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Published: November 18th 2006
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Sain bain uu
Well, it's amazing what a little communist vigour can do for one's spirit!
We've had a very interesting few days, and despite the total lack of hot water for almost a week, we're doing better.School began last Thursday with quite the fanfare...two opening ceremonies, complete with a matronly, portly-bottomed Russian MC, cute kids doing Russian song and dance routines, balloons floating off into the sky (pollute the city a bit more, kids!) and some pretty serious uniforms (suits and stilettos), set off by the hundreds of bunches of flowers held by the kids for their new teachers. (We got none, as we're not class teachers, and felt suffieciently hard-done-by). Although the Russian songs were undeniably cute, our favourite part was incidentally the only Mongolian performance. A girl performed the national dance, which was more aptly described as an amazing act of contortionism that our country surely couldn't match. Very pretty indeed.
In her big, booming voice, the very enthusiastic MC announced us (you'll have to imagine the strong Russian accent) to the crowd as:
Hockings Gareth Danielle and
Close Melanie Joy.
We waved to our adoring new fans and cringed at the latest contortion of
our names.
On Friday we had our first classes, which went quite well. We started with 9th grade, and have since taught everyone from 7th-11th, plus one "experimental" 5th grade class today. Kids are kids...there are a few clowns, but they're mostly quite sweet and okay at English. The older kids (Years 10 & 11) are our faves as they're good for a chat (and they love that we just got married and sigh at the romance of it all...Awwwww!).
Friday night was time for a celebration, so we walked to a restaurant near the Wrestling stadium that's been voted the best restaurant in UB for 7 years running in the "Mongol Messenger" newspaper. It's a North Indian joint and we went a little crazy and ordered loads of food, most of which we had to doggy-bag up for lunch the next day. The food was indeed excellent, and I must ask where they get their eggs...We're craving eggs like you wouldn't believe. We can't find them anywhere, possibly because of the avian flu problems, possibly not. We've only been able to get them at restaurants, and have done so enthusiastically.
On Saturday, Mel went off to
explore hereto-unexplored parts of the city.In a market (in search of eggs), she found us a very exciting pet. His name is Manuel, he lives on the windowsill, and he's a basil plant. We've been talking about getting a pet, but couldn't think of anything we could abandon after 9 months. Now if Manuel survives, we can just eat the rest of him before we leave. Problem solved!
After meeting in the city, we walked up to a cairn on a rise looking over the city and across to the mountains, then had Cuban for dinner (more eggs!)
We went to the movies for perhaps the last time for several months and saw Madagascar , just 'cos it was on. The coming attractions are decidedly uninspiring...The Fantastic Four, Deuce Bigalow...Eurpoean Gigolo, and Batman Begins. WHY?!? It's quite upsetting, really.
Sunday was mountain-climbing day! Long overdue, but had it not been for our health we'd have done it so long ago. The city sits in a bit of a bowl created by mountain peaks, which at the moment are invitingly green and rolling. We set off from the stadium, the scene of the boy-band-concert-debacle, and headed toward the
mountain. Before long, a river stood between us and the mountain, deep and flowing fast. We spotted a bridge, but decided to sit down on the riverbank for lunch before setting off for it. The weather was great, so we thoroughly enjoyed our Scottish reminiscing-over-bread-and-cheese-in-nice-spot moment. Again, in true Scottish form, we ploughed straight up the side of a VERY steep hill, passing grazing horses and goats. We walked for about 6 hours all up, and were really quite impressed at how clean the air looked from up there. It was a great view of the sprawling city...high rises in the centre and ger districts around the outside. The plants and insects atop the mounatin were certainly different...we've ever seen anything like it.
So back down the mountain, we went for some more eggs (Yay!) at a Korean restaurant we'll be sure to return to. Yes, it's true, we're avoiding Mongolian food, but it just smells so bad! But it does manage to creep into other foods anyway...and the repercussions are dire!
So on the food front, we're returning to that North Indian place tonight. We have to, you see, to celebrate the momentous occasion of our big
ONE MONTH anniversary (or is that lunarversary?) Yes, with no hot water we're smelling pretty rotten, but we're still sickeningly in love...Awwwww.
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