It's been quite a lazy week.

November 28, 2008

I realised that I forgot a story or two. The first is from when Mendee and I were in the market. The market was as full as any other time and we were carrying my bag Mongolian style. That’s where one person holds one handle and the other person gets the other and holds the bag between them. The first time I ever saw someone doing that made me giggle. I’ve found that it’s very helpful, though, if you have a heavy or cumbersome bag. So, we were pushing our way through the crowds and, as always, I was watching everyone, making sure they weren’t going to do anything stupid. About that time, I saw a guy coming toward us. He started to go around me, but when he saw how we were carrying the bag, he tried to go right between us and bumped into my chest at the same time someone from behind crowded close. That is one of the exact situations I’ve been warned against, so my OH CRAP reaction kicked in; but not before Mendee strong-armed the guy out of the way with some harsh words. The guy attempted to pick pocket me. He didn’t get anything, though. Still, my heart was beating fast for a minute.

This evening, we went to Budvar pub. Do you know about Budvar? It is the original Budweiser. There was actually a big lawsuit about four or five years ago, but of course, the American Budweiser didn’t get into any trouble, since they have a gazillion dollars. I thought we might meet some other PCVs there, but it ended up just being Mendee and me. That was cool. I really enjoyed the fact that they have dark beer. As I’ve said before, most of the beers in Mongolia are lagers, even the imported kind. I could tell he was as glad as I was to have another guy to talk to. He lives with his wife, son, and college-aged niece. We talked about all kinds of guy things. If you don’t know what guy conversations are like, I’m not going to enlighten you. It’s better that you stay innocent. Haha.

November 29, 2008

I woke up late today and felt pretty good. After trekking all over the city yesterday, I was really tired when I finally got in the bed last night. And the bed I slept in was huge. I could actually stretch out and not have my head and feet cramped. After taking my time to get ready, I met some other people and walked to where the Thanksgiving luncheon was to be. It was at a really ritzy neighbourhood, where the ambassador lives. Once inside, you could almost think that you were in some U.S. suburb. When I walked in, there was all kinds of food. Here is a list of what I had on my two different plates: turkey, stuffing, dressing, deviled-eggs, green bean casserole, hash brown casserole, mashed potatoes, salad (the real kind, not Mongolian salad, which is really slaw), slaw, celery with peanut butter and raisins, pita bread with spinach dip, chicken salad, strawberry tart, brownie, and at least 3 or 4 other things that I can't think of right now. That's a list of all the things that I ate, but only about 3/4 of the things that were there. Before I got there, I was totally expecting for people to only give half an effort into what they brought. I was happily surprised. There were about 50-60 Volunteers, 15 staff with their families, the ambassador and some embassy staff, and a couple of other people that have to do with American foreign affairs. It was nice to eat and visit with everyone. I especially enjoyed seeing Evan and Alex. They were with me during training and we were/are pretty close.

When I left there, I went to theatre and watched Tropical Thunder. There is always at least one American Movie playing, and that was it. The theatre is enormous. I got there just in time for the movie to start. There are assigned seats, but I didn’t even pay attention to that since there were plenty of empty seats. The Coke and popcorn was something that I haven’t had in a while and it was kind of nice. The movie was full of stupid humour and I was cracking up, but I noticed that the Mongolians weren’t. When I started paying attention to the Mongolian subtitles, I saw that things weren’t translated correctly. I don’t know if that’s because it was being edited or because those words/thoughts/concepts don’t translate. No matter. It didn’t take anything away from my enjoyment.

I left there and went to Budvar, since it is pretty much across the street. Last night, the place was hopping, but we were two of only six people when we showed up. About the time we were thinking about leaving, about 10 more PCVs randomly showed up. They had already been drinking and were a bit rowdy. One of my friends from Bagakhangai was in town, too, so she hung out with us for a bit. She is working on her masters at a school in UB, so she’s usually in the city on the weekends. About an hour later, she went home and the rest of us went to Oasis. That is the club that I went to before. Do you remember me telling you about it? They let PCVs in for free with the assumption that they will make up the cost in alcohol sales. I didn’t buy any alcohol there, but judging by everyone else’s drinks, the club wasn’t hurting for money. Most of the people that were at the Thanksgiving lunch were there, plus several Mongolian friends and other random people.

I met some really interesting people. Like any international capital, there are bound to be travelers, and if you’re in the right place, you are bound to meet them. I met a French guy named Damien. He is on his second world tour. This time, he has walked as much as possible from France. After he goes to China, he will slowly make his way back. I really like meeting new people and hearing their stories, so I was sure to ask him to share one of his favourite with me. He told me how he was walking in some mountain in Russia and it was getting dark. He was concerned about where he was going to stay for the night when he saw some lights off in the distance. He headed that way and found an old Russian farmhouse. When he first knocked on the door, they opened it, saw him, then shut it in his face. He screwed up his courage, knocked again, and pleaded his story to them. They ended up letting him come in for the night, fixed him a really nice dinner, and gave him a warm place to sleep. He said that he’d originally planned to leave in the morning, but he ended up staying for five days. When he left, the family was trying to get him to marry one of their daughters. Another guy I met was named Ryan, from South Africa. He went to photography school and his affluent family paid for a trip abroad. When it was over, his parents told him he could either move out and find a job or he could continue to travel and stay with them for free, but he would have to pay for his trips. He decided to travel. After working three jobs, seven days a week, for eight months, he had enough money saved up to turn in a notice at all his jobs. For whatever reason, he decided to come to Mongolia. When I told him about the old Russian military base where I live, he became very interested. He wants to be a war-zone photographer. I told him he was welcome to visit anytime and we made plans for him to visit me on Dec. 15. I really enjoy all the international connections that I’m making while I’m here.

November 30, 2008

This morning, I woke up and asked a friend back in my town when the last meeker would be going back. I was reminded that local elections were going on today, so the market was closed. Before, the elections were for districts. This time, it’s on the community level. Since the market was closed, that meant that there were no meekers there. They were somewhere else, and I had no idea where. My next thought was that I might be able to take the train. Mendee’s father is a train worker, so we asked him and found out that there was a train leaving this afternoon. That gave me enough time to run to the State Dept. store for some mushrooms and canned chili. I’ll eat some of the chili tomorrow and enjoy the heck out of it, I’m sure. When I left, I went across the street and ate two chicken sandwiches at Big Burger. As I’ve written before, chicken is hard to come by here, so whenever I can, I try to eat some. I really miss it. From there, I went back to Mendee’s and went with him to vote. We dropped off my flash drive to get some pictures printed, and then went to the train station to buy a ticket. It was much easier than I thought it would be. I just walked up to the counter, handed them my passport and money, told them where I wanted to go, and they handed me my ticket. When we got back to pack my stuff and pick up the pictures, I barely made it to the train on time. I had to run and get them to open the door to me. I was worried that I was going to have the same thing happen to me that happened to one of my friends on her way in. She missed her train by two minutes and didn’t get her money back.

When I got on and got settled, I was excited to be finally riding a real train. I rode a train in Amsterdam, to Brussels and back, but that was one of those new-fangled trains. You know, the kind that goes from zero to a million in less than a minute and you can hardly tell you’re even moving. This train was one like you’d see on old movies, chugging across the land. The train drowsily zig-zagged through the countryside and took about 2 hours and 40 minutes to get to my stop. If you remember, the train station is in the other part of town from where I live. I had talked to my boss, via text, and asked her to find someone to pick me up, but my phone died before she could find someone and let me know. I was a bit concerned when I got there. One of the train workers helped me carry my bag, and I think he was in the process of helping me get to where I wanted to go when a car honked at me. It was someone to pick me up. Whew! I was not looking forward to carrying my bag 6.5 kilometres, in the dark.

When I got home, I went and talked to my boss for a few minutes, then came home and surfed the web. That’s pretty much all I did tonight. When I talked to Ryan last night, he reminded me of a website called CouchSurfing.com. I had checked it out a long time ago, but had forgotten. I signed up tonight. Check it out if you like.

Now, I have a harrumph in my throat from all the smog and club smoke. I have never been in a city with smog before. UB is terrible. It’s even worse in the winter time, with the cold weather keeping it close to the ground. You can see and smell it the instant you walk outside. It’s actually got my nose sore, too. My nose is sensitive anyway, from getting banged up so much in wrestling, and it doesn’t take much to aggravate it. I’ll have to be careful not to get a nosebleed. For now, though, I’m going to bed a bit early. I’m still just a little sore from wrestling, and my legs are wore out from pounding the pavement across the city and back all weekend.

December 2, 2008

Today, in my English class, we reviewed for a test. Last week, I told them they will have a test on Dec. 16. I think I will make it written, with a mix of fill in the blanks, matching, and answering questions. We’ll see. Today’s lunch was boats. Yum! Even better was that they weren’t fresh out of the steamer, so I could eat them right away. The rest of my day was quite boring. I went to the social worker’s office, but they are always doing stuff on the computer, and I have no idea what it is. Even worse, they don’t know how to explain to me what they’re doing when I ask. Usually, I just sit there and do a little bit of language studying. That reminds me. Something happened to my Mongolian notebook. During training, I made a notebook with absolutely every lesson that we had, plus a lot of extra stuff. About three weeks ago, I couldn’t find my notebook. I’ve looked everywhere and asked people, and I can’t find it. I’m really bothered about that. I think that someone stole it. If that’s the case, that really makes me mad. Just the other day, I started making a new one. I won’t be able to reproduce the one I had, but at least it will be something. Luckily, the Peace Corps randomly sends out language materials, and I have my training book and a couple of others. Also, a guy sent us a link to something from the internet. I don’t know the exact address right now, but if you do a Google search for Byki, I’m sure you’ll find it. Look for the Mongolian stuff and you can check out the language. You can even download the lists. I doubt you’d want to, but I did.

December 3, 2008

Like all Wednesdays, I went to the other part of my town today. It’s always an adventure to see who my co-worker can find for me to ride with. Today, I rode with the driver of a benzene truck. I don’t know what benzene is, but when I asked him what was in his truck, that’s what he said he had. I got to the other part of town around 10:15 and they told me they were working on population numbers for people and animals. The animals in Mongolia outnumber people almost 10 to 1, so it’s a pretty big deal. I sat around for a little while, watching people working on their stats. At lunch time, some random lady showed up with hoshor and I enjoyed the free lunch. Just a few minutes after that, one of the social workers called my boss and then handed the phone to me. My boss told me that they were busy and I could go home to rest. Then, just to make sure I understood, she sent me a text message saying the same thing. I don’t know why they didn’t show me what was going on, or ask me to help, but I didn’t mind. The only thing was, there was no one going back toward my part of town any time soon. Instead of sitting around, I decided to take off walking. Wouldn’t you know, this was the coldest day so far. The Peace Corps Safety and Security Adviser sends us text messages when there is inclement weather. Last night, we got a message about how cold it was going to be. I thought about that as I took off walking the 6.5 km (4.01 miles). I put on my gloves and toboggan and took off walking. I wasn’t even out of the other part of town before my nose was freezing. You remember that harrumph I told you I had in my throat? Well, I’ve found out that if you want to get rid of something like that, just take off walking in negative temperatures. It all came into my nose and I couldn’t help but blow it out. Oh, and you know how you randomly see some rednecks put their thumb against one nostril and blow snot out the other? Gross, huh? Well, almost every person in Mongolia is a redneck, including me. That harrumph is gone now cause all the snot went from my throat to my nose. Gross! It took me 45 minutes to get to my apartment, and I was pretty doggone cold by the time I got here. I got online and check the temperature and it said that it was -20 degrees Celsius, and felt like -32 degrees Celsius. Whew! I feel tough after walking that far. I had to go to the bank, and there was a woman who asked me how I got here. When I told her I’d walked, she just looked at me. I told her I’m “strong” (tough) and she just giggled. I sure do feel tough after walking that far in such temperatures.

December 4, 2008

I knew there wasn’t going to be anything going on at work today, so I stayed home and slept late. For all of you who didn’t think I would do it, I’ve uploaded some pictures. It didn’t take a long as I thought it might, but it still took almost an hour. I guess that’s not bad for right at 250 pictures. I hope you enjoy them. Those are all that I’ve taken since I’ve been here. I went to work around 2:30 for my usual English lesson. Wouldn’t you know it, when I got there, no one came. I was getting ready to come back home when my co-worker, Oko, came into my office. She went looking for everyone and they all said they were busy. Oh well. You know I didn’t mind. I hung out with her for a bit before coming home.

December 5, 2008

This has been a lazy week for me. After this last weekend, knowing that I’m going to be gone all next week, I haven’t felt like doing anything. Good for me that my boss hasn’t been in town and nothing else has been going on. I slept late again today, then got up and cooked a really good brunch. Have I ever told you about “stuff?” It’s something that my mom used to make for me whenever I would go home. I really like it. It’s potatoes, onion, meat, and eggs, all fried together. I always put some strawberry jam and hot sauce on it, too. I ate a big bowl of it and wanted more. This afternoon, I went to teach English at the Labour and Social Welfare Department. There were only three people there, and two of them speak decent enough English to understand most of what I try to say if I speak really slow and use simple language. After that, I went to the school to talk with the students. There were only three girls and the teacher there. We talked for about 20 minutes, then they decided they’d rather play on the computer. Fine with me. I got a beer and came home early. Now, I’m cooking some pinto beans. I made some slaw earlier. I plan on having an easy evening.

I hope you are good. Next week, I will be in UB for training. I’ll come back to my town the following week. It will be good to hang out with Americans for a whole week. I’m sure I’ll feel as lazy as I have this week when I get back. I’ll have my internet with me, so email if you like. Oh, I’m downloading the new Ludacris CD right now. So excited. Talk to you later. See ya.