Back to the 13th Century

Let me just say, I love working for Mongol Aspirations, one of the Bilingual Cambridge International Schools here in UB. Several times a year, they go out of their way to show us how much they appreciate our living on the other side of the world from our families to teach here. A couple of weeks ago, they did it again and took us on a tour of the 13th Century National Park.

The idiot foreigners like to sit in the back of the bus where every bump on the country roads sends us flying into the air and provides several huge laughs from the Mongolians when we scream and grunt. Oyuna, our Mongolian English teacher, was kind enough to sit back there with us.

It's a nice stretch of beautiful Mongolian countryside that holds several attractions that show what life was like in the 13th century when Chinggis Khan was in power.

On the way, we visited the Chinggis Khan Equestrian Statue (I like calling it "Shiny Chinggis" when I'm by myself). It's the largest statue of a horse in the world and I think it's only fitting that Chinggis would be sitting on it. 

I took this picture at another time I visited (a few summers ago, I think)

The elevator was out (of course it was) and so we had to climb the stairs to the top (this statue is about 131 feet tall btw). The thing is, the staircase got narrower and narrower as we ascended. Not cool.

This is Chinggis hugging us. (See why I call him "Shiny Chinggis"?)

Eric "holding" the gigantic whip that represents the golden whip that Chinggis  supposedly found on this site.

Under the statue is a museum and the biggest Mongolian boot in the world. It's a size 4, 680 and took about 250 squares of cow leather to make.

Our group consisted of our principal and his son, headmasters and their sons, a few office staff and our school bus driver. A very fun group!

In the museum we found a necklace with our favorite symbol on it - many of us wear a similar one around our necks. It's a symbol of a belief that was here in Mongolia about 1,000 years ago. Incredible.

We went to the King Palace and got to dress up and pretend we were Khans (Kings).

Eric and Beth Khan

We caught the Mongolians laughing at us and were told that it looked like Eric had two wives.  When I objected, they changed it to "a wife and a mother-in-law". Whaaaaat...

We went to the Shaman Camp which centers around a tree that was struck by lightning. Those who follow Shamanism believe places where lightning strikes the earth are where the heavens meet the earth and therefore very special places.

The tree had a huge bird's nest in it and had many prayer scarves tied to and around it.

 It had several gers around it for Shamans from all kinds of different tribes. 

(Click here to read about my visit to Mother Tree, another Shamanistic place).

This was inside one of the Shaman gers. It had several costumes for the Shaman to wear and drums.

We got to visit an Educational Camp but unfortunately, it was dark by then and pictures really didn't turn out too well. 

We also got to eat dinner in a ger and enjoyed some horhog (pronounced "horhuck") by candlelight. 

(Here is a blog that shows my first Easter here and how Hurhog is prepared)

We had a great time and felt very fortunate to be with such wonderful people in such a rich and beautiful country.

 If you ever come to Mongolia, you should really visit this place!

Hair cutting ceremony

It seems as though there are many cultures that like to commemorate a child's first haircut and the Mongolian culture is no different in this area. While in America, we may go to a barber while our mother takes some pictures and perhaps saves a lock or two, here in Mongolia there is an entire celebration (called a Daah Urgeeh). 

Once a child turns a certain age according to the lunar calendar (even ages for boys like 2 or 4 and odd ages for girls), their parents throw a party celebrating the child's transition from babyhood to childhood. This can be an intimate party just for family members or a big party with lots of guests and usually happens on a special day (a buddhist monk or lama can tell them when is the best time). I was fortunate to be invited to one of these which is really pretty cool as not many foreigners get to be involved (about a year ago - I'm behind on blogging).

This is my principal, Tumuur and his son on the right. They were sitting at the head table along with grandparents, aunts and uncles and other special family members and guests.

As with many Mongolian celebrations (and ours for that matter) there was a TON of great food. Here is a sheep and a tower of biscuit/cookie type things. Later in the evening, my principal cut the sheep and served everyone - it reminded me of the head of the household carving the turkey at Thanksgiving.

One of the courses was this chicken with pineapple and smiley faces. FUN!

What's a Mongolian celebration without entertainment - especially someone playing the horse head fiddle which is a very traditional Mongolian instrument.

 We sat down to eat a really nice meal with several courses and were entertained by singers, dancers and musicians. Once everyone had had a chance to eat and enjoy themselves, the ceremony began with another family member whose hair cutting ceremony was in the same lunar calendar as the boy  (this can be a close friend if no one in the family matches up) taking the first lock of hair. Scissors with a blue scarf (a prayer scarf) attached to them were used and as each lock of hair was cut, it was placed into a little pouch on the boys back. I discovered later that the hair must not be thrown away nor ever touch the ground and will be kept for another ceremony when the child enters adulthood. 

After this, the family members were then allowed to cut and with each cut, the guest gave a gift to the boy (money or toys).  I saw small little tinker toys all the way to child-sized battery powered cars that they can literally get into and drive around (this was a hit) as well as a nice bike. 

His grandfather rolled the hair up and afterwords, placed it in the boys pouch on his back.

A grandmother, very proud, and smiling from ear to ear with some tears in her eyes. So sweet.

Once the family members had their turn, it was time for us other guests to give gifts and cut his locks!

There was a friend helping us - I suppose so we didn't cut too much hair and none would be left for the other guests, haha! They had probably close to 100 people - he got a TON of fun gifts and money!

While he was going around, getting his first haircut, each table stood up and sang for all the guests. Many of the songs were like lullabies or nursery rhymes, songs about kids and/or mothers. My table had a few of us foreigners so we sang "You are my sunshine".

As the ceremony wound down, my principal came around to each table and we toasted to his son's transition into childhood.

As you can imagine, the boys hair looked pretty uneven and choppy after this ceremony but soon after, he got his head shaved and his "new" hair came in (kind of like us losing baby teeth so our adult teeth can come in). After this ceremony, his hair will be kept short.

It was a pretty neat experience to be a part of! And since then I've wondered if I could ever get my friends and family members to give me gifts for the privilege of cutting my hair...

The wrong side of the...culture

Today I have a sinus infection which means that I'm a lovely ball of phlegm. Growing up with allergies, I'm used to my nostrils taking turns mimicking a running faucet and feel quite certain that YOU have experienced this too...especially if you're from Texas and living around Tornado Alley.

The problem is that I'm sitting in the middle of a room, surrounded by my Mongolian teachers (good friends) who believe it to be rude to blow your nose in public. I don't want to offend them, they are all incredibly nice to me and it's not their fault that our cultures have different social expectations, so I'm going to the bathroom every now and then just to blow my nose. It got me to thinking about several of the cultural social differences that I've experienced while living here for the past two years.

 If you're like me, you probably don't think you're as shaped by your culture as you are - then you go to another culture and are slapped in the face by all that is different. It's easy to want to say "Hey! Y'all are all doing this completely wrong." or to be offended no one says "Bless you!"...as if they don't care that I just sneezed.

However, I need to make it perfectly clear that neither culture is right or wrong or more or less superior. I'm not writing this to complain or shame, just to point out the interesting differences in my North American/Texan culture and my Mongolian culture.

Sneezing, snot rockets and spit envy.
I didn't realize that blowing your nose in public wasn't socially accepted until about a year ago when a fellow American teacher here pointed out a sign that had been posted on our teacher announcement board. It stated something like "If you need to blow your nose, go to the toilet." Out of about 10-12 notices on the board, this sign was the ONLY ONE printed in English as the rest were in Mongolian. At the time, there were only two of us English speaking teachers. No doubt who this notice was for... The funny (cultural difference) thing is, it is perfectly acceptable to do a "snot rocket" (close one side of your nose and blow real hard out of the other - the contents of your nose not going into a tissue or anything, just out and on to the ground) in public. Spitting is also perfectly acceptable and Mongolians are really good at it - read about my Spit envy here.

Wait your turn...but only if you want to.
In Mongolia, waiting your turn is only a suggestion. Lines do form in some fashion, however others see absolutely no problem in jumping ahead of you. Especially when there's a crowd. I've watched as a poor cashier gets three or more different people shoving products and money at him/her. If she/he is really good, they can tell who was first and every now and then will tell the others to wait their turn but that is rare. My first instinct when this happened to me was to give them all dirty looks, then to give the cashier a dirty look for allowing it to happen. But the thing is, it's not considered half as rude as it is in North America so there's really no point. You just have to be bold and try to shove your products and money in the cashiers face before the rest of them...or just take a breath and be incredibly patient.
...I've learned to be more bold...

Movie theater rumblings
The first movie I saw in Mongolia was Ghost Rider 2. Aside from the terrible movie, I was in for a bit of culture shock when the mob of movie goers tried to all crowd into the theater at once (see the above cultural difference about waiting in line), the movie started early, no previews, phones went off throughout the movie - and people ANSWERED them in their regular speaking voice volume, and there was always a rumbling like conversations were going on throughout the movie. We get mad when people text during a movie but here, that's NOTHING. I've seen many more movies (good ones) and 9 times out of 10, people wait in line to get in, the movie starts on time, there are previews (my favorite part of the movie) and most people are quiet. I've actually gotten to the point where I don't mind the rumblings as much.

Did your mother ever teach you about staring?
Being a foreigner means I stand out. I shouldn't stand out that much - after all, this country was filled with Russians from 1921 to 1992 so it's not like Mongolians have never seen "white people". UB is FILLED with foreigners from all over the world: Russians, Chinese, Germans, Australians, Canadians, Indians, French, etc. so most of the people living here are very used to foreigners. Unfortunately, many people still stare - most don't mean anything by it, they are just curious and if you give them a friendly Texas smile, they'll smile back. However, there are days when I'm wrestling with insecurity and I don't want to be stared at - my North American culture buzzer goes off and I just want to yell at people to "STOP STARING! Don't you know that's rude?!" It's really not rude here.

Meeting time = TBD
So if you make plans in North America and set a time, we expect each other to be fairly punctual. Not so here. Now there are exceptions of course, you can't be late for school or work but when it comes to other things, it's totally acceptable to be several hours late. The Mongolian people see spending time with people to be a priority so if they are with friends/family and they are not ready to leave yet, they won't. Even if you have been waiting for two or three hours. They will show you the same affection though, once they get to your house, they will spend as much time as possible with you. It may be inconvenient but they are genuinely very warm and friendly.

An open invitation
To go along with the previous one, if you just show up at someones house, whether you know them or not, they will drop EVERYTHING and cook for you! You will get their finest drinks and entrees and will be welcome to stay for as long as you want. Their hospitality is unprecedented and a HUGE part of their traditions. I went over to my neighbors apartment the other day to drop something off and the husband immediately started making this HUGE beautiful omelet for me - I mean it must have been made from about ten eggs, literally. Just for me. Of course, I had just eaten and had to turn most of it away which I hated doing. This is definitely one of the many things I find beautiful about the Mongolian culture. If someone just shows up at my door in Texas unannounced, you're lucky if I even ANSWER the door, let alone let you in and wait on you!! Most likely, I'll give you a dirty look too...unless you're bringing me my nephew or a puppy.

Dinner is served! But just for you for now
Something I found surprising at first was how meals were served at restaurants. Whichever meal is ready first, comes to the table first. This can be awkward if you're out with several friends and only one or two actually have their meal, the others coming seemingly sporadically. Do you eat? Do you wait? If so, do you wait for everyone to get their meal or just most? Mongolians dig in whenever they get their meal - after all, why let it get cold? So that's what we do also - no guilt for starting in early, no worries for being the last one to finish. Nice.

Everyone is a taxi
If you need a taxi, just stick out your hand and one of the thousands of cars on the road will stop for you. In North America, it's considered dangerous and ill-advised to just get into a strangers car but here, not at all. Anyone wanting to earn a little extra money will pick up passengers and drive them wherever they need to go. The going rate is about 60 cents per kilometer but as a foreigner, I usually get charged a dollar or so. I don't mind because usually when I take a taxi, I'm too cold, too sick or too tired to care about getting over charged. Plus, I've had some fun conversations and met some neat people by doing this. It's strange but the truth is, it really is safe here and you can always wave them off if you get a strange vibe from them. I've only heard of one person who got hurt doing this and it's a "friend of a friend of a friend" type of story.


I kicked your foot
I love this one too! If you accidentally kick someones foot, you shake hands. Whether you're on the bus, or walking down the street, whether you kicked a complete stranger's foot or your best friend's foot, you shake their hand! It's so fun - it's like a little "oops, I'm sorry I kicked your foot, let's still be friends and shake hands." thing. I've done it on accident many times and I always wait for a hand to appear out of nowhere. Sometimes they see that I'm foreign and take their hand back like they don't expect me to know what to do about it. But when I offer my hand to shake, I get a little spark of appreciation look.

There are many more cultural differences but those are the ones that really stand out at the moment. Nothing like living in another culture to teach you humility and patience!

Time to go to the toilet to blow my nose again.

The Grade Book

This is my grade book.

It's called a "Teachers Journal".

It's all in Mongolian. 

The purple post-it note says:

"Do not make mistakes!

Don't use correction tape."

You can only write in blue ink.

I've written in pencil.

I've made mistakes.

I've used correction tape.

I'm fairly certain most of what I've written in it is wrong.

For those non-teachers, this is the book where I'm to record all my students, every one of their absences, all my lessons, all my assignments and grades. It's tedious work, especially when you're out for a few weeks. It's really easy to fall behind, which I've done miserably. To make things worse, some of my classes have been changing almost constantly and I'm still not sure how to record them accurately. 

I've made tons of mistakes. I showed my headmaster and she said, "Oh noooooo. This is not good." Pause. "It's ok, I'll just tell them (the people from the Ministry of Education) that you're a foreigner and didn't know better."

Soooo true. 

I wonder if that excuse will work even though they've explained it to me, clearly, several times now?

Mongolian men know how to appreciate their women.

It's Women's Day again in Mongolia (actually, it's tomorrow, March 8) and that means all the men in this country are letting the women in their lives know how much they mean to them. LOVE THIS HOLIDAY! It's kind of like their version of Mother's Day but they like to include all the other ladies in their lives.

Since we're at school today (it's Friday), the men gathered all the ladies up and serenaded us with a couple of beautiful songs about mothers. Then we were showered with candy, roses and wine (which I polite-fully declined as it goes against my contract). A few lovely speeches about how their lives would be boring without us. So sweet.

Then, we were ushered into the main common area where the senior boys were acting out plays, singing and dancing for all the girls in school. Most of the jokes I didn't really get (a drawback of being a foreigner) but could tell they had practiced and wanted to make us laugh - LOVE IT! More flowers, notes of appreciation and candy followed.

Happy Women's Day!!!

Women's Day last year was awesome as well!

The Number One Complaint

Every morning, I walk out of my apartment building and the first thing I do (if it's not too dark) is check the visibility. Most mornings, it's low meaning that I am about to begin my two-mile walk to school breathing toxic air and I usually mumble a few grumblings.
I now have two options:
1. I can just suck it up - literally, hoping that it doesn't affect my asthma or give me a sore throat before I get to school.

This was taken last winter -
I didn't even bother to
wear make up that day.
Just about everywhere
you see white is frost -
made from moisture from my breath -
it goes everywhere.

2. Wear my mask. The obvious choice is a mask right? But I hate wearing it because I can't walk too fast with it as I'm breathing in most of my carbon dioxide unless I'm breathing normally. It's also messy - the moisture from my breath collects in the mask so by the time I reach school, my makeup around my nose and mouth is gone, my face is wet under the mask, and everywhere that my breath escaped from the mask is frosty, including my eyelashes/mascara. This means that by the time I reach school, my makeup is ruined, my face is either wet or frozen, my skin will break out eventually, and my mask is soaked with spit and snot and makeup.
I'm not exaggerating but am writing this to be a little humorous because in the end, it's a small price to pay to make sure that most of the toxins in the air aren't reaching my lungs.

To give you more of an idea about what it's like here, read this article Life in a Toxic City. It's a little long but the first several paragraphs are interesting I think.

Every now and then, I'll ask my students what they would change about Ulan Bator and almost always, the first thing they say is the pollution. Hopefully, they will continue the work that is being done and eventually, UB won't be one of the most polluted cities on Earth.

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing!

Today is Christmas day and I would be lying if I said that I haven't had a few moments these past two days where I felt a little blue not being with my family. As usual though, so many things have been wonderful.
Here is a bit on how amazing my day has been!!

• It snowed yesterday - almost all day so I woke up to a white Christmas! This is special because usually this time of year it is way too cold to snow. That's right - TOO COLD to snow. It's been a "warm" winter and therefore, snow was a blessing.
• For a country that doesn't celebrate Christmas, there are tons of Christmas decorations everywhere - Christmas trees (called New Year trees here) are all over the city complete with a star on top!
• Melba and I gave our fellow teachers little Christmas gift bags which was fun to do!!
• I've been teaching my students what Christmas is about!

I gave my students the Christmas story cut up and rearranged.
They had to try to put it in order and then answer some reading comprehension questions.

They asked what a manger was. This was my answer.

• I got to give my students little Christmas gifts - mostly things you would find in a stocking - SO FUN!!

Here is one of my 10th grade classes opening their gifts.

•  All of the students sang a few Christmas songs just for Melba and I!

This is the common room - the students decorated it to look like a living room.
And did a pretty darn good job!!!
They were singing along with the karaoke on the TV.

Students singing! 



More students singing! Notice the big snowman.

•  After singing, they presented Melba and I with Christmas gifts and notes of appreciation!

I've felt very appreciated here and wouldn't trade the opportunity to tell my students all about my favorite holiday for anything.

Except maybe this face...

My nephew!

Merry Christmas and thank you to all of you who make it possible for me to be here!!! I appreciate your support, both financial and otherwise, 

TREMENDOUSLY!!!!!!

Bah Humbug already!

Today is Thanksgiving but I walked into the teacher room at school with a dark cloud circling above my head. I have plenty of reasons why.
Ahem.
I didn't wake up with my family close by, no plans to have a Thanksgiving feast or family games, no plans to go see a fun movie or play with my nephew. My apartment building had it's power turned off due to construction but forgot to turn mine back on yesterday so I woke up without power, my poor electronic devices running on fumes, the food in my fridge melting and going bad (I opened the window to the negative temps to help keep my food cool but it only let in tons of smoky, polluted air), couldn't see to put on my make-up, spilled coffee on my off-white CASHMERE scarf and my SUEDE skirt (which is fortunately brown) and on top of all that, I saw a dead dog and another limping with one of it's hind feet missing. Totally breaks my heart.

I actually feed strays treats/dog food when they'll let me. Yes, I'm THAT person.

It's definitely one of those mornings when I ask myself, "Wait, why am i here again?" But when I walked into the teacher room, I was greeted with "Happy Thanksgiving!" from my fellow Mongolian teachers. This wasn't expected because they don't celebrate Thanksgiving here. Then one of my students stopped me and said, "Happy Thanksgiving, Teacher! Thank you for being such a great teacher!" and melted my heart again.

Undeserved Grace. That's what I'm living in and who am I to not revel in it day to day.

My friend, Andrea, took this of me (I'm in the middle)
just being quiet and enjoying His beauty. Wish we could live this way!!!

SO, here is a list of things that have happened to me over the past 24 hours:

• I woke up in Mongolia - here for a purpose that is far greater than I will ever know.
• I spent last night drinking a semi cold Dr. Pepper, in a bubble bath, candle light, in total silence, not worrying about emails/social media/etc.
• Nothing in my fridge is irreplaceable
• Neither is my scarf or skirt
• I've been here for 21 months and this week was the first time I saw a dead dog - pretty incredible actually!!
• I rarely have problems with power, internet, water or heat - AWESOME!!!!!
• I'm surrounded by friends and family who wished me a Happy Thanksgiving
• I just got word that my power has been turned back on

Team Mongolia
A.K.A. My  family in Mongolia
A.K.A. A bunch of nerds living in Mongolia...

I've Got Skills! No, I've Got A Skill!

Ever since I learned that I couldn't hit a baseball, even when it was placed on a cone in front of me in T-Ball, I've known athletics was not going to play a big part in my life. Totally fine with this except people seem to think that I should be able to play SOMETHING at least. For example, last year around this time, my fellow Mongolian teachers insisted I play volleyball on their team against a rival school. I soon proved that I was not a liar and indeed, have absolutely NO TALENT at hitting a volleyball anywhere but out of bounds. They quickly replaced me with another teacher before anymore points were lost.

A couple of weekends ago, we took all our students to the countryside to watch them compete in tons of different sports. They have the teachers compete here and there against each other as well. So, here come the questions:
Do you play soccer? No.
Do you run? Heck no.
Do you play tug of war? N- oh, well, yeah, I can do that...
So, I got at the back of the rope and wrapped it around my hips as my students suggested and pulled. My hips finally proved helpful at something other than taking up too much room and my team won! Finally, something I can do that would qualify as a sport!!! ;)

Other than that, I spent most of the day watching our students compete and I couldn't be more proud of them! They all worked together beautifully, cheered each other on, and ran their tails off. Relay races, sprints, long jumps, soccer, and of course, wrestling just to name some highlights. Here are a few pictures - most taken by a fellow teacher Boggee who is much more talented at pics than me :)

One of our buses broke down so we took pictures of course.
"MT" are our school's initials.

Mugi and I have lunch almost everyday together.

Some of my 11th grade girls - so cute.

I don't know how they are able to drink a whole
2-liter and still be toothpicks!

Girls races.

They love soccer.

Lady teacher tug of war! My teammate Melba is in purple.

My athletic skill! I'm in the back, winning with my hip power.

Wrestling is the favorite of Mongolia.

I got to help hand out medals. Billy won about 7 that day.
And was hurting on Monday...

Everyone together!