Advertisement
Published: January 7th 2005
Edit Blog Post
Statue of fat guy
I dont know who he is. sorry Terribly sorry not to have written for a while, but- over the christmas and new years festivities i didnt really do a whole lot worth reporting on, as im sure my distinguished readership would be wholly uninterested in tales of drunken exploits. not that i drink.
Anyway merry christmas and happy new year, i hope you all had a great time and im sure oundle was, as always, excellent fun.
Whats that i hear you cry? what have you been up to? well, since i last wrote about lake baikial i have undergone many a trying test of my fortitude and composure, the most demanding of which took place apon my embarkation of the train to mongolia.
I left Irkutsk on the overnight train to Ulan Ude, from there i caught a train to the russian border town, where i planned to get some mongolian money and head on to Ulaan Bataar, however little did i know that the russian border town was so small and pathetic that no one had even heard of an ATM or Bankomat or money dispenser. So im in a tiny siberian town that exists soley for customs checks and to garrison
Circus
circus and some mountains in the background some angry looking soldiers with 200 roubles (4 pounds) and about 150 tugrigs (mongolian currency)(7.5p) so, unable to afford a ticket back to civilisation and cash machines i elected to boldly go on and cross the border, so i purchased a 150 rouble border crossing ticket- (a 10km journey that takes 5 hours because of customs and passport checks) and, after a 3 hour sleep in the station like a true grubby backpacker, i hoped on the train with absolute faith that something would come up to prevent me being stuck in outer mongolia with no money or way to travel on. Anyway we pull in to the border and the russian border guards storm the train, (i say storm because it sounds like something they should do being russian border guards, infact they just got on the train) this is at 3am, so the guards work their way through the train looking at passports glaring at would be immigrants and the miriad of people smuggeling goods back and forth for profit and then they get to me, she takes my passport looks at me to make sure its me and then walks off with it. my muted protestations fall
Sukbataars mausoleum
like lenins, except less evil and less open to the public on deaf ears and i watch as she leaves. im not too panicked though as she has other passports too- a few minuites later a male guard comes into the cabin and sits down with my passport and says, with a big golden grin; "you have problem" and proceded to explain that i wasnt properly registered, as i had been overnighting in trains so half the time i wasnt registered properly, this is a legitimate reason i think but he didnt want to hear it. so he starts to demand 1096 roubles as a fine (about 20 pounds) to allow the train to get on its way. I explaing that i would more than love to pay the fine but i have less than 50 roubles and 7.5pence in mongolian currency. of course this incenses him and he keeps banging the table and pointing at where he has written 1096 roubles.i repeatedly show him i have no money and cannot pay, i offer to pay in Sukbataar (mongolian border town (means axe hero how cool is that?!)) but of course thats out of his juristiction. So after about 15 miniutes of him angrily demanding money i didnt have he stood
up, tapped his shoulder badges and pointed to the garrision, laughed and said "good luck". then he leaves with my passport.
Of course now im a little worried.
After half an hour of sweat and contemplating how the russians will get their 1000 roubles worth of entertainment out of me another guard comes in hands me my passport without any funny looks, leaves the train and we start moving. I cant quite believe my luck, convince myself that i was at no point remotly worried and that all is well with the world. We pull into Sukbataar and i am dismayed to find it is smaller and more pathetic than the Russin border town. I look at the train timetables, but their in mongolian so they are of little help as my new russian timetable decoding ability is now useless. i change what roubles i have to tugrigs and with all the confidence of a man holding 40pence going to buy a long distance train ticket i march purposefully upto the counter and ask for a ticket to UB, she wants 5000T, i have 1000, sensing by her glare that she probabnly isnt in the mood to be
bargained with by some damn westerner i ask for Darkhan (which is half way) and, miracously it is 1000T! oh joy of joys! i leap triumphantly onto the train and read in my book about Darkhan, i read that that is the second largest city in the country and am sure that it will therefore have an ATM, satisfied i will not spend the rest of my life in mongolian train station waiting for christmas miracle, i start reading about Ulaan Bataar, and 7 words hit me like a trans siberian freight train:
"There are no ATMs in Ulaan Bataar"
Imagine the dispair, the fear and apprehension at what i would have to do to get money! I did not panic however, i saw that i had a choice, either panic and waste valuable calories wich i may need when living in outer mongolian train station with no money for food, or choose to ignore what i had read. i chose the second option and simply carried on reading. Apon arrivial in Darkhan i decided, since i was ignoring the sentance, i would look for a cash machine, and, low and behold, i found one. Pretty sure ive
never been happier; i damn near kissed the thing.
Anyway, I arrived in UB at 7am christmas eve, where about 20 peace corps people were for christmas so i 'hung out' with them and watched some movies, ate, drank and was merry. after recovering from the christmas/new years excesses I did some touristy things, took some photos and thats about it, food is so cheap here; you can eat alot, (and i mean alot by my standards) for 1 pound and you can eat at v.posh restaurants for 5pound a head. accomodation costs 2 pounds a night. oh the joy of being a westerner.
I leave for china on monday and will write again after Beijing.
P.s: I have added some photos of a country trip i did yesterday- views of some of the countryside, which is far prettier than UB.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.04s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 9; qc: 23; dbt: 0.0198s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Bilguun
non-member comment
Fat Guy Statue
The fat guy is B. Tserendorj, a political figure from the 1920's. He was the acting head of state in 1924, and some consider him to be the first president and/or prime minister (as the titles then did not follow those of the western parliamentary model, his position could be interpreted either way) of Mongolia. But it is not a fact that all Mongolians are clear upon, much like the rest of our 20th century history up until the fall of communism. Thank you for the photos, it brings back some nostalgic memories. I will make my way back home to Mongolia soon and am looking forward to it.