Not much time left in training. woohoo!!

July 25, 2008

I just got in from town, posting my last blog. Whenever someone in our group gets a package, they always wait until we are finished for the day before they hand them out. Today, I was one of the lucky ones to get a package!! It was from my mom. Thanks mom! Mostly, it was some stuff that I’d gotten ready before I left, consisting of a few books, some writing pads, pens, and some Girl Scout Samoas. I love Samoas. Those are the absolute best cookies ever made, in my opinion. I have fond memories of sitting and sharing a box with someone, eating the whole thing in one sitting. I could eat a whole box by myself, though, but I try to have a little bit of control. Also in the package was some candies and snacks. Have you ever heard of Nilla Cakesters? I hadn’t until I opened the box. One of them was smashed, so I opened it first. OMG! Those things are awesome. I suggest you pause, right where you are, make a trip to the store, buy a whole bunch of them, eat some on the way back, and then eat the rest as you finish reading this. They are so good. The only thing that could make it better would be if I had some cold milk to go with all this stuff. Have I ever told you that I have an enormous sweet tooth? I love candy. Ha, one of the first things I learned to say in Mongolian is that I like candy – “Be chickerind dortay.” But, the sweets I have will last me quite a while. I have pretty good control when it comes to eating sweets. I feel fat enough with all the food that I’m served. As much as I want to eat all the candy, I know that I don’t need it. Now, when I get to where I’ll be, and will be cooking for myself, that might be a different story. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Today is Brother Baasan’s birthday. He seems to be a pretty cool fella. A few of us got together to celebrate in his name. It’s really a rare occasion that we get together, so it was a good time. When I left, we happened to be next to one of my cousin’s house. It just so happened that they were getting home at the same time, and they hopped out of their car to ask my help with their computer. They had a game they were trying to install and couldn’t figure out why it wouldn’t work. After some messing around and asking questions, I found out they had recently bought the computer in the capital. One problem, though, is that whoever sold them the computer had set up an administrator account and put a password on it. What a jerk! I have no idea how to explain to them that they probably didn’t buy what they think they did. Tomorrow, I will “help” them fix it. That probably consists of formatting their computer. Man, I hope I don’t mess something up for them.

By the way. Have you seen the show Futurama? It’s dumb, but funny. If you have a chance, check it out. And for my friends who know about San Francisco, you should check out Eddie Izzard’s stand-up Dressed to Kill. Good stuff.

July 26, 2008

When we first got here, we were told that we were going to have to do a community project this summer. In my bagh, there are two groups: the entire CYD group, and part of the Health group. At first, we were told that CYD had to split into two and do a project each, and the Health people had to do a project of their own. Then, we were told that we were going to have to do those projects, plus another project all together. I don’t know what the problem was, but we were getting all kinds of conflicting reports on exactly what we were to do. Finally, we were told that our entire bagh had to do one project, all together. Whew! That cut down on a lot of freaking out. Next, we got together to try and figure out what exactly we wanted to do. That is a story all its own, that I won’t relate here. Needless to say, there was plenty of argument involved. One wouldn’t think it would be that hard to agree on something, but I don’t think our bagh has ever totally agreed on anything, yet.

Eventually, it was resolved that we would make an area where the local kids could play volleyball. Kids here love basketball and volleyball. At first, we were going to do it at a random empty lot that kids play in all the time, after cleaning it up a bit. After some discussion with our teacher, and the sports director at the school, it was decided we would do it at the school; and instead of a volleyball court, we would make a track for them to run on. So, we made an appointment to meet at the school today, at 5 o’ clock, with all the shovels and kids we could gather. We showed up and got right to work, with the awkward Mongolian shovels that we’d brought. What is a Mongolian shovel, you ask? Well, have you ever seen those small, military shovels that have short handles, with no kind of an angle whatsoever? It’s basically like that, but the handle could be made out of anything from the thickness of a broomstick, to the thickness of something that your hand can’t entirely wrap around; and it could be wooden or metal. And most all of them are spade-shaped. I was the lucky one to have one that had a long handle made of wood, and the shovel head was angled slightly, and squared. Everyone with the other shovels went through and tore up the ground for me, then I used mine to “grade” the track, so it would be close to level: thirty metres by two metres. Within the first 20 minutes, I had a blister on the palm of my right hand. It took us almost four hours to finish. And the whole time, the sand fleas were eating away at our legs. As I’ve written before: either I’m tough, or I’m dumb. I’m just glad to be done with the whole thing. One more thing to check off our list. When we were finished, several of the kids started having races. That was cool to see. We were glad to see that they were at least getting a kick out of it tonight. Ha, once, when some kids were running back, some other kids started running. I don’t know how they didn’t see each other, but two kids ran into each other head-on, at full speed. Neither was hurt, so we all got a big laugh out of it. Man, Mongolians are freaking tough. I see things happen to kids all the time that would have an American kid absolutely screaming bloody murder.

A few weeks after being here, we were warned about what is called a “fire plant.” We thought the person telling us was just teasing, but he assured us he was not. He said that when you rub against it, it feels as if you are on fire. The only way to stop it is to pee on it. Kind of like a jelly-fish sting, I guess. Ha, he told us of one girl, who knew what it looked like, and squatted over one when she peed, with disastrous effects. Oww, I can only imagine. That would suck. Well, today, I had my own run in with the “fire plant.” As I was walking through a field, I saw a big plant and purposely stepped on it. I missed part of it, though, and it swiped right across my leg. Instantly, I said, “Yoi, yoi, yoi, yoi, yoi!” which is Mongolian for, “Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!” It felt just like it was described to us: as if my leg was on fire. After about 20 minutes, most of the sensation dissipated, but six hours later, I can still tell where the plant touched me. Too bad I was in a hurry and didn’t get a good look at the plant. I’ll have to find out what that thing looks like before this happens again. It’s quite uncomfortable.

July 27, 2008

What a day I’ve had. I woke up at a decent hour, for a Sunday, though it was still hours later than my host-family was up and about. As I was eating my breakfast, I told my host-mom that I was going to leave at 1 o’ clock and go to the other bagh. Well, as always, that set off a flurry of action. She ended up cooking a big lunch for me, about an hour and a half earlier than I would normally eat it. That made my breakfast and my lunch about an hour and a half apart. Oh well.

The other bagh was having a cookout and they had invited us. What fun. There are at least one or two people over there whose company I particularly enjoy, so I was looking forward to it. I had directions to the house where it was going to be, so I made the trip by myself. I even got the whole way without a taxi driver trying to rip me off. I was feeling good about myself. In my directions, it said that the house was a 15-20 minute walk from the school. I had my watch on, so I checked the time and set off, not paying much attention to anything but the time. After 15 minutes, there were no more houses, and there was plenty more hill. Okay, I thought, I’ll go another 5 minutes and see what I see. After 5 minutes, I still hadn’t crested the hill, so I figured that my pace was off and decided to check on the other side of the hill. Once on the other side, I couldn’t get a good view of what was going on, so I decided to go “right down there” and see what I could see. Well, before I could get “right down there,” a microbus full of people came from the direction I was heading and stopped next to me. The driver said, “Go back that way.” I said, “Why?” The driver looked at me and said, “Go back that way.” I said, “Why?” Another guy in the back poked his head out the window, and the driver said, “Go back that way.” I said, “Why?” Of course, this was all going down in Mongolian. I could feel the tension rising. The guy who had stuck his head out the window said, in English, “I’m Captain.” Okay, I thought, and…? In Mongolian, I said, “You mean, the police?” He said he was and I realised that there were several police on the microbus. Then he said, “Go back that way.” I said, “Why?” The driver asked for my passport. I told him I didn’t have my passport with me. Then everyone froze. Oh crap, I thought, and then I remembered my Peace Corps ID card and gave it to them. They took the requisite forever to look at my ID, as all police do, and then started asking me where I’m from. I told them I’m from America and I was just walking because I thought my friend’s house was that way. After all this confusion, a third policeman got out of the microbus, came around to me and said (in perfect English), “You can’t go that way. The Mongolian/Russian border is that way. You have to have a letter from town saying you can go that way. Only microbuses and taxis are allowed to go this way. You must go back the way you came.” Ohhhhhh! I thought, Why the heck didn’t you come out here and talk to me in the first place? Then the first police officer took my picture, with his cell phone no less, and we all went our way. As they drove away, over the hill, I thought, How do they know that I don’t let them get out of sight and then continue the direction I was going? Whatever. I finally found the house I was looking for. If I were to measure the distance at my pace, it only takes 10 minutes to get there. Oh well. Nothing like a good story.

At the cookout, we had a good time. They had all bought a bunch of food and decided to just get together and have a good time. It was nice. Mostly, it was just people sitting around socialising. In case you don’t know about me, I love socialising. I’m an adept when it comes to socialising. I’m quite the butterfly. I enjoyed visiting with the people over there. They made hamburgers and French fries. Of course, things here don’t fry crisply, so the French fries weren’t what was wanted, but they seemed to be alright. When we left, we went to find a taxi. I was 150tg short of being able to take the 700tg taxi ride, so one of the guys loaned that amount to me. After waiting and hoping for a taxi, one finally showed up. Then, he told us that since it was after 8 p.m., the ride was going to cost us 200tg more than normal. There were three of us in the taxi, and I thought one of the guys was going to get into a big argument with the driver. There are a few of us who take it personally when we feel as if we’re being ripped off, and he’s one of them. We decided to pay the fee, but that only took us into town. We had determined that we would not pay any more price hikes for the taxi to our bagh, so when we got to the taxi-stand and found out the prices, we decided to walk home.

It had rained a lot this morning, and on and off the whole day, so our normal route through the field was rife with water puddles. The zigging and zagging probably added at least 10 extra minutes to our time. I was pretty tired when I got home. On the way, I thought, the last thing I want to do right now is go home and speak Mongolian. You know how it is when you’re tired: you don’t want to have to engage your brain if you can get away with it. Well, wouldn’t you know it, we had company over; and they were drinking. Doh! Luckily, it is people I’d met before, so the novelty of me has worn off for them a little bit. Still, I was socially required to sit and have a couple of beers with them. It wasn’t too bad, though. I’ve noticed that in the last couple of days my understanding of Mongolian has increased. I don’t know if that’s because people are dumbing it down for me, or if I’m getting used to it. I hope it’s the latter. Still, it’s better than some people here. It’s kind of cool when people ask me what a Mongolian said cause they know I understand better than they do. In a couple of weeks, we will have another language test. The first one was just an assessment of what we had learned. This one will be the real-deal-Hollyfield, with the results being sent to Washington, D.C. We have one more unit to learn, and then we will spend the rest of the time doing review. I hope to do even better than I did the first time. That’s shooting for a lot, so cross your fingers for me.

July 29, 2008

Today was our last language lesson of new material. For the rest of the time, we will only do review. Our test will be at the end of next week. We are all very excited about it and can hardly wait for it to be over with. From what we were told, it will be the exact same kind of test that we took before, but about 10 minutes longer. I don’t think that will be very hard. I know that I can conjugate verbs better than before, so that will be a plus.

Also today, we learned who will be going to Bayan-Olgiy (the Kazakh region). I am very relieved to report that it will not be me. I don’t want to go there for two reasons. One is because I would have to begin a new language all over again. I struggle enough with Mongolian. The second reason is that I would feel so isolated over there. That region is what the Peace Corps calls a “fly site.” That means that you can only get there via a plane. It’s so far away, and over such rough terrain, that it would not be feasible to take a car there. It would just take too long. So, because of that, you can’t easily go and see your friends in other parts of the country. Mongolia is about the size of Alaska. That means it’s pretty big, but not too big to explore. If you’re over there, that limits your exploration, unless you are willing to spend more money to do it. I’m trying really hard to only live on the money that the Peace Corps gives me – and I’m doing good so far – so that means I probably won’t make it over there anytime soon.

This evening, as I was sitting on the porch studying, my host-dad and –mom said, “Trip, let’s go.” “Okay, where are we going?” I said. “That way,” they said. When we got to where we were going, the lady started taking my measurements. She was measuring me for a traditional Mongolian shirt. Sweet!! I have several friends whose host-parents have bought one for them, and I have been jealous. I don’t know if I’ve written this before, but I think my family is one of the poorest, so I didn’t think they would be getting one for me. I’m very excited about it. As you know, I’ll send pictures when I can.

July 30, 2008

So, I know there is at least one of you that knows I’m a pen snob, but did the rest of you know? If not: I am. In particular, there are two different kinds of pens that I use. Both are the ones that I had on my wants list. When I was packing my things to come to Mongolia, I was sure to pack enough of each to last me a couple of months, at least. The one kind, I use for letters and journaling. They write big and the ink flows as quickly as my thoughts. The other kind is the one that I carry in my pocket, all the time. If there is anything that I need to take a note about or if there is something that I need to sign, it is the one I reach for. Partly it is because I don’t want to use anyone else’s pen that could have been in anyone’s grubby hands or nasty mouth; but mostly because I like the precision that it affords. When I was back home, one pen could last me for about two months. I would usually be out of ink when I threw it away. Well, since I’ve been here, I’ve been lucky to have one last me a couple of weeks. For whatever reason, the balls keep coming out of them. It sucks even worse because it is hard to find good pens here. Especially for a pen snob.

On August 12, we will find out where our permanent sites will be. We are all very excited about it. I will write more about that later. The reason I mention it now is this: if there are mailings that you plan to send to me, and you haven’t gotten them ready yet, please wait until after then. I will email you with my new address then. I will not post it on my blog (as a matter of safety), so you will need to write it down and put it somewhere you won’t lose it. I will tell you all of this again when it is time, so don’t worry if you forget between now and then.

I’ll go to town tomorrow and post this. This weekend, we will have our host-family picnic, so I won’t be able to then. I hope you all are doing well. There are a few of you in particular who I have been missing more than usual lately. I think you know who you are. Please know that I love you as much as ever and I pray for you every day. For the rest of you, I miss you, too, and thank God for you. Take care.