more Americans, and becoming connected with the affluent Mongolians who have studied abroad.
Study abroad programs are only available to rich kids in the capital. She comes from an extremely poor rural family, and the reality here is that hard work is usually not enough. There are no scholarships for people like her to study abroad.
Her mom is a 48 year-old single parent who works as a janitor in a retail section of the market.
Nyamtaivan also has a 25 year-old sister with a mental disability that prevents her from working, so Nyamtaivan helps look after her when she's not at school or studying with friends.

We can't do all the work for her, but we can give her a start.

How will money be raised?
Among the 7 of us Peace Corps volunteers in Bayankhongor, we will each raise $1,143. Divided in this way, our minimum goal of $8,000 can be achieved with a little hard work and from the generosity of friends and family who also want to turn the opportunity into a reality for Nyamtaivan.

Who is in charge of the money?
Leslie and Nathan Chamberlain are in charge of holding and dispersing the money from the Paypal account linked to StudenttotheStates@yahoo.com. They will pay the placement agency New Voice.

What will the money go toward?
The money we raise will be used for her airfare, tuition, visa and placement costs through the agency.

Tuition: $5-6,000 (we'll know exactly how much when she's placed)
Airfare: $1,300 (approximately)
Placement cost: $1,200 ($600 already paid)
Required spending money: $1-2,500 (100-250 for each of the 10 months in USA)
Visa: $131 (Nyamtaivan's mom will pay as her contribution)

What is New Voice?
New Voice is a placement agency that sends over 200 students abroad every year who are required to have a minimal English fluency and be able to pay the fees. They also place university students. To read all about New Voice, you can go to their Web site.

This one of the only possible placement agencies for a child with a rural upbringing. All other placement agencies we saw were only for kids in the capital. Few programs even work with Mongolia. For example, there is to AFS that placed Europeans in our high schools when we were growing up.

What is Paypal?
Paypal is an online merchant service owned by Ebay that can also be used for donations and paying back friends. All you have to do is create a username and password, plug in the numbers of the credit card you want use, and then make the donation. The money will come from your credit card through Paypal, unless your Paypal account already has money in it.

If you already have money in your Paypal account, there are no transaction fees. However, it does charge 2.9% for each credit card transaction for the incredible convenience.

Click here to donate now!
What if I don't want to use a credit card to make a donation?
You can send a check to Leslie and Nathan. Please email nathan_chamberlain@yahoo.com for details.

What do I get if I donate?
Besides the satisfaction of helping a special kid achieve her dreams, we want you to get a little something too, so here are the suggested giving levels.

Help send Nyamtaivan to the States by giving:
$10-24	Added to Nyamtaivan’s email update list*
$25-49	Get a personal email and picture from Nyamtaivan
$50-107	Get a postcard from Nyamtaivan
$108 (1 month’s salary)	Hand-painted Mongolian card
$216 (2 months’ salary)	Hand-painted Mongolian card & 1 felt handicrafts
$324 (3 months’ salary)	Hand-painted Mongolian card & 2 felt handicrafts
$432 (4 months’ salary)	Hand-painted Mongolian card & 3 felt handicrafts
$540 (5 months’ salary)	Hand-painted Mongolian card & 4 felt handicrafts
$1,300 (Est. airfare)	Tax incentives (negotiable)

*All donors will be added to her email

Although the items we ship to you are valuable for many reasons, they do not cost much.

What is the deadline for the fund raising?
Our fund raising goal is to be finished by May 31, 2010. The bill is due in August, so we will continue to raise money until then and even after if we need to. But we are all volunteers and have many other projects we focus on that also demand much of our time in our community. Additionally, most of us will be finishing our Peace Corps service this summer with camps in the countryside throughout June and July, so we won't be available to continue the day-to-day fund raising efforts.

In short, we hope you'll make your donation sooner rather than later, though a few of our friends and family have pledged to help by sending money each month until August, which we encourage and can certainly accommodate as well.

How can I stay in touch with the project as it develops?
If you give money, you'll receive periodic updates from Nyamtaivan on her progress. You can also join the Send Nyamtaivan to the States Facebook group for more pictures, videos and written updates.

Board and Committee Trainings: Zavkhan Aimag

2010-03-03T14:47:00.013+08:00

NOTE: This entry was written in September 2009. It was subsequently published in March 2010. You can check out the full album of pictures and captions here.
Nathan recounts his trainings trip
After returning from the long summer in UB as a Peace Corps trainer, I had a few days rest, saw my awesome new office, met up with my counterparts including my equally awesome new manager, and then I left town for a week to talk board and committee structure to representatives of our self-help groups in Zavkhan Aimag, the province to our northwest.

For two days, our driver Chuka (pr. CHOke-uh, short for Stone Hero) and I braved the wide open yet very rocky road for the few hundred kilometer trek. Despite the language obstacle (he doesn't speak English) and that he doesn't hear so well, we were great travel companions. We left about 4 hours after the 6am start time he'd set (I was up at 5am), which gave me a little time to work on a good case of whiplash as my body kept going limp vying for spurts of sleep along the jarring terrain.

The gloomy and sleepy drive was uplifted by this unknown family that yelled for me to take their picture.

In Uliastai ("With Birch Trees"), the provincial capital, we met up with the training manager and project manager who had flown in early from UB. After some rest and preparation, our first day of three began with great energy as all participants were on time and checked in before we arrived 5 mins late. This energy carried throughout the entire training all the way to the end of the third day, in no small part due the staff's ice breakers, energizers and engaging games.

Over the course of the three days there and in Bayankhongor this past week, I presented on:

The intrinsic values of being a trustee on a volunteer governing board such as theirs. I adapted materials presented by good pal and fellow PCV Judy Gates, who traveled to other parts of the country with the staff in the previous month. We talked about the virtues of someone who would be elected by their peers for such a position and why the right people are important for the process. We also talked about the skills and qualities the have and will hone during the next year as a trustee.
Conflict resolution and communication techniques, which was rewarding for me. I told them a couple ground rules for resolving disputes like making sure not to accuse the other person (use "I" not "you" language) and to only be concerned with facts. Afterward, I asked them to list their most common problems and then broke them into groups. In those groups they had to come up with solutions. Most involved writing or enforcing rules of attendance, and some were more complicated personality conflicts. Each group presented their solutions, and then I pointed out exactly how to use the techniques to get workable solutions. I was shocked to hear epiphany "ooo" and "ah" sounds as they were able to see how the techniques actually work in practice.

I handed out a sheets of paper per group. I wrote the name of a personal quality/trait of a successful leader, they met as a group, and then presented their opinions to the whole for discussion. Here, a group presents about openness.
International cooperative structures that reinforced the information my Mongolian counterparts were teaching about how to transition their business after our funding and program finishes in the next few years. I talked about a grocery co-op in Philadelphia I knew about that has been around since the early 1970's. They were interested mostly in the bulk rate purchasing power and guaranteed markets established for local produce and other goods.

My counterparts played a business game that pitted groups against each other through a month of business. There were setbacks like sickness and medical bills, taxes, material and production cost fluctuations, and they had to demonstrate quality of product by making a folded paper tube that would withstand being thrown on the table without breaking.

After the teaching, we had a little time to relax, take in the sites, and enjoy Zavkhan, which some regard as the most beautiful of the provincial capitals. One of the most identifiable attributes is the mountain toward the center of town that plays host to 9 white Buddhist shrines and radio transmitting infrastructure. The peak, as nearly every single peak in Mongolia, also has a few ovoo, or piles of stones adorned with Buddhist scarves.

I was also able to meet up with the Peace Corps volunteers there. 2 of them will start a research project about product supply chains in the province with the workers from a branch of my NGO, starting with a research methods seminar for the staff (that went really well and was later duplicated in Bayankhongor by Leslie and me).

Nate Pauls, Ben Cannon, Mike Loehlein meet me at the government building for some fun.

Cards, and an evening video with some countryside folks
We visited a nearby village for monitoring and evaluation of their businesses and were pleasantly surprised by the activity there. We also played some cards, and I'm happy to report that, even though I didn't know how to play the game at first and no one was really willing to teach me, I was able to figure it out quickly enough that my team won a best three-out-of-five hand tournament. The candy bar we won was all the sweeter.

Later that evening, we played a PR video showing the villagers examples of how the business program works around the country for others in their similar situation.

Villagers wait for the evening PR video to begin.

Is it okay if I sit here?
This is my most embarrassing moment in Mongolia, possibly ever. The woman who was sewing asked me to take a seat, which I did on that little bench in front of the orange cabinet.

After I sat there for about a minute and a half, my project manager said to me with a concerned face and through gritted teeth, "Nathan! You're sitting on God's chair!"

Of course I got up and then asked tensely, "Why didn't you tell me?! I didn't know!" My training manager replied, "Because we didn't know either." Every other time I sat for the next week, I would first ask if that was God's chair before plopping down.

Oh, so very, very lost
After our trip to the village, on our way to another village, we got very, very lost in the middle of nowhere for a whole day. Our driver doesn't know the roads in that province, so despite his best efforts, we eventually had to follow the power lines for a few hours before we found any semblance of civilization. We returned to Uliastai after a long day, and had to scrap the rest of our countryside trips.

After a day's rest in Uliastai, we headed back toward Bayankhongor only to be lost for that entire day as well, even driving through a neighboring province that wasn't especially "on the way." Once we knew were lost again, the women began to come unglued on the driver. We finally made it to Bayankhongor Province after a flat tire, and we crashed on the ger floor of some people we knew. In the morning, the matriarch milked some yaks for the morning milk tea, and we were on our way.

When we met up with the programs director later that week, she asked why we hadn't taken a GPS receiver. We all looked at her and the driver and screamed "WHAT?!"

The Secret History Radio Program

2009-12-17T01:34:00.018+08:00

Recently, we traveled back to Darkhan (our pre-service training site), to help record a radio program on the Secret History of the Mongols - in English. It will eventually be aired in all 21 Mongolian provinces and be packaged for sale. The final product should look something like the Mongolian version below.

The Mongolian version of "The Secret History of the Mongols Radio Play." The English version we worked on will also be packaged and sold, as well as played on the radio.

We got involved in the program after our friend Tysen recorded his piano audition peices for grad school with the producer, Javkhaa, who is well known to PVCs in Darkhan. He is always working on documentary film projects, including one we might be in about couch surfing in Mongolia. He'll also do a program featuring Tysen and other forgeiners who live in gers in Mongolia, which will air in Mongolia. He speaks English pretty darn well, has a jounalism degree and has a trade school degree in videography. He just turned 30 a few months ago, so he likes to tell us he is our older brother but we look like his BIG siblings.

Javkhaa: radio producer, director, videographer, editor. He's hard at work and enjoying his job.

First, Nathan performed as Jamukha, childhood friend turned sworn enemy of Temujin (later Chinggis Khan or Ghengis Khan, as you might know him). As a protagonist, Jamukha was a dark villanous character who eventually asks the great king to spare his life with a quick death. During that time in Mongolian history, the Mongolian tribes that were spread wide across the vast steppe were being organized by various regional powers. According to the legend, the most successful kings were Jamukha (later Gur Khan) and Chinggis Khan. Chinggis Khan offered to share the kingdom together, but the Gur Khan refused in favor one, unified Mongolian people.

Nathan spends some time in the recording booth playing Jamukha, sworn brother turned sworn enemy of Temujin/Chinggis Khan.

Because the parts have been recorded part-by-part, we had to play off Nargi, a Darkhan English teacher and summer Peace Corps trainer. Nargi's English is so good, he has a kind of California surfer accent mixed with his Mongolian accent. Javkhaa was able to direct us pretty well, but for the more complicated direction, he used Nargi as a translator. Incidentally, Nargi also wrote the screenplay for the English version we were recording.

Besides his charm and wit, Nargi is an Elvis impersonator, and a good one. He's a really talented musician and learned most of his English through music, he says. His most notable influences are, of course Elvis, and the Seattle grunge scene, especially Nirvana.

Nargi played various characters to set up our scenes. He also acted as director and translator making sure we got the most out of every scene.

Leslie played O'luen, mother of Temujin (later Chinggis Khan) and his siblings. Her part was a little smaller, but very powerful. Her energy and poise came through well as she delivered the well known stories encouraging Temujin and his brothers to stop fighting amongst themselves and to work together, which foreshadows Chinggis Khan's unification of the Mongol tribes into one, powerful people that eventually established the largest empire in history ranging from Asia to Europe.

Leslie turned on the drama as O'luen, the mother of Temujin/Chinggis Khan.

We enjoyed our time in the booth with Nargi and Javkhaa. Look forward to hearing this English version of "The Secret History of the Mongols Radio Play" on 106 FM in Darkhan next year after post production has been completed.

Teaching on Khongor TV

2009-11-19T15:57:00.008+08:00

Our new site mate, Anna, and old site mate, Peder, have been teaching English on TV with a Mongolian teacher for a couple of months now. Last week, Leslie was asked to play and teach a song.

On the studio's chalkboard, Leslie wrote the lyrics of the first and most recognizable verse of the Woody Guthrie classic, "This Land is Your Land." After reading the lyrics aloud, the Mongolian teacher, Dashka, translated the words for the over-the-air students at home.

Then all together, they sang the whole verse through:

This land is your land, this land is my land

From California to the New York Island

From the Redwood Forest to the Gulf Stream waters

This land was made for you and me.

To break it down, first Leslie read the lyrics for pronunciation. Then she sang the lyrics, putting the tune with the words. And then finally, to cement each new portion, she accompanied herself on guitar and sang.

With the first line sent out and happily sung in gers throughout Bayankhongor, she continued likewise with the next three lines, finishing by once again singing the whole verse from top to bottom.

And that's how you teach an English song when you can't see the students.

Because the schools have been shut down all month due to the H1N1, teachers have commandeered the airwaves to teach lessons from UB. Regular classes start up next Monday bringing those to an end, but Anna and Peder's regular English classes will still air Tuesdays and Saturdays at 7p.m., so tune in to Khongor TV and learn your ABC's.

Swine Flu Blues: Stand Fast

2009-11-09T15:40:00.009+08:00

We took most of October off to be in the States for Nathan's brother's wedding, which ended in a marriage to the lovely Elizabeth Carr, so it seems the trip was a success.

We've been back in Mongolia for a few weeks now after a ridiculous trip home that involved lost luggage, missed flights, an extra day in Chicago and an extra day in Beijing. We made a lot of lemonade from those lemons, but it was an expensive and bittersweet drink. Thanks to Larry Chamberlain, Patriarch Extraordinaire, for his willingness to help us make the best of it, and to Catherine Kruszka, Esq., for finding a place to watch the Phillies, going out of her way to help us recover our luggage, and for giving up her bed.

Unfortunately, now that we're back, the schools in Mongolia have been closed and the country is at a virtual standstill because of the H1N1 virus. At around 8-900, the number of confirmed cases is relatively low, but the per capita infection rate for Mongolia, which has less than 3 million people, is kind of high. No school, no travel, and other types of gathering places like bars, discos, and seminars have also been shut down. For Peace Corps, the official response is to "Stand Fast."

Classes will now also be canceled for the next 2 weeks during this 14 Days of Alert. In other parts of the country, especially around UB and the other 2 bigger cities on the train line, there has been a more rapid spread of the virus, but in our area, 385 miles and 12-20 hours from the all that, we only have 3 reported cases. If nothing else, it would seem that this shutdown may have helped combat the spread for now, but the jury is still out on that. We have a long, long winter yet to traverse before the final verdict is reached.

Peace Corps Washington is requiring that all volunteers be immunized, but with the transportation shut-down, we won't be getting those for a while. We're waiting on a final word from the Peace Corps Mongolia medical staff as to when those will be given. We have a pleasant Thanksgiving planned here in Bayankhongor and we're not looking to travel again quite so soon, so we're hoping there won't be a mandatory trip to UB during that time. We'd prefer to hop a plane ride to the city in time to go to Cambodia in mid December. But we also don't want to get sick.

Here's to standing fast! Whoosh!

City Night Magazine Pizza Review

2009-09-30T22:10:00.023+08:00

During our marathon summer in UB, Nathan ate some pizza, and then he wrote about it for City Night magazine where the editor-in-chief for the English section is a former Peace Corps Volunteer. Click on the thumbnails or read the copy here.

"Za" in the Mongolian language is a word used much the same way Americans use the word "okay."

UB Pizza: Taking Za to a Whole New Place

Do you know where to get a good slice of pizza in UB?
That is the question I asked around town when I came in after thirteen months in my countryside soum center of Bayankhongor, where pizza is not a real restaurant option. I like pizza, and in the States, I especially go for non-franchise, local shops that work hard to provide good pizza for a thrifty budget. I also occasionally respect specialty pizzas that take a chance to be more than just crust, sauce and cheese. Fortunately for me and those who like pizza, Ulaanbaatar has something for everyone if you know where to look for what you like.

Where did pizza come from before it wound up in UB?

I will let the historians and food anthropologists fight over the exact details, but topping flat breads with oils and other ingredients has been part of the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern diets for centuries. The modern version that has been adopted as perhaps America’s most favorite food, though, is fairly young and owes its roots to Italy.

As the famous story goes, an Italian baker named Raffaele Esposito created a dish to impress a visiting King Umberto, and his wife, Queen Margherita in the late 1800s. He achieved this by topping his flat bread with the national colors using red tomatoes, white mozzarella cheese and green basil. The monarchs were complimentary of the dish, and it was heavily copied. As with the office Canon, the copies of copies of copies started to become new things all their own.When Italians began immigrating in large numbers to the United States in the early 1900s, they brought their national dish with them to large cities like New York and Chicago, where they morphed to meet the differing demands. But it was not until after WWII when GI’s, who counted on the food to supplement their rations in wartime Italy, came home with hankerings for their familiar cheese-topped chow, that the dish really joined the national diet.

What makes a pizza a pizza?
Sometimes called simply a “slice,” a “pie,” or “za”, it is a whole meal in one dish. It is easy to make, it has a wide variety of nutritional necessities, and even when it is bad, usually it is still pretty good.

For me, pizza has to have a flat baked dough, sauce, cheese and toppings. With those general guidelines, almost anything is possible.

The basic varieties to look for in the States, depending on your tastes, are the New York style flat pizza in its many incarnations, mostly characterized by wide, thin, and foldable slices. There is the also flat but cracker crust variety typically made in brick ovens, which come more sparsely topped, are generally much smaller and are considered by some to be a more gourmet option. On the other end of the spectrum is the Chicago style that typically has a super deep, doughy, buttery crust and is generously topped. Chicago’s culinary cousin, which is not to be forgotten, is the square or rectangular-shaped Sicilian style pie with a tomato sauce on top of the cheese.

You might also find various varieties of white pizzas where the sauce is made of butter, cheese, milk, flour and heavy on the garlic, or the younger barbeque and Buffalo wing pizzas that use those sauces as their base under the cheese and other complimentary toppings.

No matter how you slice it, everyone has their own definition of the perfect pizza. The key ingredients of crust, sauce and cheese leave room for imagination, and that room takes pizza to an all new place: Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, where I visited all the best pizza places as they were recommended to me by friends and strangers.

Pizza Romano – mutton on the Hawaiian, delivery, decent price, showed up hot, no English

In the interest of experimentation, I ordered a Hawaiian pizza for delivery from Pizza Romano. This is my wife’s favorite variety, so throughout our years together I have eaten my fair share of this adaptation, though this was the first time I ever had mutton beside my pineapple. I appreciated the sweet flavor of the fruit and the pizza showed up piping hot from the driver with ample sauce, but nothing will erase the unexpected taste of sheep meat from my mouth’s memory. Also curious about this particular convenient way of getting dinner straight to my door was that even though the menu was in English, no one on the other end of the phone spoke any English. So, if you want to enjoy a slice of hot pizza in your house clothes, brush up on your address and directions in Mongolian before you call.

Nayra Café – good price, lots of options, good amount of cheese, undercooked, limp crust

Especially for the price and variety of options available, I like going to Nayra Café located on Tourist Street. Their pizza offerings are not the best in town, but they are good. They now have a petite pizza that provides the perfect portion for a lone eater looking to fill up or two light eaters, making it the best value among the UB eateries I visited. They also recently started serving beer by the bottle for those who enjoy a cold one with their hot pie. As is common among UB pizzas, though, the pizza was a little undercooked leaving the crust a little doughy and the cheese too limp. Even still, this little café holds its own against the big guys. Go to Nayra if you want a comfortable vibe with good, laid back English speaking staff, but keep in mind that you may not find the perfect pizza.

Marco Polo – bland, brick oven, overpriced, white pizza option, little sauce, biggest disappointment
Probably the most disappointing pizza trial I wrapped my taste buds around was at Marco Polo, near the circus. For my preference, the pizza was simply bland. The brick oven margherita had a good thin crust perfectly suited for this style of pizza, and the toppings were fresh. Those qualities aside, there was not a hint of garlic, oregano or anything else resembling flavor. If your palate is less demanding of these spices, this could be your place for a nice evening out. And for the lover of the unorthodox white-sauced slices, Marco Polo has your pizza too. If you are an American looking for a taste of the old familiar from the mother country, you could do better to save your tugriks for tastier food.

California –pretty good, 10% VAT, good size but moderately overpriced, great cocktails

California has some pretty good pizza. For the price and the 10% value added tax, you might want to suck down one of their many tasty cocktail options first as to better tolerate the equally high price tag. Rich with fresh ingredients, a respectable amount of cheese, and a relatively full fluffy crust, this pizza is not quite worth it when you consider more affordable options elsewhere. You might better enjoy some other menu items as California also churns out good salads, various chicken fair, burgers, and Buffalo style wings. This restaurant, on Seoul Avenue a few blocks east of the circus, is a good option if you have money to spare and enjoy a somewhat formal but relaxed atmosphere.

Pizza Broadway – pretty good pizzeria atmosphere, well prepared, relatively expensive, lacks pizzazz

I visited the branch of the UB franchise, Pizza Broadway, tucked in a comfortable cave-like basement on Peace Avenue, just east of the state department store. They have quite an extensive menu of pizzas and the deepest crust I found around town. The service here was uncharacteristically attentive, catering to mostly foreign patrons with wait staff that spoke English well. Disappointingly for me, I had to wait almost an hour and a half for a pizza that was promised in twenty. As my tablemates sat around ready to leave, they mercifully allowed me to sample their cold remainders while my waiter apologized for pizzas after pizzas that went to other tables full of customers who had arrived a full hour after I did. Kitchen blunders aside, I was afforded quite the sampling during my wait, and what I found was reliably decent pizza that just lacked pizzazz. No bite I chewed underwhelmed me, but for the price and the pomp, it did not overwhelm me either. Pizza Broadway is a pretty decent pizzeria.

Pizza del la Casa –good price, English speaking staff, good pizza, root beer

Pizza del la Casa on Peace Avenue was heralded by many as THE place in town for a good slice of pizza, and is credited as being the first real pizza option. The atmosphere with brick accents over the doorways, hand-painted Italian accents in the corners, and various Italian food items displayed within cut-outs in the walls, is a was a little forced, but actually quite reminiscent of a 1960s style New Jersey pizzeria, which I ultimately decided was a plus. Besides that, the pizza was pretty good too, though I did not feel the menu items were that strong. The vegetable pizza I ordered was topped with spinach and broccoli that were both quite fresh and tasty, but once again, they took it out of the oven just a few minutes early leaving an actual layer of uncooked dough just under where the sauce should have been. I was really expecting spectacular pizza here based on the recommendations, though really it just met the middle of the pack. The saving grace for my meal, I felt, was an ice cold glass of root beer. Go to Pizza del la Casa if you want some decently priced, passable pizza with an eclectic American-inspired ambiance.

Granville – surprisingly good, cheese perfectly browned, crust perfectly cooked, tasty

A favorite place for me and my friends to dine is the relatively new Irish Pub, Granville, just north of the Flower Center. Though the restaurant more resembles an Applebee’s or TGI Friday’s or wannabe sports bar rather than an Irish pub, Granville provides diners with ridiculously large portions, as you might expect in an American-style casual fine dining establishment. This enclave has a plethora of delicious options, including a surprisingly awesome pizza, which until recently, I had unfortunately overlooked for the head-sized burgers and buy-three-get-one-free cocktails. The Granville pizza I sampled sported perfectly baked cheese that was beautifully browned and hardened on the surface, and it still managed to retain the stringy elasticity I expect from a good mozzarella smothered pie. Underneath, the sauce was sweet and flavorful and the fresh toppings were even and sparse enough not to overwhelm each bite. It was simple, good and a moderately priced option with the characteristic UB-style thin, flat crust. Sporting a decent menu and friendly atmosphere, Granville’s got some good pizza.

No matter what you prefer on your pizza, it seems UB has its own style. UB pizza tends to be a little doughy and limp, and the sauce is conservatively served up underneath cheese that is usually removed from the oven before a splotchy, deep brown layer sets in. Despite this characteristic style, I look forward to a UB that is able to incorporate truly deep dish, buttery Chicago-style and the unorthodox Sicilian style pizzas. These heavier versions have a hearty quality that the thin, more pedestrian pies, cannot quite deliver.

I only tried the pizzas that were recommended to me, and despite some deficits, there are surely some good pizza options among this group for the differing palates among the international travelers, foreign expats, and both countryside and urban Mongolian pizza enthusiasts. There are more out there to discover for yourself, though, so ask around and find that perfect pizza – za yu [ok]?

Thanks to:

Slice/seriouseats.com

Menshealth.com

Wikipedia.com

Brian O.

City Night

Bayankhongor American Culture Center Opens!

2009-09-22T09:38:00.035+08:00

Excerpts from the grant we helped Tysen and Oyuntugs write:

"The Bayankhongor American Culture Center (BACC) is the brainchild of Oyuntugs, PCV Tysen Dauer’s counterpart. She noticed that Bayankhongor Aimag [Province] lacks a public English education center and adequate English resources. Community members have requested several English based classes. Over twenty five Bayankhongor residents requested a TOEFL preparation class. There have been over two hundred fifty requests for English courses ranging from elementary to advanced conversation classes... There have been numerous requests for English literature, TOEFL resources, computer classes, English language films, American popular culture magazines, and above all a safe and engaging space for Bayankhongor youth.

"To address these needs, Oyuntugs approached the aimag government in January 2009 about acquiring a space for the BACC. The local government has given the BACC two rooms in the aimag government center and has promised to provide rooms in the future Children’s Palace, which is currently being built in the aimag center. [At the time of the grant], the BACC [had] limited resources: four sets of benches, five tables with broken legs, a small desk, and a blackboard. Resources are being accumulated through additional grants. These resources include books, DVDs, CDs, music scores, computers, internet access, and electronic English language learning programs."

From the grants, we were able to get all of these items, paint the room, install electricity, and have desks, chairs and shelves made. And this made for a great atmosphere for the sample classes we taught during Saturday's open house.

PCV Peder and his counterpart teach a lesson together during the open house.

(Left) New PCV Wally teaches with his counterpart, Boldmaa, the head methodologist for the aimag. (Right) Students actively participate during a class.

The open classes were well attended, but the opening ceremony was the highlight of Saturday's events. Our Peace Corps Country Director Jim Carl flew in special to offer his remarks. He was set to come to Bayankhongor for a routine, periodic site visit and was able to arrange his schedule to accommodate our needs. He and one of the medical officers, Amy, stayed in a hotel in Bayankhongor for 5 days.

(Left) Peace Corps Country Director Jim Carl makes his opening remarks praising the work of the community and emphasizing that this is just the beginning of a new step toward bringing the USA, which is often referred to as Mongolia's third neighbor, closer to Bayankhongor. His counterpart representing the provincial government reinforced the same.

Nathan's counterpart Undrah, who has a commanding voice and personality, was the master of ceremonies. Here, he is making notes.

Leslie accompanies a group of students on "This Land is Your Land."

(Top left) A performer from the 4-member group, Baby Girls, from new volunteer Anna's school, stands in her school uniform anxiously awaiting a resolution to technical difficulties for her song and dance to "Eternal Flame". (Top right) Dancers from Tysen's business school danced to an upbeat number you might hear behind cheerleaders at an American sporting event. (Bottom left) A Mongolian dancer from Leslie's theater cuts an impressive rug. (Bottom right) Undrah holds the microphone for a student from Leslie's theater who is playing the horsehead fiddle or "morin huur".

Jim Carl and a Mongolian girl cut the ribbon to open the Bayankhongor American Culture Center on September 19, 2009.

A Special Thanks
We called out to our friends and families to show us Americana. With their help, we were able to print and display over 260 photos on the wall of our culture center. Here are some of the highlights:

Please check out all the photos here and here.

Thanks to our professionals:
Eric George
Piper Robbins
Rob Shore
Ashlee Christian

Thanks also to our keen-eyed amateurs:
Melody McFarland
Lydia Godfrey Donovan
Melissa Munoz
David and Melissa Reeder
Paige Robbins Elwafi
Cat Kruszka
Kristen Chamberlain
Mary Lou Chamberlain
Kendall Glouner
Cipperly Good
Jen Sokira
Nancy Nally
Bonnie Gruttadauria
Cynthia Rack

(Top, bottom left) Attendees gawk at the photo wall courtesy of our friends and family. (Bottom right) Students, teachers and Peace Corps volunteers and Peace Corps Country Director Jim Carl pose to commemorate the opening of the culture center.

Classes began this week, and the third consecutive week of American Movie Night hosted by Leslie, is set for this Friday! You can come, but just a warning, it will be packed like last week.

MST 2009

2009-09-06T17:27:00.004+08:00

After we finished training all the newbies, it was our turn to get together with our training class of M19s to discuss our successes and challenges during our first year at site. To date, we have been here just over 15 months - three months of training, and a full year in Bayankhongor (pr. "buy-in-hunger" for those scoring at home).

This three-day mid-service training (MST) was also designed as a working retreat to help us recharge our batteries. Thankfully, the budget our Peace Corps office requested for this gathering was accepted, and we were actually treated to a pretty decent few days in Terelj National Park, just outside of UB. We had some good food, meaningful collaboration, and believe it or not, one of Mongolia's two golf courses.

Thanks to Garrett for most of these pictures.

The driving range left a little to be desired, including a fence to keep out the animals and a machine for collecting the balls.

It wasn't exactly the best course ever, sporting hard as brick artifical greens, but beggars can't be choosers.

Fellow PCVs and great fellows, Brian and Patrick joined Nathan and Garrett for the walk and some picture taking. Their golf-like commentary was hysterical, especially Brian's, whose dual citizenship as a Brit grants him a native British accent - twas perfect for a day at the links whilst on holiday.

The skins game was spit almost even with Nathan upping Garrett by one. All 6 balls were lost in the impossible rough, which led to only eight of the nine holes being successfully completed. but who's counting?

During our down time one evening, there was also a Settlers of Catan tournament. It's a board game kind of like Risk meets Monopoly launched from the mind a super nerdy German guy in the 1990's. It was a blast, and though Nathan was knocked in the first round, Leslie and our site mate, Fahd, made it to the finals in this double-elimination extravaganza.

Thanks to Amber Barger [white sweater, bottom right] for these pictures and for organizing the tournament.

But it wasn't all fun and games. We spent from 9-4 everyday meeting in various small groups discussing our last year and developing strategies for next year. Despite the concerns from some of the Mongolian staff that there was a lack of strict structure, this open format proved to be really worth while and worked extremely well for us. Sections of the day were used for sector-specific meetings, fundraising/grant writing, safety and security, cooking, mental health, and of course, the Mongolian language.

Leslie, Patrick and Garrett have a silly moment during an otherwise very productive Mongolian lanugage session.

Leslie enjoying the cooking demonstration/class with Matt (with the hat) and Evan (with the classes) put on by the medical officer, Paul (kneeling, far left). Thanks to Matt for the photos.

All and all it was a great way to get new project ideas, and the much needed rest and relaxation gave us great energy coming back to site. Thanks to the Peace Corps Mongolia staff for a well orchestrated event from start to finish. Year number two at site is officially off to a good start.

The Belle Tuul's in America

2009-08-19T22:34:00.002+08:00

A special bitter-sweet goodbye and good luck to our dear friend, Tuul Sukhbaatar. She worked as a translator for GTZ a German NGO. Tuul has just left the country for graduate school at Antioch in New Hampshire.

We love you Tuul! Good luck! Now you’re an authentic cool “east coast” girl, for sure!
Туулаа бид нар чамд хайртай, амжилт хүсье! Одоо чи жинхэнэ саак “east coast” охин болсон шүү!

It was all worth it...

2009-08-15T22:27:00.001+08:00

Sometimes the clichés are clichés for a reason.

“It was all worth it!”

But let’s start from the beginning.

As you might have heard, we put on a few concerts in the last year. Planning for the initial concert began as a request from my theater boss in Bayankhongor that eventually involved our friend and vocalist Julia, and our friend, site mate and pianist Tysen. My boss wanted the people of our rural province to experience live classical music, which wasn’t hard to talk me in to. Julia, couldn’t wait to get on stage again either, and since Tysen had begun preparing solo piano pieces for his graduate school auditions and was looking for an opportunity to practice those pieces for an audience and to work with vocalists for the first time, he was easily in too.

We had the request from our Bayankhongor community and the interested parties, but we wanted to take it a step further by taking the show on the road and donating the proceeds of our concerts to charities. After some negotiating with other volunteers who would eventually act as our hosts and concert agents at the several performance sites, we decided on a few different organizations where the ticket money would go. The two big concerts were the one in Bayankhongor, where the Association of Parents of Disabled Children (APDC) is attempting to build a therapy center, and in Ulaanbaatar the National Center Against Violence (NCAV), which is always in need since the funding they receive for facilities does not cover food for the women and children who stay there.

For the NCAV Ulaanbaatar concert we worked with Muugii (pr. MOW-gee), who Julia had been speaking with for the past year about collaborating. We had a great time working with Muugii! She convinced Khan Bank to donate their gorgeous theater space to us, got a local school to donate their piano, and she talked 5 Mongolians into performing with us. And she was just a joy to be around. I was really impressed when I met her and the entire NCAV staff, so since most of the new community youth development (CYD) volunteers I’m helping to train will be placed at sites that have NCAV shelters, I arranged for them to meet at the staff’s office.

The visit was fantastic, completely informative, and helpful for the trainees! They were able to learn how the shelter system works, who the volunteers are that work there, the education and outreach they do, and how we as volunteers can help it meet its goals and further its mission.

At the end of the meeting, Muugii stood up and presented me with an unexpected certificate in appreciation for our concert and the money we raised. Julia, Tysen, and I thought at best we probably only raised about 400,000 tugriks ($275), but instead we raised 900,000 tugriks (approx. $620), which we felt was great, but how far could that money really go?

Then Muugii sat down, and with very little pomp and circumstance she calmly said that our money paid for two months worth of food for two shelters! I was shocked! I was so happy and so pleased. That’s more than I ever thought possible. Many of us began to tear up. Then she said:

“Oh, yeah, and also it paid for a boy’s…….how do you call it?.....hmmmm…..OH, yes, a boy with cancer’s bone marrow transplant .”

BONE MARROW TRANSPLANT?!?!?!?!?!?!

How could it be that $620 paid for two months of food for two shelters and a bone marrow transplant? I couldn’t believe it! I still don’t believe it. But I’m glad it did. Wow.

I’m so thankful for the opportunity to work with the NCAV (and also the APDC)! In the coming year I plan to work with our local center against violence in Bayankhongor to find more ways I can help this great organization!

Putting on the concerts was hard work, and it took a lot of coordination. I’ve had some very challenging moments and some great moments here in Mongolia over the last year, but that must be my proudest! It was all worth it!

CYD Camping & Training

2009-07-31T12:02:00.012+08:00

Our weeks keep getting busier and busier. Last week the PST (pre-service training) CYD (community youth development) coordinator and I presented 4 sessions, went to a children's camp for 3 days, and evaluated 2 days of life skills sessions. I can officially say I am worn out!

In order to help the trainees bond with the campers and practice verbal and non-verbal communication as much as possible, we created a scavenger hunt for the first day at camp. Each team consisted of 8-9 Mongolian campers and 2 Americans (each American with a digital camera). To really make the communication happen, we made the scavenger list in Mongolian. The campers needed to find ways to let their Americans know they needed to:

Get a picture with the entire team touching one of the yellow rocks (half way up a mountain)
Lift one of the campers in the air
Know the names of all their Mongolian teammates
Sing one verse of a mongolian song
Create a team pyramid
Take a picture of 4 campers and an american doing a cartwheel simultaneously
etc.

A gaggle of teams racing up the mountain to be the first team to the yellow rock.

Carolina & Kara's team make a pyramid.

Molly & Aleta's team's mountain side cartwheel attempt.

My personal favorite part was when the teams returned. The Mongolians had to explain what a "S'more" is based on the desciption their American teammates provided for them with their limited Mongolian skills.

(all in Mongolian)
ME: "What are S'mores?"
MONGOLIAN KID CAMPERS: "*name brand cracker* then chocolate then hot white candy then *name brand cracker."
"like hot bon-bon"
"with fire chocopie" "sweet cracker (miming on top) chocolate (miming on top) white on fire candy (miming on top) more sweet cracker then yum yum tasty"

After each team explained it, we let the campers know that we would be making S'mores the next day during the camp fire. They were all impressed and very pleased with our "jinkhin" (authentic) American camp food. During the camp fire we sang Mongolian and American songs, including both national anthems, as prompted by the campers.

One of the most difficult parts of being a Peace Corps volunteer is learning how to work with a counterpart, and the greatest role of a Peace Corps volunteer is to build the capacity of your counterparts. The process of working with your counterpart and your host country organization to find the needs of the community and work with your counterpart to help them effectively do the work that is necessary is time consuming, frustrating, and typically doesn't work how you want it to. But, what WE want is not the point. This is a hard concept to teach. I know the trainees have been very frustrated by it, and I have been frustrated by trying to teach it. Luckily, it was a highly successful few days in at the children's camp.

Allison presents on HIV/AIDS asking students to place cards with behaviors in the "high risk" "medium risk" "little risk" and "no risk" catagories.

Megan presented on the topic of Self-esteem asking the campers to write postiive things about each other on papers on their back.

Molly's presentation on friendship went remarkably well as she had to present to teenagers and was able to help facilitate a great conversation the campers brought up about romantic relationships.

One of the most important things to teach as a CYD volunteer is life skills, and counterpart work is essential. Uugana, the PST CYD technica coordinator for the summer, had to work major overtime to work with each of the 8 trainees to help them prepare their life skills sessions. Each trainee was instructed to use Uugana as they would their counterpart at site. Unfortunatley for Uugana, much of the work is supposed to be on the shoulders of the counterpart. Thankfully, she's a good sport, and did an excellent job with the trainees. The trainees & Uugana presented on topics such as:

Self esteem
Communication
HIV/AIDS
Decision making
Planning
etc.

Though I'm completely pooped (as are the trainees), I feel as though they will be much better prepared to create sustainable work at site! Now to sleep!

Training in the Land of a Hundred Trees

2009-07-26T17:49:00.013+08:00

Leslie and I have been trainers in our respective fields for the second half of pre-service training to our the newest round of prospective volunteers. They arrived in the middle of June, had 4 weeks of language, culture and "tech" training (I'm a business volunteer so my tech training is micro to medium business), and now we've embarked on our 5 weeks. During this time we have been out of Bayankhongor, the provincial capital where we've been volunteering for almost a year now. We've been in the country nearly 14 months to date.

Leslie is away at a children's camp all weekend, so I thought I share a little bit about what this tech training is all about.

All the trainers for the different tech areas (English, health, youth development, business) have office hours during the week at the Peace Corps office in UB where we prepare sessions, and then three days a week, we travel to their training site in a nearby provincial capital called "Hundred Trees."

There are some classroom hours spent talking about Mongolia's history, most of the which is introductory topics about the switch from the planned economy from the 1920's to the relatively new free market system that's been in place since the early 1990's. We also talk about how to work with Mongolian counterparts, translators and the expectations of the work ahead of them.

Meet the crew:
Of the seven trainees, we have two women, both with exellent creditials and advanced degrees in business. We also have two married guys with some good experience between them, and whose wives are CYD trainees (youth development), just like Leslie and me. The other guys have business related backgrounds and perhaps more limited experience, but have a lot to offer our program.

During this day of training, we got out of the classroom, as we like to do, to visit some working small to medium-sized businesses. The trainees ask questions about the businesses and get an idea of what they're in for.

Mola translates as we visit a family with a small garden of carrots and potatoes and greenhouse with tomatoes and cuccumbers for sale. They are supported by the NGO World Vision. We were excited to see them growing peas and green beans outside, but for now, those are just for personal use.

My counterpart for the summer, Mola, has a great background in business and is a real task master. She makes all the phone calls to set up these visits. In this case, we contacted three NGO's in the area and asked them to connect us to a couple of their clients who'd be willing to talk to us.

Our second visit was to a car repair shop that also has the town's only car wash, operated by the son. Notice the motor on top of the blue metal container.

Mom does the tire repair using a fancy piece of equipment they were able to purchase with a loan, and Dad does most of the welding with an electric torch they recently purchased. He was trained in Russia many years ago and seems to have it all down, though he's not wearing a protective mask, but rather a cheap pair of what appear to be off-the-rack sun glasses. He's making repairs to the ramp he use to elevate the cars.

Mola does all the traslating during these visits and is an intrgal part of our training. She's a real pro, having lived in the Colorado for a while.

The first business was a micro business on a very small scale, the second was a small family business on a larger scale, and the third we visited was a member of the chamber of commerce and a well established dairy farm with a barn, stables and some pretty modern equipment, something I had not seen before. It was a real education for me.

[Left] The indoor stables are not heated in the winter, but provide a great place for the 30+ cattle to while away the -30 degree cold. [Right] A two year old cow stands on some "handy work." Cows aren't fed hormones and only feed off the native grasses during the summer and prepared grass fodder in the winter. We all agreed that a two year-old cow in the States could eat this cow for lunch. The owners were a little surprised.

Leslie and I carpool in the Peace Corps microbus with the health trainers, whose site is on the way. We drop them off, then pick them up on our way home. Each way the trip is about an hour and a half, so after our 3-4 hour sessions, we usually don't get home until after 7:30 in the evening. This particular day, there were some host family issues with one of the health volunteers, so we hung out in the microbus for a few hours while the trainers worked to resolve it.

Mola passes a volleyball back and forth with the school's caretaker while I lounge in the microbus. We made it home by 9 that evening and were back at the grind by 9 the next morning.

Trainees still have until the middle of August in training where they'll set up a community small business syposium attended by local business owners and do some practical consulting with individual businesses. They are up to the challenge, but they are also eagerly looking forward to where they will live out their days as volunteers, which won't be finalized until the middle of August as sites continue to be developed.

Stay tuned for Leslie debriefing of training a the children's camp.

Eagle TV: The Behind-the-Scenes Look at Our TV Debut

2009-07-07T14:59:00.063+08:00

As our fellow Peace Corps Volunteer Kevin put it with tongue in cheek, the best part of sharing the celebratory meal afterward, is that no one in the restaurant knew what big stars we were.

For the big summer festival of Naadam, Eagle TV, a Christian TV channel, wanted to do a show about foreigners performing Mongolian music. After seeing our swearing-in videos on youtube, they called Peace Corps. We met to discuss, and this weekend six of us made the magic happen. It will air on cable and streaming on the internet at 8 p.m. (8 a.m. EST in the States) during the third day of Naadam, July 13, 2009.

We were supposed to meet at 8:30 in the morning at the Peace Corps office, but the camera crew didn’t show up until hours later. We weren’t all that surprised because they’d shown up six hours and four hours late for the previous two meetings, but we were nonetheless naively prepared for a reasonably on-time arrival. They did send a handler at about 9:15 to make sure we were all there.

When the camera crew finally arrived, they took a quick shot of us heading out of the office and we headed out of UB to Tereelj National Park. The ride through the winding road included a few random stops along the way like when we parked near some folks selling camel rides to tourists, and when we checked in on an overturned SUV that had recently driven off the road scattering and trapping passengers and gear (everyone seemed miraculously OK).

Our Trailer
We arrived at the consummate countryside oasis complete with a stream, trees and large birds of prey, including a pair of large hawks. For our “trailer” they set us up in a nice ger where we were able to relax and nap for a few hours before our lunch of tsuivan (how Mongolian's do chow mien).

Costumes
The rest of the crew arrived with costumes soon after, which we got to play around with. These are the finest quality traditional outfits, made by perhaps the finest tailors in UB, according to our producer. No one took our measurements, but everyone's deel fit well with the exception of the boots, which were a few inches too small for the guys.

Julia and Leslie pose in their fancy deels.

Nathan's feet are mostly up in the legs of the boots, high-heel style.

We all got a bit of the "pose fever" in our awesome costumes. Jaime [left] pauses for a moment at least a dozen feet in front of the trained eagle.

Jaime Ly
Once we were in costume, the real filming began. First was Jaime Ly performing her traditional Mongolian dance about nature and animals while the rest of us enthusiastically watched. Jaime, whose parents are Vietnamese, hails from Washington, D.C. She had some costuming problems because the outfit that was appropriate for that ethnic group was not the dance outfit, and there were no dancing shoes for her. No problem, though. Take after take using the cassette tape deck in the mini-van as her accompaniment, and despite having no formal dance training, she made do with what she had and put on quite a show.

Jaime performs her dance beautifully
in the afternoon sun as the crew rehearses how they'll film it.

Leslie and Nathan
Next, they set the two of us up with some creative direction. All in Mongolian, the producer pulled Nathan aside and described how the shot would work. He would sneak up from behind Leslie, pick a flower and hand it to her as a surprise before the music began. In two takes, with no accompaniment, we sang our love song. We haven’t seen the footage yet, but we felt the second take was about as well as we could do it. Fingers crossed!

You'd never know that the microphone is under that pile of leaves on that tree trunk.

It only took us two takes to get our performance on film. Hopefully they were the right two. We were a little nervous.

Julia Cannon
Despite delays, once the shooting began, there was no stopping – they moved right into shooting Julia’s “Ankhni Hair” (First Love). You might remember Julia from our Bayankhongor concert from a few months ago. Julia is from Winston-Salem, NC, and has a theater degree. For her performance, she and the crew crossed the stream, and she was set up in a bright little clearing. It took several takes for them to get what they were looking for because they started with her walking, but because there was just a boom microphone (that captures all sounds in the immediate area), they were picking up the crunching of twigs and leaves beneath her feet. She sang quietly seated a few times, and that seemed to do the trick.

No pole for the boom mic? No problem as long as you have a ger and mailing tape nearby.

Julia and the crew had to cross the stream for this shot. I was no problem once the shoes came off.

Amber Book
Next, for Amber Book, they went to a new location with fewer trees and more mountains because Amber has been volunteering in the far West in Hovd that has a different landscape. This region is heavily comprised of ethnic Kazaks, so though Amber learned a little Mongolian two years ago during her Peace Corps’ Pre-service Training, she has primarily been speaking Kazak since she went to site. Amber sang, “Tulan Jer”, a Kazak song about missing ones homeland. Amber, who’s from Pittsburgh, PA, and has a vocal performance degree from Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

The Eagle
In the Kazak region, eagle training and hunting using eagles is a big deal, culminating with the annual Eagle Festival in October. On the way through Tereelj National Park, we saw a guy with a trained eagle sitting next to the road, so the camera crew stopped and hired it and the trainer for the day. This thing was huge, standing about two and a half feet high with a wing span of over a few yards. At one point, one of the hawks that lives in this area was swooping down trying to provoke the competing bird. Thankfully, it was blinded with a leather mask because I would not want to get on its bad side.

The handler moves the eagle. What an impressive wingspan.

Julia, Jaime and we take turns posing
with the blinded eagle from a safe distance.

Kevin Johnstone
We took a moment to enjoy a specially prepared horhog, then the final sequence began with Kevin Johnstone from Cleveland, OH. He’s been playing guitar for about 16 years. He is mostly self taught with some intermittent formal education smattered in, and he recorded an original album in his ger this past winter. He’s been in Selenge Province (the same where Leslie and I trained) in a small village for about two years, and just like Jaime, Julia and Amber, he’s an English teacher. He’s set to leave in August after he finishes helping a monastery develop marketing materials.

Kevin entertained us and flawlessly performed a more modern selection, "Cetgeliin Jiguuree" (Wings of My Heart), on Leslie’s Martin guitar. We all stood by and cheered him on, dancing and acting a fool to finish the filming day.

Kevin's performance was the final of the day.

Deep in the trees, it began to get dark pretty early.

After some van problems, we finally made it back to UB after midnight, 15 hours after the day began. We Americans agreed that in the States, the amount of filming we did probably would have been done in just a five or six hours including travel, but we also all agreed that the day was a resounding success.

Studio
The next day, we made it back to the Peace Corps office by 10 a.m. to meet the camera crew that was also supposed to meet us there at that time. When they showed up after noon, our collective patience was a little frayed, but we sucked it up nonetheless for a ride out the airport. One shot of us coming out of the airport, and we headed for the studio.

In the studio, we each sat down with a reported who asked us various questions about our backgrounds. Five out of the six of us conducted the interview in Mongolian, but they asked Nathan to do his in English for the English speaking audience.

Finally, with our fates sealed in the hands of the editors, we all went out for hamburgers, salads and a cold drink to celebrate the making of our first music video in Mongolia.

Broadcasting – When, Where, How
To check out our performance live on cable and internet July 13, 2009, tune in to:

Streaming video at 8 p.m. in Mongolia (8 a.m. EST) http://www.eagle-tv.mn/mn/

or

Eagle TV in UB on cable and terrestrial broadcast at 8 p.m.

Summer Camp at Uvgun Jargalant: WE CAN DO IT!

2009-06-26T14:08:00.032+08:00

After some administrative problems including being told we would have three quarters as many, then twice as many students as we'd planned, we had a good 5 days in the countryside at Uvgun Jargalant, "Ol' Blissful," a summer camp for children nearly 70 kilometers from Bayankhongor.

(Thanks to Peder for this photo). For more photos from the camp week, click here.

Our particular camp focused on English and life skills, and there was some physics rolled up in there too. As you might imagine, the planning and compromises that went into making the camp were many, including a surprise early morning flight back from UB for Leslie because two of the English teachers and the life skills teacher dropped out two days before we were supposed to leave. We nearly canceled the thing altogether because of the many frustrations and misleading, fanciful assertions made by some of the Mongolian staff, but like many kids who are forced to go to camp and then end up loving it, we found ourselves sorry to see the camp end.

The first two days were treacherously cold and it snowed on and off, sometimes for over an hour. We were advised to bring clothes as if it were winter, and we did a pretty good job layering. Unfortunately, we didn't quite take them as seriously as we should have because as it was snowing through the broken window of our room and we were hunkered down in our sleeping bags, our faces were ice, ice cold. We never thought it would snow in June, and in fact, the other two Peace Corps volunteers who went with us (Peder and Fahd) were so convinced it wouldn't be that cold that they didn't even bring sleeping bags. Brrrr.

Peder & Fahd took some of the kids on a day hike up a smaller peak on one of the surrounding mountains. Notice the storm clouds with snow rolling in.

Nathan, clad in every piece of clothing he brought to camp, waits to receive a pass from a student showing off his best Boomer Esiason.

Despite the cold, we and the 27 campers were outside much of the time. And much of the time was flexibly structured so we knew about what things should happen around what time. Thanks to some last-minute but pretty comprehensive planning, we came up with a schedule for the week and a theme for each day.

Our Daily Schedule at Uvgun Jargalant Camp

9-10	Breakfast
10-11	English lessons in 3 groups by level
11-11:30	Tea, butter crackers
11:30-12:30	Life Skills (1/2 hr), Physics (1/2 hr)
1-2	Lunch
2-3	Free time
3-4	English (language games)
4-4:15	Tea or yogurt
4:15-7	Structured play time (hiking, football, sports tournament, scavenger hunt)
7-8	Dinner
8-11	Event (drag show, dancing, plays, poetry-off)

Themes included family, sports, nature, weather, and incorporated several grammar points based on class level. Each American was partnered with a Mongolian English teacher so the teacher could learn from the lessons as well. With some mixed results among us, the system seemed to work OK, though if we had had more time to plan, the Mongolian teachers could have been more involved.

The first day we arrived at camp in the afternoon, so after a quick break for some soup and the first of many yak milk teas (not even as good as you might think), we interviewed each of the 10-17 year olds and grouped them according skill level resulting in some of the older kids winding up with the youngest kids. No matter, though. All the students were motivated and energized for each lesson, and we didn't have a single discipline or attention span problem.

Students used their bunks as desks and chairs. Much of the teaching was active and involved speaking or drawing, so they got along just fine.

The classroom was useful, but we were outside a lot. In fact, many of the highlights of the week for us included:

1. Nathan's hike up a steep mountain with 4 kids.

The five hiking guys stop for a quick photo.

[Left] The grounds of the camp. [Right] The kids found wild onions and a kind of sour wild leaf vegetable they called red cabbage. It was like grocery shopping on the mountain.

2. Football, including an 11 on 11 game.

Teaching and playing football was a big part of our camp. It started with just throwing the ball and ended in an 11 on 11 game, culminating in a well defended long bomb that hit its receiver on the run for a touchdown!

Early on we taught the campers some sports words and phrases.
Here you can hear them shouting, "Pass it to me!" and, "Throw it to me!"
They had the throwing part down, but receiving never did catch on.

3. And teaching music outdoors.

The kids do their best James Taylor on this Carole King favorite of ours, "You've Got a Friend."

One evening, Leslie and I turned in early while Peder and Fahd attended the camp drag show. We heard they were going to have a "Miss" competition, but didn't know it would be the boys dressing up as girls. Some of them really committed and pulled it off. The one older student dressed his version of Middle Eastern garb won the competition. Maybe less IS more.

Another day was filled with a Mongolian sports tournament that pitted us against each other in a tug of war. We broke the rope with our awesomeness leaving the competition in a draw.

And at the end of the evening, Leslie put on her dancing shoes to teach the Cha Cha Slide. Think of it as a kind of hip-hop line dance, where the recorded announcer instructs dancers when and what to do, like a solo square dance. It was a big hit.

"Clap your hands. Now hop. Slide to the right. Slide to the left. Cha-cha-cha," and so on.

On the final evening they put on English language skits of Little Red Riding Hood and Goldilocks and the Three Bears (which they knew through Russian influence), and The Boy Who Cried Wolf was new, but a big hit. In the two latter skits, they came up with original dialogue and memorized it in between readings from the narrator. We were impressed.

What Nathan thought was most stunning from the week was how well Leslie was able to really instill some positive qualities through life skills training. Most notably, she taught them about sportsmanship, being a role model, and positive language. After the second day, the motto of the camp was "We Can Do It!" in English. This flavored everything we did from then on as kids happily shouted the moniker to their friends while hiking, working in class, and competing on the field of play.

It was a good week filled with more than we can put on one blog, so check out more of the action here. We look forward to doing the camp again next year working from the strengths and weakness of this year.

Training of Trainers: New Volunteers on the Horizon

2009-06-14T11:50:00.022+08:00

For two weeks we have been in Ulaanbaatar (UB) planning for the arrival of the 20th round of Peace Corps volunteers here, the "M20s."

Leslie was already in UB after doing some seminars in other towns, but Nathan was able to fly in from our Bayankhongor. Interestingly, on May 28, his flight was delayed by three hours because of the (presumably) final snowfall. To fill the time in the low-traffic airport, he watched a rousing makeshift ping pong tournament among the staff.

By the time the plane arrived, nearly all the snow had melted and the flight was uneventful.

During the week and a half of training, we learned some higher level facilitation techniques, and feedback and evaluation strategies. Training for the new volunteers is broken into two halves. We will be teaching the second half. Because of budget cuts and the devaluation of the dollar, the training this year will be two weeks shorter than our training last year. This posed many new scheduling complications and curriculum adjustments, resulting in us spending much of the time working with our sector groups of three, which included one Mongolian specialist who has been hired for the summer and another volunteer who will be teaching the first half.

Esayas is a Sudanese-born Eritrean. He's lived in the States since he was boy, forced out of his country during the civil unrest of the mid-late 80's in neighboring Ethiopia. Because of his dark skin, flamboyant personality and fluffy hair, he gets a lot of attention wherever he goes, and he's perhaps the most petted American in Mongolian history.

Garrett hails from Summersville, WV, home of the Gaulley River and popular hiking and whitewater rafting destination for Nathan's Boy Scout troop in the mid 1990's. Garrett likes country roads that take him home to place he belongs, has been a WVU football tailgating enthusiast since he was a fetus, and holds a degree in accounting he tries to put behind him.

This is Mola's first year working with Peace Corps' community economic development (CED) training. She lived in Germany for a few years and then Denver, CO, working at the retail chain Old Navy, while her husband earned his masters. She has two little American citizens who live with her and call her mom.

Uugnaa is a university English teacher who has her own small NGO in Mongolia. She was the community youth development (CYD) pre-service training coordinator two years ago, so she can hold her own and really doesn't even need the volunteer trainers.

We worked in our sector groups to revise the teaching curriculum based on our experiences and the adjusted program guidelines negotiated by the Mongolian and American governments.

When training was done this past Friday, we mounted up all of our training materials to bring to the training site, about an hour outside of UB in the neighboring provincial capital.

Peace Corps Mongolia Headquarters.

Peace Corps got some new microbusses this year. They smell new.

Check out this stack of new tumpuns ready for trainee bathing and clothes washing.

After we unpacked and set up our temporary offices, we were treated to a lazy afternoon at a ger camp, how Mongolians do resort life. We had a great time tossing a Frisbee, playing catch with a softball, and hiking around with the Peace Corps staff and Mongolian language teachers discovering the history of the area.

Training Manager Chimgee sports an impossibly large visor. She's a taskmaster and has been quite an asset to Peace Corps during her nearly 20 years.

Some language teachers and Nathan take a break from a short hike up to a rebuilt monastery.

This site used to be a monestary that held over 1200 monks until communist revolutioanries in the late 1930's massacred them leaving only remnants of their quite life in the hills. Notice the terraced landscape around the lonely ger that used to hold the hundreds of gers.

We'll be back in the middle of July to help with the second half of training. In the meantime, we wish the new trainees good luck as we continue some grant writing, work at camps, and work back in Bayankhongor. Once again our separate work schedules will keep us apart for a few weeks, so eventhough we're happy to be busy with productive projects, the distance can be a challenge.

A Year in Review

2009-05-30T08:24:00.001+08:00

As May 2009 winds to a close, we’ve begun to look back on our first year as Peace Corps volunteers in Mongolia. We’ve seen and done some exotic things, learned some random stuff, had some real cross-cultural challenges, and we’ve had some of the most rewarding experiences we could have ever hoped for.

Often times, as you can imagine, life here is different. We've had to adjust to a new way of bathing and to using our handy-but-complicated clothes washer. The weather is a little more complicated here than advertised, and the travel is excruciating at times.

Despite the challenges of our jobs and different ways of life, the biggest challenges we’ve faced have been missing out on family events. Nathan’s dad almost died twice this year resulting in double bypass surgery and few months later, aortic stents. Leslie missed her brother Stephen’s wedding and the birth of Karsen, niece number three to oldest brother Chris. We’ve both missed holidays, impromptu family gatherings, having our friends over for barbecues, swinging by just to say hello, weathering the recession job losses of Nathan's brothers and their main sqeezes, and so much more.

Instead, we've grown closer as our own little family and brought in some new folks to help us make it, which include our counterparts and fellow Peace Corps volunteers. We performed at our swearing-in ceremony, put on a show in Bayankhongor, and have enjoyed learning all about Mongolian music. In fact, Leslie was published for the first time in a peer journal, Voices, discussing music, which is a nice resume booster and proud moment.

Thanks to everyone for sending us packages and continuing to care. We hope you also continue to read our blog in year number two, and we hope to see you in October when we fly to Ohio for Nathan's brother's wedding and trip to PA for some Shaffer family fun.

Here's to year number two!
Leslie and Nathan

Monitoring and Evaluation Trip to the Northern Villages

2009-05-23T18:32:00.054+08:00

Last week, just after our rousing concert, I took off for the countryside with Alta, my manager from UB, Undrah, my counterpart in Bayankhongor, and our driver Chuka. Leslie was at home gearing up to go on the road with her concert when I left. So far it's been almost two weeks since we saw each other and we have one more week to go.

You can see all the pictures with detailed captions here.

During the trip we gave presentations about some new procedural and structural changes that have been made to the business program, marketing, and I talked about project management. By the end, Undrah was doing all the presentations, demonstrating what we in the international development game call "capacity building." He learned from Alta and I, then he was able to do it himself, furthering one of my objectives as a Peace Corps volunteer. We also visited with the banks to make sure micro loans were being paid back, and we met with the local mayors to chat about our progresses.

Alta and I sat with the village mayor. Undrah took the photo.

Outside the classroom and meetings, though, I had the chance to get to know Bayankhongor Province and my counterparts a little better. Not surprisingly, this was the best part of the trip. I saw some absolutely stunning vistas and wildlife scenes, met some real characters, ate less meat than I thought I might, I watched Spring blossom around me, lived on solar power, and saw how to kill an animal. Oh, and I had a blast.

Buddhist monks drew some art for us to enjoy on our long trip.

Yaks!

In this village, trash was dumped just outside of town. Notice the horn sticking out of the burlap sack.

Undrah's niece heads inside for something apparently quite important.

Cell phone companies power their towers with solar panels.

The eagle had landed.

Check out this ger placement!

Statues of horses, yaks, goats, sheep and camels were in almost every village we went to. Animals are obviously an important part of Mongolian countryside life.

Where there's water, there's life. Spring sprang while we were on our trip after some recent rains.

How to Kill an Animal
In case you're not familiar with how to slaughter an animal in Mongolia, here's a step-by-step tutorial. It's actually pretty cool and, I think, humane.

1. Tie up the animal (or have your buds hold it down), then use your trusty knife to make a small incision.

2. Stick your hand inside and find the right artery around the heart. Now pinch that until the animal stops moving.

3. Take your hand out, but leave any clingy guts inside.

4. (not pictured) Skin and gut your little lady. Supper's waiting on you.

Tea Time
If you were wondering how to make tea for guests in your ger, you're in luck. Normally Mongolian's drink milk tea, which is just black tea with a lot of milk cooked in. What's interesting about this time of year is that milk is scarce due to skinny animals who've endured a long winter but don't yet have spring grasses to graze on. The following technique is really only used for black and green tea, not necessarily milk tea.

1. Boil some water and put in loose tea. Mix well.

2. Scoop the tea through a mesh screen into the pot.

3. Pour tea for your thirsty guests.

4. Put the wok away and cover the fire.

Mill Your Own Barley
1. Pour in whole grains into your homemade mill of two flat rocks with a hole in the middle of the top one.

2. Next use a stick to spin the rocks. As they spin, the ground grains fall out the side.

3. Serve with a specially prepared Mongolian yellow fat, water and sugar.

This adroit and pleasant 72 year-old gentleman has been using this technique for 15 years. His parents were farmers, but he took other jobs during the planned economy. When the government changed to the market economy in the early 1990's he used his knowledge to start his own small farm. He has 10 children, 3 of whom are still in college earning degrees in business, computer engineering and accounting, so he said he was working hard to get them through. He is quite strong, but well worn by life.

His plot of land is few acres just outside of town, and he works it all by himself. This year, he's adding another 100 sq. meters or about another third of his field. He's also a motorcycle repairman, among many other things. It was a pleasure to meet him.

It was quite a long trip, but I was happy to learn many new things about life in Bayankhongor's northern villages. To see all the pictures from the trip, please click here.

Our Concert Evening

2009-05-19T23:39:00.030+08:00

Friday, May 8, 2009 we put on a show. All proceeds went to the Center for Children with Disabilities.

It all started in February as our good pal Tysen began seriously working up some grad school audition pieces on piano. He wanted to do a recital so he could have a practice benchmark and to show off his stuff. He asked Leslie to sing a few songs, and they set a date.

Then, while we were in UB on other business in March, we ran into Julia Cannon, theater degree holder and performer extraordinaire. She signed on to join us in Bayankhongor as well, singing her own stuff and collaborating with both of us.

A few weeks later, our Peace Corps coordinator came for a site visit and recommended that we call a second-year volunteer, Dwan, who has an extensive dance background. One phone call and Dwan was in and wanted to dance with Nathan.

As the performance date approached and details were arranged, the Mongolians at Leslie’s theater were beginning to make it a much bigger deal than any of us had anticipated at the start. We just wanted a small, fun recital we could be proud of. There were big questions of, “Who will be your producer? You can’t do a program without a producer.” They said, “Who will pick your songs for you and in what order?” and “Who will tell you where to stand and when?” and “Who will print the tickets?” We already had the songs picked out, it was easy enough to decide the order, and where to stand was based mostly on the grand piano placement.

The grand piano. Though the theater proudly boasted having the piano, we found out a few weeks before the concert that it hasn’t been played since glasnost and perestroika were all the rage, and it had presumably seen better days before. The keys on the last quarter of each side didn’t work, it was more out of tune than Florence Foster Jenkins, and it was looking like if we didn’t get it fixed, there wasn’t going to be much of a concert. Tysen rightfully refused to play a classical concert on a cheap Casio and the clangy upright in the practice room wasn’t a better option. After some hemming and hawing over it (including the theater director insisting that Tysen only play in the center if that’s where the keys worked), they called in a “specialist” from UB to put the piano back together again – sort of. Almost all the keys worked, though the tuning left much to be desired.

As the concert week approached, the piano repairman had come in on the preceding Friday, Julia came in on Sunday night, and then Dwan came in on Monday night. By Monday the piano was “fixed” and it was looking like we might just pull this thing off. Dwan and Nathan began blocking their dance, working with the dance teacher at Leslie’s children’s theater. Tysen began putting the final touches on his pieces and learned much of the accompaniments for the ladies, and the ladies worked the kinks out of their songs. At some point, Tysen, Julia, Leslie and Dwan sat for an interview with the local TV with Leslie’s theater and children’s center counterparts to promote the event, which aired that week.

By Thursday, the pre-order tickets, which were to be sold to businesses as the producer’s big idea for securing attendance, finally came in from UB effectively killing the “pre” portion of the pre-selling concept. That meant we weren’t sure if anyone would show up at this point because there was no sign, almost no promotion, and the only real word we had around town was from us and one TV news story.

Finally by Friday, hours of rehearsals during the week and frayed nerves later, which included a rousing dry run that made us all a little nervous about the lighting and sound, not to mention a problem that left the “E” key (two below middle C) ringing every time the sustain peddle was depressed, the show was to go on. One carpenter and a host of last-minute onlookers and well-wishers later made the last few minutes eventful, nonetheless.

Earlier in the week, our friend and English teacher, Bayarmaa, translated a summary of each vocal piece into Mongolian. She stood on one side announcing in English and Leslie’s young theater counterpart, Baagi, stood on the other, announcing in Mongolian.

Tysen started with a two-part Beethoven sonata (Sonata in E Major, Op. 101 movements I & II). After he stopped between the movements, the announcers came out and began announcing his next piece, causing him to craftily scrap the second Beethoven movement. He went on to expertly work his way up and down the keyboard, often eliciting “ooos” and “aahs” from the crowd as he played Bach (Prelude and Fugue in C Minor, BWV 84), Chopin (Ballade, Op. 38) and Glass (Wichita Vortex Sutra).

Then Julia and Leslie alternated intermittently, performing some really great musical theater and foreign language numbers. Because the theater sound guy is so bad (the mics are always, always wildly screeching out feedback and are turned up too loudly with a tin-can sound), that both opted to sing without mics, which balanced well with the piano. They each nailed their performances with energy and flair while Nathan turned pages for Tysen.

Julia sang:
“Show Me” from My Fair Lady
“This Place is Mine” from Phantom of the Opera
"How Could I Ever Know" from Secret Garden
“All the Same” from Man of La Mancha

Leslie sang:
“Se Florindo è fedele” by Alessandro Scarlatti
“Nel cor piu non mi sento” by Giovanni Paisiello
“What Good Would the Moon Be?” from Street Scene
“Les berceaux” by Gabriel Faure

Together, they sang “By My Side” from Godspell.

After the piano was pushed off stage, Nathan and Dwan danced their ballet number to Mozart’s Klavierkonzerte Nr. 20 (II. Romance). Dwan played a doll and Nathan played the doll maker. Here is the synopsis of the 10 minute dance:

Scene 1: The Doll Maker
The story began with Nathan at a workbench while the doll he was building sat awkwardly in a chair on the other side of the stage. He walked around his doll with a sketch pad and pen, made improvements, and tested the working order. He mimed drawing in eayes and a smile.

He decided the last touch should be to wind up the doll and let it move freely, but the doll moved rigidly and eventually fell. Nathan reset the doll, tested the moving parts, looked at his watch and left stage.

Part II. Magic Dust Brings Life
As the music changed, magic dust (confetti thrown from the curtains) entered the workshop and caused doll to sneeze, and then poof, the doll became filled with life. She jumped up and became aware of her body parts and began to move with limited range. As the music changed, confidence built and she danced freely with joy and excitement!

Part III. Discovery of A Life Created
The doll maker arrived the next morning concentrating on how he might improve on his mechanical creation. The doll was still dancing with excitement but hid as Nathan’s back was turned to her. Nathan finally noticed the doll missing (from a musical cue) and then frantically searched until he found her behind the chair. He reached for the animated doll and they danced together. She gleefully showed off her new moves and the they ended in a joyful pose as the music wound down.

During the middle of the third act, about 7 minutes into the 10 minute routine, it began to rain on the front of the stage in one long, heavy stream. Luckily it turned out that if the announcers hadn’t cut off Tysen’s second movement in the Beethoven piece, Leslie would have been on stage singing her Faure number as the open grand piano turned into a kiddie pool. Crisis was coincidentally averted and all were counting their hindsight lucky stars.

The final number was a resounding success as the two of us sang “Hairlan Duumaar Baina” (our now routine love song) with Julia. The only hitch was the electricity kept cutting out, so the accompaniment hiccuped a few times and the microphones kept cutting out. Nonetheless, it was the decided crowd pleaser of the evening.

Though it was raining and snowing outside, and the concert wasn’t promoted much, we were amazed that the house was full with around 400 audience members. It was made up of our Mongolian friends and counterparts, but mostly it contained people under the age of 12, which was exciting at first. The problem was, we had prepared a program for businesspeople who were going to buy pre-sold tickets to a classical concert. As you might notice by the selections, we didn’t have a lot to keep the attention of anyone who might have been born after we graduated high school, with exceptions of the dance and the Mongolian number.

In fact, during nearly the entire concert, children and adults were talking at normal levels (not even whispers), one kid toward the middle back started listening to other music on his cell phone (boombox style), and people were taking phone calls like they were waiting in line at a mall food court. To say it was a tough crowd would be an understatement. It reminded us of the cheap movie theater we would sometimes go to near the bus station in Philadelphia or one of those clubs with the metal cages the Blues Brothers played in the movie. If David Letterman had been there, he would have been tugging at his collar with a grimace. When we talked to a Mongolian English teacher about how rude we thought it was, she just laughed and said that’s how Mongolians are. Just then we realized why every concert we’d been to had the microphones and accompaniment turned up to full blast. It occurred to us that maybe they just want to drown out the crowd noise. Either way, we all earned the evening.

Once the bows were finished, instead of the curtain coming back down, there was an anticlimactic moment for us Americans that seemed to be the Mongolians' entire reason for the concert. In Mongolian style, there was a long, gracious presentation of gifts and flowers and commemorating certificates issued to each one of the volunteers who performed. Speeches of congratulations and appreciation were delivered by the Mongolians who helped us plan and execute the performance, and we all posed for pictures.

Afterward we all went out to dinner and recalled the triumphs and difficulties of our first concert in Mongolia. May 8, 2009.

English Olympics

2009-04-30T07:24:00.006+08:00

One way the school system in Mongolia motivates students and teachers to work on their specialized fields is through big-time competitions they refer to as “Olympics.” There are all sorts including physics, math, Russian, and among others, English. Including Leila in a nearby village, there are six volunteers in Bayankhongor, and since we all speak English pretty well, we were the official judges.

English Olympics might conjure up thoughts of a gymnastic language contest in front of a captivated, cheering audience like a spelling bee, but in reality it’s a cerebral, intense, quiet, mostly written examination. There are different sections of the written test including fill-in-the-blanks listening, multiple choice vocabulary, open-ended questions, and reading comprehension. Afterward, students sit before the judges for a speaking test that involves direct and open-ended questions like tell me about your family or compare and contrast five given pictures.

Here are some examples from the 10th grade written test:

When I was younger I _(used to)__ swim in the river.
I have had this book since ___________.
a. one year b. three months
c. April d. now
What are you going to do this summer?
_______________________________________________________________________

The events reminded us of solo and ensemble, and regional to state choir and band competitions for music students in the States. In those, students sit before a panel of judges and play or sing prepared pieces of music alone or with a group, which they are subsequently assigned a score for. Parents and other competitors usually are allowed sit in the room and watch at least portions of the events. In Mongolia, it was interesting: of the hundreds of competitors, we never saw a parent or spouse. Here, it seems, teachers teach, students learn, and that's the end of it. Usually spouses are not invited to work events (we're an exception) either. Family and work or school are completely separated.

Our first experience with the language-off season came a few weekends ago. Friday was an event at our friend Tysen’s business school among his teachers. It wasn’t the most polished group of competitors, and it seemed as though almost no one took it very seriously. Much like their students’ competition a few weeks later, the teachers were able to prepare written remarks ahead of time, but almost no one really did more than a few minutes in advance. As a result, the competitions dragged on a little and were sometimes ruled by flush-faced awkward silences. Even still, those who chose to compete bravely performed through charades and a Jeopardy-like answer and question game.

Sometimes, waiting until the last minute to do things yields a team name like, "We Wish Raining."

For our continued support in judging competitions, the business school had a cake made for us with the "Thank You" in English. It was totally unnecessary, though completely welcomed.

Our second round of competitions was the next day and involved sanctioned tests for 9th graders, 11th graders and the teachers. Winners from this round will go on to Ulaanbaatar (the capital) next week to compete nationally. Each of our three high schools and those in some nearby villages had vetted and registered their best candidates for the two hours of writing and 15-20 minute verbal interviews, which we Americans exclusively administered. There were a few real stand-out students and some unexpected results from the teachers. The latter created a bit of a fall out with one teacher who was perhaps the favorite to win. Though his written scores were far above the field, his verbal scores were nearly the lowest. Apparently he talked a lot and eloquently, but he failed to answer the questions, perhaps expecting a “gimme” from the volunteer judge. Instead, the teacher disappointedly accepted the bronze medal, and for the next few days he verbally and via text message accosted the judge. Thankfully, the sour-grapes teacher won the Russian Olympics the next day, putting him in a better mood. After the dust settled a few days later, he humbly apologized and we’ve all tried to move on. Obviously, he was among the competitors who really took the Olympics seriously.

From the competition, Nathan has asked two graduating 11th graders (Mongolia goes to 11) to collaborate with him on a project he’s working on to build their resumes for college. The project will aim to reclaim a dust bowl portion of the countryside left gutted my illegal mining activity. As that project develops, we look forward to telling you more about it.

The next day was a genuine joy to administer. It involved 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, and 10th graders, many of whom speak English better than their teachers. On this day, we only verbally interviewed the top five scorers on the written test, as opposed to needlessly interviewing everyone as we were required to do for the sanctioned test. Nearly every student we talked to was composed and confident resulting in some fun and interesting interviews. Though this round of tests won’t send anyone on to compete at nationals, it introduced some exceptional students to us, who have subsequently asked for private tutoring.

Students wait for and receive medals for their efforts. Noticeably missing from the competition for us were parents.

Leslie has been successfully holding English Movie Night every Friday at 6 pm. Only 2 students showed up the day before the English Olympics because their teachers said they needed to study for the next day’s event. The ones who did show up were two of the gold medalists.

Next week, our 11th grader pal, Bilegt, will be showing his skills in UB. We’ve been working hard on phrasal verbs, how to write an essay, and verbal test techniques. We have our fingers crossed for him!

All and all our 11th month in Mongolia was an interesting one, and we kept very busy working on plenty of work and community projects. May will be our 12th of 27 months.

Whiffleball in Full Swing

2009-04-23T12:43:00.021+08:00

Though there's been some wicked wind storms ripping through Bayankhongor the last two days, (resulting in 1 of our 2 our back doors being ripped open, which broke the glass and has allowed nearly unfettered entrance for sand and dust), last weekend I played wiffleball with two other Bayankhongor volunteers and the Gold Medalist in the English Olympics and Silver Medalist in Russian Olympics.

We played for about 2 hours using a good ol', made-in-America, Whiffle ball and an sawed-down old shovel handle with a pronounced banana-like curve in the center. Because it was only 2-on-2, we played with kickball rules, which allow for a fielder to tag out a runner by throwing the ball at him. We also played with only two outs, and there we no walks. In other words, it was a lot like American League Baseball.

Because the field is very dusty and sandy, it was difficult to drag a single into a double or longer and the wind was knocking down anything with loft making it hard to catch. Consequently, it was a lot more fun to be on offense than defense. That didn't stop the fielders from also having some good laughs.

This is third weekend in a row where we played, but this is the first time we had our expert photographer, Leslie to capture all the action as it unfolded. It was a crisp and chilly but sunny Spring day with an often stiff breeze. It was the perfect day.

We had a blast and though it was competitive, we were all happy to play. Our friend, Bilegt, the English phenom, is going to UB next week to compete in the national English Olympics. We wish him luck and hope he can find some time to play again this weekend.

To check out all the photos, click here.

Spring is here! Kind of!

2009-04-16T08:24:00.011+08:00

This post is for you, Uncle Alan.

"The weather in Mongolia is always changing: some days you can experience all four seasons."

-Traditional Mongolian Proverb

The last few weeks, the weather has been awesome. It snowed about 10 days ago, but it quickly warmed in the late afternoon to temps high enough for a light jacket. Routinely since then, the it's been in the 30's at night and in the 60s-70sF during the days. Consequently, we've put away the long underwear for the season and have now embraced Spring. However, Spring, while it does include mild summer temperatures, also includes mild winter temps as well. This Friday is the last day the city heating plants will be running heat, but it's only 55F in our apartment, so I think they gave up a little early.

It's 55F in our apartment, but the smokestack shows no sign of life.

Leslie's curled in a sleeping bag sarcophagus on a chilly morning.

So you can keep up on all the latest weather in beautiful Bayankhongor, we've added a widget to the left side panel or our blog. Check it out.

Bayanhongor Weather

Bayanhongor Time

Spring = Dust Storms
In all seasons in Bayankhongor, we've noticed that it is windy. But with Spring in Mongolia comes dust storms without warning. We went for a pleasant Easter hike down to the river with one of my counterparts Sunday. We lazily ate jelly beans and chocolate (courtesy of our benevolent site mate Tysen), and shared bread, peanut butter, pickle salads and huushuur. It was a good thing we left when we did, though, because in rolled a storm worthy of a name.

As we walked back toward the city, we could see it enveloped by the flying dirt and debris. Our faces were pelted with small rocks and the whirring wind was so loud in our ears, we could barely hear each other speak. The more we walked, the more intense it became.

And just as suddenly as it had appeared, the clouds of sand and whirling trash came to rest back down to the ground, merely rustling as the wind continued to quietly blow around us.

The Sky is Gray
Since Spring has rolled around, the sky has been noticeably gray and gloomy, but the sun is coming up much earlier now. At Tsagaan Sar in late February, the sun came up at around 8:30 and during January it wasn't up before 9 o'clock. Now in mid-March, it's pleasantly up before 7am and doesn't go down until almost 8pm. This is a good feeling as we climb out of the winter blues.

Spring has been a little gloomy so far, but more people are out and about as the weather eases from the below zeros to the triple-digit summer heat.

A child walks to school next to our building on a gray morning. The metal thing on stilts is where we burn our trash. This is also the field where we've been playing whiffle ball recently.

Construction
Spring is also the time for construction to begin, so of course, they're putting a third floor on our apartment building. It's been a bit noisy as they've been welding and knocking down wood walls to brick up the full loft above us. It will be a welcome addition come next winter. There was no insulation up there, just a slat wood floor, so the heat from our place bled right out.

Our landlord has begun adding a third story to our building. Here they've welded the frame for the next flight of stairs.

As you can tell, construction in Mongolia is a non-specific art. We're not sure what's level here on the new support beams. Try coming up those stairs with no light in the stairwell. We didn't know we'd miss American building codes so much.

Care Packages
Thanks to the Reeders, Michelle and Cindy, and Leslie's parents for awesome care packages full of leisure and travel books, socks, macaroni and cheese, bagged/canned salmon and tuna and chicken, fruits, dry soup and dry soup makings, nuts, peanut butter and all the fun personal notes. We really appreciate it!

And a big thanks to Julie and all the folks at Easter Seals of SE Pennsylvania for sending a box chock full of instruments for the center for children with disabilities. They are quickly being put to use. We can't wait to show you some pictures. (The peanut butter and Mama Mia DVD were awesome surprises too.)

Long Time Gone: Trading the countryside for urbane Ulaanbaatar

2009-03-31T16:00:00.009+08:00

It was a long month in UB, but we're back in Bayankhongor now. Though we got a lot done while we were away and enjoyed lots of great food, fun company, and regular hot showers, it has been so good to be home.

Leslie
The initial purpose of our trip to Ulaanbaatar was for me to lead several trainings on music therapy, specifically for social workers and social work students. I was asked in January to create a training for social workers with Save the Children. It was very successful, greatly due to my Peace Corps CYD director, Enkhee, who has social work degrees from the U.S. and is capable of maneuvering the complicated subject of music therapy from the English language to Mongolian. At the Save the Children workshop, I was asked to return for a follow-up with the social workers and also to present a 20 hour workshop with the seniors at the Mongolian State University of Education Social Work program.
Though only one of those workshops worked out, due to scheduling issues with the Save the Children social workers, I was able to have a successful week with the students at the university!

Enkhee spent a couple mornings translating for the first workshop, but it was impossible to get her away for 20 hours with the students. Thanks to a previous volunteer, we met a remarkable woman named Tuul Sukhbaatar! Sukhbaatar means Axe Hero! (and the same guy the town we trained in and the Square in UB is named after) in Mongolian. You can imagine how hard core that makes her! I was lucky that she was willing to take her vacation time to help me out. Much like working with Enhkee, it was really easy to work with someone I adore so much.

*Note: Tuul will be starting her masters degree in conservation in the United States this fall! This, of course, means that I will connecting her with many of you! She's a blast! I'm glad she'll still be there when we are finished in Mongolia!

I did my best to make it an extremely experiential week for the students, so Tuul and I worked with the social work students on lyric analysis, musical biographies, song re-creations, and music relaxation. The students lead several experiences during the week! The next week Enkhee told me that when she met with the students they were very excited to share with her all they had learned.

The next step I would like to do on this project is to re-create similar workshops throughout the country, since training in the countryside (not UB) does not happen as often. In addition, a fellow PCV, Julia, would like to lead some experiences on drama therapy. Currently, the Center Against Violence has expressed an interest in our workshop for the social workers that work at the Women's Shelters in the provincial capitals!

If you want to know more about how music therapy may work in Mongolia check out Voices in May. Voices, the online World Forum for Music Therapy, has agreed to make Mongolia the country of the month in May. I will be writing the article on the history of music here and how, though there are no creative arts therapists in Mongolia it is primed for use of creative arts in therapy and social work. I'm thrilled for my first published article.

Nathan
While Leslie was doing her seminars, I was working on an internet project for my NGO, which is about half way done, but we need a lot of translation into English before it goes up. I can't wait to unveil it when it's done.

In the interest of setting up some sort of micro-financing partnership, I met with a guy from www.kiva.org. They have access to money and a partnership with a bank my NGO has already partnered with to give out micro loans, but they don't have a lot of vetted candidates to loan to. We have a ton of suitable recipients with no access to money. It seems we should be able to work something out. Lots of hoops to jump through first. We're hoping we'll be able to get Brother-in-law Stephen's Kiva credits our way.

Originally, I was only supposed to be in town for about three days while Leslie stayed to work. By the time we got back into UB from visiting our host families for Tsagaan Sar, though, we had both been pretty sick for almost two weeks. We got some antibiotics that didn't do the whole job, then I got some chest x-rays to rule TB, then we were both put back on another, longer round of antibiotics, which seem to have done the job. Also, because of the unexpectedly long stay, I only had about three outfits, so my clothes took a beating.

I was around a little longer than planned, but serendipitously, I was working for my NGO at the UB headquarters during a time when they were having some big discussions about an EU grant, and I eventually helped write parts of it. They kept me in town for an extra 10 days to help see it through. We're just in the beginning of the vetting process, so if it materializes, I'll elaborate on it more then, but potentially, it would invest in infrastructure and technical skills training for rural arts and peer-to-peer life skills education using Leslie's children's theater over three years. Leslie and I both had a lot of input, so fingers crossed for it to make it to the next stage. My programs director and country director at ADRA (a married Australian couple) are a real whizzes at the writing and planning, so even if it doesn't materialize, I at least got a lot out of the process.

I also found out that I was chosen to do training for the incoming volunteers. We'll be expecting them in 2 months, which surprisingly means we've been here 10 full months now. It will take me out of site again for 4-5 weeks during the summer and a weekend of training in May. No definite word on Leslie yet, but we both feel it's a done deal that she'll be training as well, as per her director Enkhee's recommendation. There have been a ton of budget cuts forcing the training to be much different than we experienced, so we're wondering how its all going to go down.

We grabbed some urban-themed photos from UB. These are mostly taken around Sukhbaatar Square, what may be considered the center of town. You can see the difference between UB and our countryside Bayankhongor, namely the big buildings and lots of cars. You might see in one shot that someone hates Chinese people enough to graffiti it in English. (My money is on Zero, the online handle of my buddy John. John, there are better ways.) You might also see there's a wall with the Beatles on it in front of a billboard advertising fresh milk. Imagine.

A Night at the Opera
On Saturday night went to the opera to see Tosca. We brushed up on the story beforehand on the internet, though the programs (in English and Mongolian) had the same synopsis. Most of the arias were in Italian (except for one male lead who sang only in Mongolian) and the recitative was in Mongolian (except for the female lead, who sang only in Italian), though it was kind of hard to tell the difference. 1 of the male leads was just so awful it was nearly incomprehensible, but the other male lead and the female lead held their own. The costuming was beautiful and had a Mongolian flair to it especially in the sacristan's robe, which was was worn more like cinched and bloused Mongolian deel at the waist than a hanging monks' robe. The same guy wore a bald
cap and a big prostetic nose. It was a hoot.
The star of the night was the opera house itself. It reminded us of Stuart's Opera House in Nelsonville, Ohio where we've performed. It was a quaint, small auditorium with about 400 seats and the interior was adorned with beautiful colors, traditional Mongolian designs, and charming lighting. The performers weren't amplified at all, and it was a treat to hear the pure voices with the orchestra, which sadly was often too heavy and/or out of tune, owing many troubles to the low brass and clarinet. Even still, the seats were cheap at 8,000MNT ($5.33) and we got our money's worth.

The last month flew right off the calendar, and there's no letting up for now. As fun as our time was, it was not a vacation. After the hiatus from a comfortable bed and the 14 hour, punishing bus ride home, we are worn out. Also, even with per diem and help from Nathan's father, UB has so many good options for food and entertainment that our pockets are pretty bare. It should be a lean month ahead.

Our Love Song

2009-03-23T14:28:00.003+08:00

During our swearing in ceremony in August, each training community had to perform a traditional song, dance, instrument and give a speech. We sang a duet for our teachers and fellow PCVs.

As promised months ago, check out our video on youtube.

Tsagaan Sar: Enter the Year of the Ox

2009-03-02T11:40:00.028+08:00

Tsagaan Sar has so far been one of best experiences we've had in Mongolia. We were wined and dined all over town. We ate hundreds of buuz and bainsh and drank gallons a various beverages. We've met some wonderful new people and hopefully affirmed some lasting bonds with others.

If you like the photos you see here, we have a lot more with some detailed captions you can check out here. For more information on the holiday, check out our other blog post, Tsagaan Sar: We see a White Moon a risin'.

Day 1.
Nathan went to the top of the Erdenemandel mountain in the middle of town to greet the first rays of the new sun on the first day of the Lunar New Year. The irony of appreciating the sun on a lunar holiday was not lost on us, but Nathan got to the top just as the sun broke over the Ikh Nomgon mountain on the eastern side of the city.
Later that day, we went with Tysen to our friends' house. The father and daughter are high school English teachers at different schools and the mother is a retired economist who owns a small restaurant now. As per the custom, we dressed up in our Mongolian best, said our Tsagaan Sar greetings "Amar bain uu?", shared our snuff bottles, ate lots of food, drink and sweets, and recieved a gift for coming.

Later after a nap and a movie, Nathan's driver Choka and his co-worker Undrah picked us up. We went first to Choka's palatial western-style, two story house and met his family with our "Amar bain uu?"s and snuff bottles. His wife and son (who looks just like him) are a real fun sort and she made some really tasty buuz. We posed for a group picture, then moved on to Undrah's. At Undrah's ger, we did the same. A pattern was developing.

Day 2.
Nathan's new friend and English student, Bayanmunk, had us over. He's a high-school physics teacher and since his wife, Tunga, is an important judge, they've moved around a little bit for her job. As a result, they don't really have family in the area, which is good because we were able to spend most of the day being gorged by their "American-style" pasta, mutton, candy bars, Coca-Cola, cherries, strwaberries, steamed yeast bread, beef, etc, etc, etc. We were also treated to an intorduction to the head prosecuter in town who paused for a few minutes to chat on his two-way with the chief of police.

Day 3.
After our glutinous good time on Day 2, we didn't know just how much more we were up for. Day 3 is typically the day to spend with co-workers and we'd had loose plans with Leslie's, but we had no clue when or where. It's OK, because Leslie's co-worker Dogoo gave us 3 minutes warning that she was in a car on her way. We dressed, she drove and thus began another marathon day of mutton, buuz, milk products, candy and fun!

We must have gone to ten different houses that day. As required, we did our best to eat our three buuz and politely sip our generous portions of several different beverages. We had some real fancy-pants buuz at some places that even included hot peppers. What a treat and what a surpise, but yhey are theater folk, after all.

Day 4.
We spent with our new friend Demo and his family. He's a 21 year-old first year English teacher. His parents are both doctors, his one sister is a dentist, and his other sister is a college student. His parents told us over and over again their's was a family of doctors, reminding us frequently that Demo was not a docter, he was a teacher and translator. We had a really fun time with them, but neglected to take a picture.

Afterwards, they arranged a car ride to Nathan's other counterpart's house for a quick stop for some tea, milk products, vodka and meat. Again, as with each place we went, we exchanged our "Amar bain uu's?", snuff bottles and other pleasantries.

After that, we arranged another ride to the home of Tserensuren who runs a program for children with special needs, and with whom Leslie has been working with recently. Her son is deaf, among other limitations. Since there were no real resources for children like him, Tserensuren started a program at the hospital and worked closely with another PCV who recently returned to the States. They have a good thing going and it was good to share some time in her home. We're likely not to make it back too often because it is for real on the edge, edge of town. Without a ride, it would have taken about an hour to walk.

So, we finally got through the first few official days of Tsagaan Sar, though we were the worse for wear. It seems all the communal eating and drinking and lack of sleep over the past 5 days caught up with our bodies, and we have both been under the weather with a wicked throat and chest cold.

We were supposed to leave for Sukhbaatar on that Sunday, but the Russian van we booked the day before was greedily overbooked when we went to leave. We chose to let our sitemate Peder take the last remaining seat and went home. When we awoke the next day and tried to leave, we were just too completely worn out. We opted not to travel for a couple more days and this time we bought bus tickets, which had been sold out before. Bus tickets are cheaper than a crammed van and cost less.

Now we're in UB after a few days hanging with our host familes and our American friends in Sukhbaatar. We're still sick, both with the same nasty, nasty cough, but after meeting with our medical officer, we have some more agressive treatment than our gargling salt water, drinking tea, and popping pain pills. He says our cough is most likely pollution related.

Tsagaan Sar: We see a White Moon a risin'

2009-02-22T19:30:00.019+08:00

The very important Lunar New Year celebration is upon us this coming week - Tsagaan Sar.

Though technically there's only a few days of formal celebration of the holiday, we're told the festivities can last much longer, even weeks, and that it's hard to accomplish much during that time. We look forward to experiencing our first Tsagaan Sar in Bayankhongor with friends and colleagues who have already extended invitations over three days, and then make a trip to the other side of the country to celebrate with our host families.

Unlike the Christmasy New Year celebrations Mongolians hold on January 1 as a Communist leftover, this holiday helps Mongolians re-tap their herder roots with traditional dress, food and greetings.

To help explain more about what and when it is, we have specially edited materials from our lovely and helpful Peace Corps language coordinator, Ganaa. Read on.

Part I. What is the Tsagaan Sar?

The new year according to the Oriental lunar calendar in Mongolia is called Tsagaan Sar, which translates as the "White Month" or "White Moon." There are many opinions about the origin of the name, but Mongolians use white to symbolize happiness, purity and an abundance of milk products.

Some researchers believe that the lunar calendar was invented by the nomadic tribes of Central Asia and a number of Eastern and Central Asian countries, including Mongolia, have followed the lunar calendar since ancient times. The calendar consists of 12 years with 12 months in a year and 12 hours in a day. The years bear the names of animals, like the upcoming Year of the Cow, and Mongolians judge the coming year by the animal name it bears.

1. The Year of the Mouse promises good livestock productivity, especially in camels.
2. It snows heavily in the Year of the Cow and there is plenty of food and milk.
3. The Year of the Tiger is rather hard at the end.
4. The Year of the Hare is favorable at the beginning and spells disasters at the end.
5. The Year of the Dragon is rainy and floods may occur.
6. The Year of the Snake brings many disruptions and worries.
7. The Year of the Horse is also rather disturbing,
8. but the Year of the Sheep that follows it is favorable in all respects.
9. The Year of the Monkey, although cold and troublesome, brings in a bumper harvest.
10. The Year of the Cock is one of fertility and higher birth rate.
11. The Year of the Dog is severe at the beginning and kind towards the end.
12. The concluding Year of the Pig promises rich harvests, yet food shortages, should they occur, will hit hard.

Nowadays there is an argument among Mongolian astrologers about the celebration date of Tsagaan Sar because depending on the phases of the moon and the calendar used, it falls anywhere between the end of January and early March. Some say we should follow the lunar calendar invented by Tibetans, while others prefer to follow the one used by the Chinese. Either way, this year's Tsagaan Sar will be celebrated on the 25th or 26th of February. [Most people will celebrate on the 25th.]

New Year’s Eve in Mongolia is called “Bituun” - the last dinner of the old year. One must eat all the traditional dishes that evening: boiled lamb or beef, a huge variety of milk products, buuz or bansh (large or small meat and fat-filled steamed dumplings) and desserts. Many families have the tradition of placing coins inside the buuz/bansh and whoever bites into the one with the coins will have good luck. At the end of the evening, everyone’s stomach is fully satisfied.

The following morning everyone rises bright and early to walk outside of their house in the correct direction, which is indicated in their horoscope of the year. This symbolizes that the destiny of each person is directed correctly for the upcoming year. Then family members then gather around the eldest in the family and greet each other by wishing him a very happy new year.

Part II. Tsagaan Sar Celebration Customs

At sunrise of the new day, hosts and his guests dress in new dells and greet each other in a special manner. First, the youngest greets the eldest as the older person holding out his/her arms. The elder puts his hands palms down on the arms of the younger one and both pronounce traditional good wishes and rub cheeks while the older person sniffs on either side of the face, which is considered the Mongolian traditional “kiss”. Even if new year celebrations are over, friends and relatives meeting for the first time that year greet each other in this manner. [Nathan witnessed this in July when host family members visited from far away for the first time that year.]

In towns and cities, Tsagaan Sar is celebrated for 1-3 days and in the countryside villages, the reveling continues for about a week or more. Guests may come and go at any time of the day and families serve guests with plenty of meals: buuz/bansh, salads, vodka, etc. Families also give small gifts to their guests.

Traditions and customs are different from place to place and from family to family. Even for Mongolians, it is impossible to follow every tradition, but by observing and practicing you can learn a lot.

General tips during Tsagaan Sar:

When visiting, greet the oldest member of the family first
When you greet the eldest, give a small amount of 500-1000 tugriks to them depending on your site custom. Some places don’t do that.
Dress nicely. Mongolians like to greet the new year by making everything new, so many people buy or sew new dells (traditional long robes with a contrasting cloth or leather belts).
During Tsagaan Sar, people visit many families in one day. If you are going to many families, save room to eat 2-3 buuz with each family. It is polite to taste everything (start with white food), candy, cakes, meat, salads, whatever, but just a little bit. If you are a strict vegetarian, it is OK to say “Bi makh iddegui.” (I don’t eat meat at all).
When offered vodka or airag (fermented mare's milk) and you wish not to drink it, accept it and simply bring it to your lips then return it.
When you have visitors, the best thing to do is to keep your pot full of hot water and have tea ready. Candy/cookies are always good to offer. You do not need to prepare an elaborate meal; this should not be expected of you.
When someone gives a gift to you, receive it with both hands and DON’T put it on the floor.

We hope this gives you a good idea what we'll experience in the coming week. We look forward to reporting back on how it went.

Who's On My Valentine?

2009-02-19T11:40:00.012+08:00

On Thursday, just before Valentine's Day, we got a package from my mother filled with Hershey's Kisses, various small candy bars, heart-shaped candy and little Disney themed Valentines.

Thursday night, we wrote the names of our counterparts on the one side, our names on the other, and sealed them with a cute little heart sticker.

When I got to work on Friday, I took out the bag of Hershey's Kisses and began handing them out with the cards to my 6 counterparts, who wore general looks of interested confusion. My supervisors, who speak English, were in town from UB, so I said in English, "Do you guys celebrate Valentine's Day?"

Then the mood changed as the ones who speak English became giddy and quickly filled in the rest. Everyone who was busy clacking on computers and yacking on cell phones stopped what they were doing to get a better look at what was going on.

I explained to them that the cards I gave them generally used to end up in the homemade decorated shoe boxes, cylindrical cardboard oatmeal containers and modified bags of every elementary school child when I was growing up. Most of the fun of Valentine's Day was making the boxes and trying make sure I wrote down the names of every classmate, especially the cutest girls, so that everyone had a Valentine.

Though Mongolians know Mickey Mouse, my favorite part of giving the cards to my counterparts was explaining the Disney character, Minnie Mouse. It was no sweat in English, but in Mongolian, it was hysterical. The word for "my" in Mongolian is "minii", pronounced just like Mickey's tart, high-heeled love interest, but with the emphasis on the second syllable.

So, in our perfect Abbott and Costello, Who's On First banter, I asked one counterpart if she knew who the character.

"Your mouse? I thought you were giving it to me," my counterpart said.

"No, her name is Minnie Mouse."

"So, I can keep it. It's my card?"

"Yes, it's yours, but her name is Minnie," I insisted and so on until we agreed that it was not my mouse, her name is Enkhee, and the name of the character was Minnie.

Some other things I hadn't thought about were the sentiments on the cards and on the special edition Valentine's Kisses of "be mine", "I'm yours" and "I'm there for you", etc. They were really hard to translate because they're so corny and some of the meaning is lost, so I wasn't sure they really got the whole meaning, but they were appreciative nonetheless.

I learned that some Mongolians do celebrate Valentine's Day and almost everyone I talked to knew about it, but it's limited to a lover's evening sort of deal that some people celebrate with flowers and candy. It's not the forced, empty affection ritual we enjoyed as kids with little cards and chalky candies. Leslie and I personally didn't do anything special other than scarfing the chocolates with our friends and denting a huge bag of mixed nuts that also made its way into the care package.

Thanks to my mom for a fun little culture exchange.

Random Mongolian Lessons of the Day

2009-02-13T10:46:00.006+08:00

How do you run a Mongolian New Year's Party? What's the perfect background music for a Teacher's Day Toast? What's still considered an OK amount of time to wait in your theater seat before the show starts?

Check out this page for answers to those questions and more. You never know what you might learn.

We've been texting our friend Travis, a soft-spoken, Southern gentleman who trained with Leslie. He's a health volunteer who lives on the other side of the country now. It was his idea to headline a text message "RMLD:" then tell of some crazy new story or situation we could all relate to. We've we've been enjoying these messages back-and-forth since August and some are lost to history now, but Travis recently put up a Web page so we keep better track of our lessons.

Periodically check out this link for new lessons a laugh.

Oyuntugs Leads Us to New Heights (and one low caught on video)

2009-02-11T10:05:00.032+08:00

Our friend Oyuntugs [pr. Oy-un-toogs], the English teacher counterpart of our site mate Tysen, is from Bayankhongor but has a degree in tourism from a university in UB. She's in her early to mid-twenties and moved back to Bayankhongor last summer to look after her aging parents - as is her duty as the youngest child, though other siblings lived in Bayankhongor already.

To stretch her tour guide legs while she's out of the game, she started a class at the business school where she and Tysen teach. Part of that class was to a hike up the mountain shaped like a sleeping tiger. It's a stretch, but if you look just right, you can see it. It's the same mountain Tysen and I took our infamous smog pictures from not long ago.

We met at the business school for the estimated departure time of 11:00 am. Tysen, Leslie, our friend Leila who was in from her nearby village, and I met Oyuntugs at about 10 after the hour. We waited for the students to arrive and soon after 11:30, when no one else did arrive, the five of us happily headed across the frozen ground toward our sleeping beast.

Along the way, the shallow, delta-like winding river was mostly frozen but slushy and wet in points as the sun warmed it with temperatures in the teens Fahrenheit.

It was even a little colder than we thought it would be since the weather here in the afternoons recently had felt like jacket weather. Without the sun and with a stiff breeze, most of us were a few layers short, even though we were layered up. Luckily as the ground below us began to tilt up with the topography, and we got as warm as we wanted.

As we approached the peak of one part of the mountain (after some thought of turning back because they didn't think they could do it), we did have to leave Leila and her dress shoes to fend for themselves among the slippery, snowy terrain. In her defense, she didn't know beforehand that we'd be hiking and she managed to get almost all the way to the top.

Those of us who did make it, were treated to a fantastic view on a clear, crisp day as we enjoyed some much-earned snacks. Check out Leslie texting her brother Chris in the middle of the night about her triumphant ascent.

Interestingly, after we sat on the top for a about 15 minutes, a slew of students who'd chosen a different path joined us at the top. They apparently left about a half hour after we did, and I'm glad we weren't walking with them because we never could have kept up their pace. We shared our snacks and some laughs, and then they took off for another peak while we headed back down.

The hardest part was over, but we still had to get down the mountain and over the ice. The ice was still thick in parts, especially toward the mountain where the sun had been blocked the longest.

The farther we got from the moutain, the path we'd taken over the ice a few hours previous was too wet now to traverse, so we choose another route, which happily took us toward a group of children playing on the ice. Oyuntugs taught us a game where the players slide smaller pieces of ice to knock away bigger pieces of ice set in a row a few meters away. Think bowling with ice.

Fortunately, I switched our camera to video at the perfect time just after a demonstration to catch a rogue piece of ice as it came to our direction. Watch Tysen try his best David Beckam balance on the ice. (Sorry, Tysen.)

Toward the end of our return, we ran into some sheep and goats, and Leila was tickled she got to pet one. We were almost back, when out of nowhere, Oyuntugs' husband picked us up in his car not far from the business school. We trolled around for a while trying eat some lunch, but the power was out all over town. Eventually we found a place to enjoy our much awaited (but cold) huushuur.

Oyuntugs proved to be quite the tour guide to the top of the mountain and all points between. We're hoping to tackle the Bayankhongor museum soon. Hopefully she's a good indoor guide too.

Tripping Off to Tsetserleg; Getting More Than I Bargained For

2009-01-31T11:34:00.027+08:00

While Leslie was in UB for an HIV/AIDS conference and watching the inauguration on TV last week, I spent 4 days in the province capital to our north. Tsetserleg for an inauguration party and some business-related things. We didn’t have the same media access, so we just celebrated with good American comfort food and each other's diasporadic company.

Tsetserleg is generally considered the most beautiful of the provincial capitals. The city of around 20,000+ residents enjoys tree-lined streets and a beautiful temple that you can see atop a small mountain. There are volcanoes and other geological fascinations in the province making it a destination for domestic and foreign tourists. Tsetserleg means "garden" in Mongolian.

Unfortunately, cars don't go there directly or regularly and there's no public transportation from Bayankhongor, and Peace Corps volunteers are not allowed to drive while serving. To get there, I was advised a couple times to take a bus 14 hours to UB (391 miles) and get a bus 10 hours (261 miles) back from there or take a bus half way then wait on the road in the below zeros for the UB to Tsetserleg bus. In the hitchhiking scenario, I would pay the same as the trip from UB, but cut off much of the time. Patient as I am neither were options I was willing to consider just to go 145 miles north-northeast (about the same distance from Bowling Green to Xenia, OH or Philadelphia, P.A. to Washington, D.C.).

Thanks to http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Map_mn_arkhangai_aimag.png
for the map.

Instead, I got some help from an English teacher friend of mine to hire a car and driver. Tsetserleg also means "kindergarten" in Mongolian, so there was a little communication problem at first as he thought I wanted a taxi to go 100 feet. After we got that straighten out, we went to the market and announced our need over the loudspeaker where messages are constantly streaming much like an auctioneer’s speedy, monotone cadence. Two brothers answered the call and we met at my friend’s restaurant to discuss a price. I negotiated pretty toughly and the price we ended on was even much lower than the buses if a couple of us went together, so to offset the costs, I got some other guys to join me. One guy was already in Bayankhongor traveling during his week off so it was an easy sell. He went to Tsetserleg with our bearded sitemate Peder and I, but found his own way home from there.

In the States, this direct trip would be about 2-and-a-half hours in decent traffic. Needless to say, it took a little longer and the road was less traveled.

Tuesday morning we headed out on our adventure in a old Russian Jeep, a GAZ 69 or what sounds like "Jar in use" in Mongolian, the number 69. These cars are cherished for their simplicity, which makes them easily fixable, but they do have a tendency to break down frequently requiring lots of fixing.

The older of the brothers driver, Ganbold, checks under the hood while Brandon and I stretch our legs and pose for Peder's camera. Brandon was already in Bayankhongor and joined us on a whim. He only went one way on the this trip then made his way back another way.

The younger of the two drivers, Altangerel, fills up the radiator. It was a two man job keeping our Russian jeep going up these mountains. In the background, notice the "Ovoo", or sacred mound of rocks with the branch sticking up adorned by a blue scarf called a "hadag." Always pass on the left, and if you have time and/or someone's looking, circle it three times for good fortune: 1 for your ancestors, 1 for yourself, and one for your future generations.

During our trip over the roughest terrain possible, crossing (mostly frozen) streams, up mountains, through rocks, in the snow with no hardly more than a suggested path than a road, our only major obstacle was a leaky radiator that our drivers were able to keep sufficiently filled. There wasn’t much heat toward the back so my feet were a little cold, but nothing to complain about. We moved at a labored but consistent pace, never stopping longer than to fill up with water and pee and get back on the road. We did stop one time for about 30 mins to help some loggers traverse a wide river, whose efforts were futile.

Our drivers and the loggers look for the best place to cross the heavy truck loaded with wood. They did what they could, but the truck became stuck and we had things to do so we left the loggers to fend for themselves.

After 8 hours of punishing travel in the middle of nowhere, we got in at dinner time Tuesday for hamburgers, French fries, onion rings, coleslaw, cold Coca Cola and hot homemade apple pie a la mode. The dinner was pretty good. We've made better in beautiful Bayankhongor, the undisputed culinary capital of Mongolia as far as Peace Corps volunteers go, but it was fun to share in the joviality with Americans and their good American fare. The three of us who showed up late were on dishes duty.

For the next few days we hung out, ate pot pie and tacos, went dancing, attended an aerobics class and wandered around the town in the frigid -30s. Like Bayankhongor, it’s nestled among some mountains, but unlike our fair provincial capital, Tsetserleg doesn’t have coal or coal smog. What they do have are trees and tourism dollars making it a little more Westernized and modern. They even have a couple traffic lights, which weren't on. It’s quite a fine city and I enjoyed being there.

After three days there, with one left to go as per our agreement with the drivers, one of them showed up with a buddy at my friend’s apartment requesting to leave right then. If fact, the one guy who I’d negotiated with and who knew our agreement well, simply said, “Okay, let’s go.” I was completely baffled and explained to him that we would be leaving in the morning because I had things I was still doing. After a minute or two he calmly agreed and sat quietly on the couch with the other guy. It was a little awkward.

The custom for the host when someone visits your home in Mongolia is to offer them something to drink, usually Mongolian milk tea if you have it, and candy of some sort, usually aarul (hard, dried sour yogurt) if you have it, but hard candy or chocolates will do. I've never been to someone's house where this did not happen. Thinking that's why they were still sitting there, my friend offered them coffee and candy, which they quickly ate and drank in virtual silence. I tried talking to them, but I couldn’t understand them well. It sounded to me like they were asking me for more money. Feeling weird about the whole thing, I called my Mongolian friend, who’s a translator, to help me talk to them.

I was correct. She told me the driver said that since they’d been in Tsetserleg they’d lost 25 liters of gas and that I would have to pay for it or else we couldn’t get home. On my behalf, she explained to them that their stupidity was not my problem and I wasn’t paying them anything more than I owed. We both thought the whole thing was totally bizarre and agreed they probably lost 25 liters of vodka since coming to town, not gas. In the end, they agreed to leave at 8 a.m. the next morning and quietly left.

After an evening of tacos and dancing at a trul posh, newly renovated club, my traveling companion Peder and I were foolishly packed and ready to go with shoes on at 8 a.m. for the the trip back to beautiful Bayankhongor in the 69. Not surprisingly, we didn’t leave then. It's not uncommon for Mongolians to be a half an hour late so we waited. When I called them at 9, they said the car had frozen overnight and they would be there after they built a fire under it and got it started. Figuring we had some time, Peder went to the store and bought some fixings for breakfast. We made hard boiled eggs and toast, napped and left around 11:30.

Apparently to offset the costs of their lost “gas”, the one driver picked up a few extra passengers for the way home, which was fine with me since I’d told them it would be OK to have other people in the car with us. There was only one driver at this point, which gave us more room, so it worked out. When we got in, my lanky buddy Peder hopped in the front with his knees to the dash, and I hopped in the back where I had ample leg room next to an older woman in three younger women, one of whom was riding on a lap. We were packed in, but it wasn’t the end of the world.

Just when I thought we were as full as we were going to get, from the side of the road on the outskirts of town, we picked up the other driver and the other friend who I’d met the day before in the false start attempt to get out of town. And then a half hour later we picked up an incredibly old man who sat nestled beside me in the center of the jeep. If you had your fingers ready to keep track, that’s 4 women and 6 men for a grand total of all your fingers worth of people in the tiny jeep. The woman who was on my lap was a young math teacher in her early 20s and small, with an accommodating seat of her own. I didn’t really mind the ride for the first few hours.

Despite the late start and the crowded conditions, Peder and I were having a good time. About two hours into the trip, we stopped a random ger in the middle of nowhere for a break. As per the custom, they offered us some milk tea and aarul and we went on our way. An hour later we did the same, this time at a beautiful spot overlooking a deep valley.

We stopped for a break and climbed up this hill to enjoy some milk tea with a herder family whose ger was just behind me. We didn't take any pictures of the gers or the families because we didn't feel it was appropriate.

An hour after that we stopped again. Since it was getting dark and near our 4-hour mark and midway point, I figured we wouldn’t stop again. With that in mind, I drank as much tea as was offered and ate some bortsog (tasty fried bread) expecting that to hold me over until we got back home. The drivers talked for a while with the ger family and the rest of us sat in mostly quiet except for polite platitudes. Satisfied for the remaining half of the trip, I crammed snuggly back into the jeep enjoying the most authentic, warming Mongolian experience one could ever have.

Then 20 minutes later we stopped again. Now, at 5 o’clock, the trip was losing its romance and I was beginning to lose my patience for all the stopping. People were expecting us back at 8 and we were still at least 4 hours away. Politely we drank our tea. The three young teachers were becoming restless, and we were all sleepy. Peder and I and the teachers sat on a bed and drifted in and out of consciousness. One girl took them up on the offer to lay down right about the time the lady of the household started chopping at a kilo of frozen meat. For the next twenty minutes she used a clever to hack off little shards of meat and collected them on the cutting board as she chatted. I turned to Peder, annoyed, and we agreed it sure looked like we were staying for dinner. We shared a laugh about how we thought the last ger would have been our last. Several older men wondered in, seemingly from nowhere, rolled and smoked cigarettes and enjoyed their milk tea and conversation.

As 6 o’clock rolled around, the teacher to my right asked about the time in a little bit of a huff and rolled her eyes. 15 minutes later she did the same. It was obvious to us about this time that our drivers actually knew our hosts and they continued to talk and have a good time while the rest of us sat silently observing.

7 o’clock came and went, and we continued to drink tea and guess what we might be having for dinner. It looked like soup: meat and water and some vegetables. Then she added some oil, and then some more. It probably wasn’t soup.

Mongolian stoves sit in the center of the round ger and have a round hole cut about two-and-a-half feet wide in the top, which is usually covered by a flat peice of metal with a handle. When they cook, they open the top and place a cast iron wok in the whole directly over the flames. They make everything this way, including tea.

At 7:30, I still wasn’t hungry after the bortsog and liters of tea I’d drowned myself in by this point, but we were treated to a tasty, but noticeably oily, rice dish with some little chucks of meat and root vegetables, a pretty common catch-all dinner here. Eagerly waited to leave despite the kind gesture from our hosts, I ate my portion and pocketed some fatty gristle to offload later.

I asked one of the girls if she was ready to go yet, and she affirmed her exhaustion with a pitiful head nod to the affirmative and a sigh. I asked why we were still there and she said she didn’t know either, but she was tired and ready to be home.

Soon after that, the old men of the ger and our older driver pulled out paper and seriously discussed something, which went on for about 20 minutes. Things got tense for a few minutes, but resolved. Then from a cold cabinet in the back of the ger emerged a bottle of vodka. As per custom, they offered it around the room starting with the men, oldest to youngest, then the woman, who politely refused their offering by lightly touching the glass to their lips and returning to the pourer. It was obvious then that the reason our drivers agreed to take us was so they could conduct this business on our way home.

Thankfully, we made it through the bottle pretty quickly. Certainly we were ready to go now. It was already past 8, the time we were supposed to have been back. As the second bottle came out of the cabinet, the three young teachers groaned their disbelief with us in chorus.

Bottle number two made its rounds. Luckily there were about 15 people in the ger, so it would be a quick ordeal, I thought. But every time it reached the second oldest man, instead of drinking it and keeping the rotation going, he would set it down and continue talking or rolling a cigarette or ignore if for no reason, and only one of the women was drinking. Telepathically, I tried to will him to pick up the glass and drink. My eyes focused on the tiny shot and drew a line from its place on the floor to his face. My patience had run out.

Finally, at a little after 9, the driver stood up and said, “Okay, let’s go.” We left the old lady there, so we rearranged the car a little. The old man in the back went to the front seat with the small driver and Peder rode between the seats on a wooden box. I still had a woman on my lap, but the other ladies got a chance to spread out a little bit.

The rest of the ride was a blur of pain in my leg from my lap passenger and frozen feet. Because there was only heat on the windshield, every other surface in the car had frost and ice on it. Where I was, I couldn’t see anything, so as we shook and weaved and banged around in the dark, I could only see the driver’s head in front of me and a little sliver ahead of us where the headlights hit the dirt and snow. At one point we lost the road for a while, which the driver eventually found it by driving wide swaths back and forth through the valley.

We were about an hour outside of Bayankhongor approaching a small village around 2:30 a.m. when we regained cell phone service when my phone started receiving text messages in sequence from Leslie (who was in UB), my site mates, the volunteers from Tsetserleg we’d left in the morning, my friend who had helped hire the driver and the Peace Corps safety and security officer. Thankfully there’s no voicemail in Mongolia or I would have had some of those too. As quickly as I could, I called or texted everyone to let them know we were still fine.

We stopped in the village and offloaded the old man, but picked up another woman and a baby.
By 3:30, Peder and I labored into my apartment, recounted our crazy trip, contacted the safety and security officer and crashed for the night.

As far as 8 hour car rides that turn into 14 hours, it could have been worse. We didn’t break down once, we got to see some beautiful countryside, we met some interesting people, and we had the most authentic Mongolian experience anyone could ever have just short of actually being Mongolian. We left late, we sat ten people in a car meant for five, we stopped at random countryside gers for generous hospitality accompanied by tea and aarul, and we sat around while two bottles vodka sealed a business deal.

All and all, I wouldn’t say I’d love to do it again anytime soon, but I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.