Mongolia

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I got off the train and stood on the platform looking around feeling defeated. For one it was a little surreal after 15 hours of deserted nothingness - no more life than a few odd yurts, camels and horses to end up in such a huge concrete busy city. I was tired, smelly and sticky (hadn't had a shower or changed since before my great wall hike), my feet and legs were black with dirt from the Hohhot train floor and I had cut myself somewhere so also had dried blood all over my feet. I didn't have a map and I couldn't speak a word of Mongolian (all my Mongolia info along with all my other research I had on my USB got eaten up by a virus in Cambodia). Oh Shit! And then a I see a woman holding up a sign for the hostel I'd actually booked (since I thought I needed a booking for my visa application). She was so friendly, her English was amazing and she took me back to the hostel where the rest of her family work and also speak perfect english. The hostel is really nice and homely, the staff are friendly and funny, offering me tea, coffee, vodka, etc and a tour of the place. Such amazing hospitality was definitely a big shock after China and suddenly I felt much better and energetic. I was also excited by the fact that I could read signs on the street - ok so half the time I have no idea what the word means but I can spell it out at least.

After cleaning my feet and eating some proper food for the first time in almost 2 days I started another epic ticket hunt. Places on the trans-mongolian route fill up quickly so I wanted to buy one straight away for the day my Russian visa starts. I refuse to take the regular evening train since it gets stuck at the border for up to 12 hours but one of the hostel staff told me there was an express train leaving that day so I made the half hour walk back to the train station and to the International booking office. I was sent back and forwards between 2 rooms afew times before understanding that I can't book a ticket for that particular train until the day before it leaves since it comes from Beijing so they don't know how many (if any) seats will be available. This sounded too risky so I went to buy a bus ticket instead, another 40 minute walk. Plenty of people speak good English here but funnily enough the people working at the international train booking office don't. They would have to ask other customers to translate.

Just like at the train station in Zamyn - Uud the bus ticket office was in a caotic building crammed full of other unrelated offices like banks and car registration (I think) and I couldn't figure out which one sold bus tickets. In the end I stood in a random line and and tried to buy a ticket and they showed me where the actual line to buy tickets was. It cost 4 times the price I'd read online. In the evening I went and ate at a vegetarian cafe conveniently close to my hostel and ate with a fork for the first time in months. I felt just as retarded as I did the first time I tried to eat with chopsticks which I now prefer!

I arranged to go on a ger-to-ger trip for the 5 full days i had in Mongolia. The regular tours involve alot of sitting in a car so I decided on this one even though you see much less of the country. I was sent to the Gorkhi-Terelj National Park area which is only a 2 hour bus ride from UB and apparently an area where the families can deal with the no-meat factor. I decided to give dairy a go for the sake of cultural sensitivity but was worried eating meat after so many years would make me sick. The trip was very different to what I had originally expected but still alot of fun and the families were really lovely. I would sum it up as one big milk drinking and bread eating party.

The only bus leaves at 4pm so I had a whole other day to waste in the city which ended up being pretty easy. I got off the bus at 'turtle rock' where I was met by the man from my first host family with his horses. We rode back to his Gers and I met his wife and daughter. The scenery around here was really nice but theres quite alot of tourist development and their place is really close to a big tourist ger camp which played loud music and had flashing disco lights!

Although the people at my hostel insisted several times that the families had been told that I didn't eat meat I was given a plate full of mutton dumplings. They didn't seem too suprised or put out when I explained I couldn't eat meat so maybe they forgot or just decided to try offering it to me anyway. The food I got this night turned out to be the best of the whole ger trip - at least 3 types of vegetables, fried. I also had tonnes of bread stick things and several cups of the infamous milk tea, an aquired taste which I seem to have. Maybe its just because I'm so used to food with massive amounts of salt in it that to me it just tasted like warm (and slightly oily) milk. My stomache on the other hand was not coping with this sudden influx of dairy products though. Luckily I'd gotten my stomache used to wheat again in China or it might have been abit too much.

The next day was abit of a flop mainly due to difficulties in communicating. The hostel had told me this would be a long day of horse riding so I was ready to leave just after breakfast. With signs and a tiny bit of English, the man explained (I thought) that we would have lunch at 12 at the Monastery camp up the hill. After no signs of leaving an hour later, he tries again. This time I think he means that we will have lunch at his ger at 12, then we will ride on to the monastery camp. I sat around feeling bored, a little awkward, and generally in the way of the wife and daughter cooking and cleaning. When we finally left at almost 2pm we rode in the opposite direction and I finally realised that he meant that I could hike up to the monastery camp and come back for lunch before leaving. Too bad, it would have been a really nice walk. The horse ride only lasted about 3 hours but I was very grateful for that. Even on the 20 minute ride from the bus stop the day before my eyes and nose had started itching and running and I remembered '"oh yeah, I'm kind of allergic to horses". We also trotted (or cantered?) most of the way which was increadibly painful as I jumped well off the saddle constantly and any attempt to lighten the crash back down with my legs really aggravated my knees. A big storm rolled in and it started to pour as we approached the next family while two wolf like aggressive dogs chased after us barking like crazy. I'd been thinking on this day that maybe I should have just done my own thing like I'd originally planned - hiking and camping, but with the area full of dangerous aggressive dogs maybe it was a good thing that I didn't.

There was more milk and bread when we arrived and as soon as the rain stopped the man from the first family left to go back home. I don't know anyones name since they were so long and difficult to pronounce that I forgot them all within 3 seconds. The second family was an older couple who had 4 children, 3 of whom were there at some point during the evening with supplies from the city, and the daughter seemed to live in the ger about 10m away. Unfortunately all they ever pull out of the supermarket bags are biscuits, chocolate, and lollies. I wouldn't have had a problem carrying some fruit and veg with me but the hostel insisted that this was unneccessary since the families would arrange it all, but the only vegetables they seem to know of are carrots and potatoes and they was definitely no fruit. They had 3 grandchildren who were also there and dragged me away to play by the river until dinner was ready. This time I decided not to take any chances and explained straight away that I don't eat meat. I got pasta with potatoes and carrot. The others had the same thing only with meat. I liked this family much better but I think it had a lot to do with my own change in approach and attitude. The kids could also keep me entertained as well while the adults worked and cooked. There were'nt as many trees in this area and the family only used cow dung as fuel for their stoves which burnt increadibly well.

The next day was better since I understood how things worked. I knew I wouldn't be leaving until after lunch so I took my time packing up my stuff, wandered around, and spent hours with the kids again, playing in the river, skimming rocks (although one of them had such bad aim the rock ended up hitting me in the mouth and I got a swollen bloody lip), and herding goats. I'm not sure if the goat herding was just a game or if we were actually meant to be bringing them back closer to the gers. After lunch (rice and potato soup) we left on a camel (for me) and a horse for the next family. I was releived that I didn't have to get on another horse but the camel turned out to be just as bad if not worse. Yes, camels also trott and when they do you bounce much higher than on a horse! We stopped to chat to a few people along the way and arrived at around 4pm to a small village consisting of a few families and some gers. This time I was staying in a house. There was more bread and milk then my camel guide left to go back home.

There were two guys (brothers of one of the neighbours) there who spoke a few words of English and took me and the granddaughter (who insisted she was 22 although she looked about 12 and I doubt she was any older than 16) for a drive to the river and a walk around. I've been called some pretty weird names on this trip but this was probably the best so far - they called me 'Moerdoev', but then again I couldn't pronounce or remember their names either. They convinced me I could drink from this one area a little way away from the river if you blow away the leaves and dead bugs from the surface. I'm not sure if they meant it was a spring but figured I was more likely to get sick from the massive change in diet and poor hygiene than from a few mouthfuls of stagnant swamp water.

I had rice in broth for dinner that night and plenty of milk and yoghurt. My stomache had quickly grown used to the dairy and I was really enjoying it and rediscovering my love of milk. This family didn't seem to make milk tea like everyone else and it was more or less just slightly diluted and heated milk. The family had 5 cows which I watched getting milked then got to help herd then out to the hills for the night. They also showed me their vegetable growing area (a small farm) but it would be weeks before anything was ready which explained why I only got rice for dinner. I was slightly horrified by their high pressure watering of seedlings approach but I think it's quite new and they're still learning.

It rained the next morning so there went my plans for a walk up the hill. That and the pack of horrible dogs that sometimes forced us to hide within the fenced property of the family. We went round to the neighbours ger and I played with the kids and talked to the mum who spoke a little bit of English. Her son was cute but a real brat and did his best to destroy everything including our chess games (thats ok, I was losing badly anyway), card games, my bag and my camera! By late afternoon I was worried and tried to communicate my concern and find out what was going on. I was told that this day involved hiking to the next family but they told me I would go by car (by this point they had given up with Mongolian and would use Russian words when trying to talk to me which made things much easier).

The car never showed up and after a good hour calling everyone in their phonebook it seemed to have been decided that I would stay with them an extra night. There was still the problem of how I would get back to Ulaanbaatar the next day though so I ended up getting a lift back that evening with one of the guys who was there the day before (and lives in UB). This meant I had one less day in the countryside but I was seriously craving fresh fruit and veg and clean water (theres no detergent so the pot used to boil water is the same one used to cook soup, milk, etc and just wiped out between uses so the water was always greasy) and I had a few things to organise before going to Russia so I wasn't that dissapointed. The fact that the families didn’t speak English wasn’t a huge problem but it would have been nice to find out a bit more about them. For example I tried at each place to ask if they were still nomadic and moved their house often or if they had settled where they were but no one ever understood my words or sign language for this.

This now meant I had another day in the city. I walked to the southern outskirts of town, to the Zaisan memorial and along the river. I tried to catch a bus back to town but I guess I got on the wrong bus which looped back and I got off where I started. I figured it was probably going to be faster and easier to walk. I wandered round alot, looked in some tacky souvenir shops and found more vegan restaurants.

I caught the bus to Ulan Ude the next day and had the company of an English girl from my hostel. It was a long and pretty boring ride as the scenery didn't change much. I spent some time listening to my learn Russian recordings and felt like I learnt quite a bit actually. We got to the border just after lunch and as expected it took hours! The first thing we were given was a Russian declaration form written only in Russian. Eventually one of the Mongolian customs guys comes over to help us although he also doesn't speak Russian so he was translating into Mongolian then into English which was never very successful. I knew the border crossing would be slow though so managed to stay calm. I also got yelled at repeatedly by the Russian customs woman for not having an arrival card which were handed out on the bus - but hey, it's not my fault they didn't give me one. She used the approach: when someone doesn't understand you, move closer and shout louder. After finally being allowed back onto the bus it was another long drive to Ulan Ude but quite beautiful. We stopped once more for a toilet break but since I didn't have any Roubles yet I had to wait 4 or 5 hours until we arrived.

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Comments

[m.i.a.]

ohhh i cant believe you got met off the train - thats lovely. and a ger disco party wowsers - party ger. so you were the only one on this ger to ger trip? after all that worry about the dairy culture in mongolia turns out your a natural at it - congrats. ahahahah the kids threw a rock and it hit you in the face. oh no. last week at drama one of the boys was concentrating so hard he bit his lip and it started bleeding, he thought he was going to die, i told him to toughen up and ignored his wimpering! its interesting with the third family - i wonder how long they had lived in a house and and that they seemed to be establishing garden suggests they are not as nomadic as they used to be? did you get any indication why that might be? so the tour was organised by the hostel that you stayed at? i wonder how much the families got for you staying with them. such great photos of the gers. im very jealous you got to see a ger before me! and multiple vegan resturants in ulaan baatar - amazing

[MadeleineY]

I'm not even sure the first two families living in the gers were nomadic. I always tried to ask but this sentence was too complex and my hand signals sucked so I never managed to get them to understand when I asked questions about that. Yeah, I was the only one on it and the hostel 'arranges' it by taking you to the bus stop and making sure you get on the bus and calling the first family so they know your coming. They told me that they take alot of comission for regular tours but for the ger-to-ger all my money goes to the families I stayed with. I'm not sure thats true, they must take abit for themselves? And yeah, UB was big on vego/vegan but I wonder where all the veges come from/ Probably on the train from China.

[Felicity]

I was sold on Mongolia in the first paragraph
Oh goat herding, I wouldn't have been able to get that song from the Sound of Music out of me head, yodel-ay ee-oo. I can't believe you have never been on a camel. They are hilarious looking animals, my brother cried the whole time we were on one in Broome. There is one that I drive past on the way into town here in Katherine, cracks me up every time. I don't know if I would go well in Mongolia, even though it sounds amazing, only because of the whole milk thing. It was one of the hardest things to let go for me when becoming vegan (my brother and I would drink 2 litres of the stuff between us a day as kids).

[MadeleineY]

I have been on camels before, once in Broome too but I didn't remember it ever being so painful! Tourist camels don't usually trott right? Your right though, they are rediculous things. Mine had extreme dreadlocks. I think you'd be ok. I was loving the milk again but as soon as I went back to the city it was as if all the dairy eating never happened and I didn't have a single craving! and I was pretty obsessed with milk and cheese before I went vegan

[m.i.a]

haha trotting camels with dreadlocks - thats what the riverland needs to bring in the tourists! mado how about that time that i went on that camel wine tasting tour with maria and couldnt sit down for the next 2 days!!!! bloody camels im also starting to think that you have split dairy personalities - there is one mado who never thinks about dairy anymore and this other dairy lover lurking in the background. also on the vegan news front - have you heard that felicity has just about given up honey!!!!!