We have reached the end of our incredible peace corps experience. We finished in a fine fashion. We did a wonderful camping trip with a bunch of our peace corps people and mongolian friends. We rented a mini van and headed out. Our destination was a monastary at the top of the mountain. We stopped the first night at the most beautiful ger camp in Mongolia. It was located at the top of this cliff and at the bottom was a beautiful river with huge boulders everwhere. The boys went fishing (but caught nothing) and the girls looked cute. We brought along a special person to hunt a marmot for us. There was no other reason for him to be there, I don't know who he was, except that he can hunt a fine marmot. You cut the little head off, then turn it inside out, take out the guts and cut out the inside meat. Then you fill it with hot rocks and the bits of inside meat and the heart and liver. Steam was pouring out of this little marmot cooking sack. Then when it is all full you sew the neck up and blow torch the fur off. Then you cut it all up and eat it. It was the coolest bbq ever but the marmot meat is not awesome. Colin thought it tasted like squirrel which isn't a useful reference but there was not a lot of meat (mostly bone) and it was kinda wierd. The Mongolians think it tastes like horse. It decidely does not taste like chicken. That is about all I can say.

The next day we hiked to the monastary. It was 3k strait up a hill. Flys were everywhere! Millions of them! I just about died. But the monastary was beautiful, awesome views and pretty little temples. It was a wonderful camping trip.

Following was a series of goodbye parties. The first was jesse's work. We went out to dinner and fake disco. It was really nice. They gave everyone certificates of the heart to fill out about jesse and then they stood up and read them. We made a toast, recieved gifts, and then did some dancing in the resturant. At some point we were forced to teach a song and taught them the little green frog song.

Nadaam was fun but just kinda the same. We didn't stay long but my favorite part was the archery. I like it because they sing songs and stand really close to the target to make it more dangerous.

My office took us to the country side and we did a regular harhog (the hot rocks and meat in a container to cook) and we played traditional drinking games, in teams. They played with the mare's milk and since i can't drink it they made me take vodka shots instead. It was about 4 hours of drinking. It was really funny. I am actually quite good at the finger drinking game. It is like rock, paper, scissors but not.

The whole week we tried to say goodbye to people but no one wanted to say bye. So the morning that we left we met everyone at the square to say bye...but no one wanted to say bye still...so they followed us out to the very edge of town and we had wine and candy and then we said bye. It was sad and wierd. It didn't feel real so i was sad but not as sad as I might feel on the flight.

This week we have been in UB running around doing a bunch of paperwork and whatnot. Did I mention the whatnot? So much whatnot! So we are saying bye to PC people and are all ready to leave. One day left.

Thank you to our faithful and intermittent readers. Thanks to our friends and family who sent us yummy food, movies, and creature comforts. We hope that you enjoyed reading our random stories as much as we enjoyed living them.

Now to our next adventure...America or Bust.

We leave site in 15 days and Mongolia in 22. How crazy is that? We have been busy getting things wrapped up at work, work plans and reports for the new volunteers, and cleaning out our ger of things we don't need or want. Our social life has also picked up. A few weeks ago we planned a big party for our VSO friend. It was a going away/wedding shower/baby shower. We played some dumb games, ate a ton of food and had a pretty good time. Last week we went with my work to a retreat center, whose main purpose is that it has a shower, and hung out for a couple of days. It was really nice and peaceful. I gave a presentation on child labor to the social workers with jesse, my boss, and a confrence attendee as translators. We also played volleyball but my team sucked. This weekend we are going to the countryside with a bunch of people. It should be good. We are planning on seeing a big monastary that was the summer retreat of Zanbatzaar who was born in our aimag and started the Mongolian alphabet among other great achievements. One of the friends we are going with is a lam so he should be able to give us some cool insight as to what we see, or at least that is what we hope. We will also go to the waterfall. We are planning a bbq for the 4th of july. Our neighbor is a missionary from Argentina and brought a grill back with her so we might even make horse burgers. Then we have our great ger give away and then nadaam and more parties with our offices and at least one more camping trip and then we are gone! Whew. Catch all that?

Lots of things to do in UB...medical, dental, paperwork, kitty things, thesis things, and last minute souvenier shopping so place your orders now.... Then we are out, for good. A wierd thing to actually process. We have been preparing for america for a while but ....we will miss our mongolia home.

Keep on keepin on....

Today was a great day in jesse's volunteer life. Having started community meetings last fall and working though to this spring on a Peace Corps Wheat Fund project today was the opening ceremony.

Let me back up and explain. Wheat fund is availabe in some countries where USAID serves. They designate an amount to Peace Corp for them to grant to volunteers for community projects. Jesse applied for and recieved this grant. It was for $2000 USD, with the community providing 25% in matching funds (which they met and exceeded!). The idea for the project came from area health workers. They identified our container (black) market as an area that needs to be cleaned up. So the project entailed getting a big garbage can (like half a ton) made and installed, 12 smaller garbage cans placed around the market area, implementing regular trash pickup of the big canister, and hiring 5 new garbage workers to pick up the trash, sort it, and generally keep the market areas clean. They also trained 20 new health volunteers and are opening an environmental health resource room in the market.

Today kicked off the beginning of their campaign. Radio & TV covered the event and the aimag governor and arvaikheer governor as well as jesse all spoke today. It was pretty cool. I was very proud. They were able to distribute many posters as well.

Jesse wanted to leave his mark on arvaikheer and finish his service with a bang. This accomplished both.

Thats all from us.

Cheers.

so this blog is not because we have a lot to say but because we haven't blogged in a while. Today I gave a presentation about how to involve community in fighting child labor in our aimag. Now I am killing time waiting for jesse to be done with work, he couldn't finish earlier because his office was eating icecream. What a rough day. : )

We are happily planning our return to the states but are finding there are a lot of things to think about. We will land on July 22nd and be moved across country and jesse starting school by the 5th of Aug. Two very fast weeks. Everyday (now that my office has internet) I look at apartments on craigslist. Its fun. I know, I'm wierd. I also look at jobs, but it is disheartening. I will just keep crossing my fingers that something will come up that will be perfect...

We have our COS (close of service) confrence in two weeks. This is the time where PC tells us all the important info we need to return to the states and a big party with all of the M16s. Thinking about it, it is very similar to prom or something, once last hurrah before we all go our seperate ways in the big big world. Most of our class is leaving before the actual COS date (which is Aug 22). Like us, many are leaving in july.

The weather is getting nice. A cool wind but a warm sun. I think it is around 50 degrees F. Cinder loves it. Her hobbies are rolling in the dirt, shedding, and spying on the neighbors. She much perfers doing this in the sun but in a pinch dust storms and snow will do.

That is about it, like i said not a lot going on. Just wanted to check in.

Dip your day in awesome sauce.

So we went to the Yak Festival and it was...awesome. We rented a car and driver for the day and caravaned out with two other cars (peace corps, VSO, and some counterparts). It was located in a soum about 80k from our town. We had a little car and had to ford two rivers and one 2k section of lava rock field, no roads. We got stuck in one little river when we fell through the ice but we got out no problem and we didn't get any flat tires from the lava field either (nearly impossible I think).

So we pull up to this spot that has yak herds all around, a bunch of horses, motorcycles, and cars. They are setting up a bunch of gers to serve food and stuff. Each bagh (kinda like a neighborhood) had its own ger (maybe 5 total). Everyone was in dels and sporting their really nice stuff (fancy belts and the horses are all decked out too). Really beautiful. It was the first time that year that many had seen eachother, there was a lot of formal greetings. Us and some french doctors (who we told about the festivities) were the only foreigners so it was pretty authentically mongolian. Yak herders were there from all over our aimag (state).

The day started out cold and windy and progressed to cold, windy, and super dusty. By the end of the day we gross. Dirty everywhere. I can't over explain how windy it was. It was really tiring.

The first event was yak racing (they are not really high endurance animals) so it was kinda slow. The yak and rider who took second, the yak just stopped moving right before the finish line, the rider pretty much had to get off and push him over the line. Yaks have really long tounges and they were hanging out of their mouths as they panted their way to the end. It was pretty funny. We were almost run over by one that decided to run through the people rather than the course. I was taking pictures at the time so i didn't even see him coming. They took bets on the animals number 9 won, he was a champion yak, but I am not sure what for, he had medals hanging from his head. Then we were invited into one of the gers for tea and food. They made yak khushuur (the fried meat pouches) which were awesome! They tasted so good, like high quality cow, kinda. Then we had yak milk products, also good, this coming from someone who usually hides the arrol (hard milk curd) in her pocket and can't drink the airag (fermented mares milk) without feeling violently ill. Yak milk is really creamy and sweet. It made everything taste nice, especially the airag. Wierd huh? Who knew i heart yak?

We were introduced to some yak twins too. They were identical, and the mongolians were really proud of them. I think twins are rare. They were really soft and pretty calm. I wussed out and didn't get on though. They were giving me the eye. Jesse didn't either so i didn't feel too bad.

After the race and the animals had a chance to rest or get switched out they had yak polo. That was pretty funny to watch because they don't really like to go where you tell them. They played with a tennis ball and sticks. While we were watching polo a drunk driver started racing around the spectators and drove through the game. People had to run out of the way of the stupid a-hole. After he terrorized us for a minute or two he sped off into the countryside. The police chased him.

So those two events pretty much took all day. We were tired and polo was taking a long time because it was a tournament. We missed the official yak lassoing competition but we saw some informal stuff at the beginning. I took about 200 pictures. Here are some of my favorites.

That means it is cold and windy and sometimes snowy. In language training when we learned the seasons they would always ask what was your favorite season and why. I always said spring, and got the funniest looks. People hate spring here, and given the way the winters are, you know it's bad.

Not a lot going on here. Our town got wired (I think it is an election year) so I have internet at my office now and it is awesome.

Our kitty, Cinder, had a big drop in appetite recently for no good reason. We bought her camel but she wasn't eating it so we bought her horse again (what will we do when there is no more horse like in the summer and uh...america?) but she still didn't want to eat. She hates her dry cat food...so the only thing we found that works is pate. She will only eat pate if it is hand fed to her and you tell her she is a good kitty and a nice kitty and a pretty kitty. Jesse calls her is princess, yup, one spoiled kitty. And I think she is going into heat again, it is about one week on and one week off. So pretty soon she is going to wear us down and we will take her in to get fixed...

Next weekend is jesse's bday. We are going to a yak festival. How jealous are you? It is rumored they have yak polo, yak cart pulling competitions and other yak things plus a yak goods fair where you can buy yak purses and yak cheese or something. There are going to be three or so PC volunteers and about 5 VSO volunteers. It should be fun. It was supposed to be today but the government needed the yaks so they changed the date. Then yesterday they changed the town. So as long as we can find it we will be there.

I think that is all for now.

Well we have survived another tsagaan sar. For some reason this year was easier at people's houses. Less push to eat a ton and drink a ton, it was nice. We ended up visiting about 14 houses (!) I didn't know i knew that many people.

Last year we made pizza pockets for the work parties but this year jesse's work asked for sweets, so i made cookies. BIG mistake. stupid cookies. I borrowed our friends toaster oven and whipped up about 4 batches of cookies but we got our conversions wrong so it was super buttery...i had cowpie cookies not cookie cookies....and i could only bake 3 at a time. It took two days and much tweaking but his coworkers liked them, they don't make cookies here. For my work instead of a potluck present exchange like last year they decided to visit everyones home. So i had an 11 hour office party. Did I mention the 11 hour office party?! Jesse joined us (he ate 51 buuz that day and then groaned on the floor all night). The party came to our ger. I didn't make all the traditional things I made dessert. I felt like it would be less pressure if it was something totally new rather than trying to copy something they have been doing forever. So I made three awesome desserts (homemade chocolate pudding pie, pineapple upsidedown cake, and lemon squares). We served tea and soda, no vodka. They didn't really know what to do with it all but i think it was a nice break in the middle.

It has been crazy warm here, I think spring has started. Spring is not typically a nice season like it is in the states. Mainly it is just really windy and big temp changes, but this winter was not typical (warmest in 20 years) so maybe it will be a mild spring too.

I have some good pictures that i will try to post soon of tsagaan sar and such.

that's all for now.

cheers.

I was told that Wally checks our blog every week and calls Nan to let her know what is up in Mongolia. Well it has been a disappointing month of no new blogs, so this is for Wally.

We have lots of good news.

1) Jesse was accepted into STANFORD medical school. so that is pretty exciting, but isn't making the decision any easier. Although it is hard to say no to sunny cali and ivy league....

2) We got a new kitty as you can see. She found us. She was meowing outside our door and when we opened it up she dashed inside and refused to leave for about 7 days. Didn't even like to walk by the door. She was more than half starved. You could feel every bone in her little body. She ate 7 pounds of raw horse meat the first week! She has put on weight and isn't eating like a fiend anymore. We named her Cinder cuz within the first ten minutes she was curled up under the fireplace and covered in soot. She purrs alot and is quite cute. I call us her foster parents because we are not sure if we will take her home with us or not.

3) I got the resource room open. I am starting with a teachers club to improve spoken english and to have then utalize the resource room with their classes. We are right at semester change so we shall see who can make it. Thank you to those who sent books and materials, I couldn't have done it without you!

4) Work has been pretty good, for the last week or so jesse has daily given a presentation on quitting smoking and drinking to all the people who work at the government building. We also have been doing english club, getting ready for the english olympics in spring ( a big english competition in the aimag), and just completed our first pre-post natal parents group and health volunteers training. We did health topics (breast feeding, emotional health, choking...) and life skills ( money management, time management, exercise...). It went ok, more health volunteers than parents but i think it will be helpful to everyone in the end. The last day we did a 10 minute workout video with these 70 year old ladies. They were super cute and working hard. Wiping their brow when done. I am doing a soum social worker training tomorrow. Just found out this morning and not sure if i will have a translator, so it should be interesting.

I think that is it really. pretty good here, just got cold and super windy. i called in cold to work on friday afternoon... we are in pretty good health, my seasonal black lung is not too bad and jesse doesn't have a sinus infection.

ok thats all from us....

cheers

On christmas we got a call that my boss's father died. So that night we went over to the house to pay our respects. The funeral tradition is very different from what we are used to so I thought I would write about it. When we entered the house it was full of people, close friends of the family and her father. The first thing that struck me is that it is very quiet. No one was talking and there must have been 15-20 people there. Sanchir and her mom were both crying. Hugging isn't big here and leaving people to their saddness is big so they kinda wept by themselves but in the group. I don't know if that makes sense. No one was comforting them i guess. We were served milk tea, candy, salad and soup. When they were able to stop crying they were hosting us. It is very inline with mongolian hospitality and ritual but so different from the states, I wanted to be doing something but couldn't. People would periodically come in and make an offering at the buddist shrine (there is actually a picture of her father and the shrine on our first photo CD, he is the man giving jesse a snuff bottle). They made an offering of yellow fat (I didn't understand this part or where it comes from) and money. The money is used to host a party 40 days after the death. When we left the image that broke my heart was of the younger daughter who was serving us all this food quietly sobbing into her sisters shoulder. We gave money and a hug to sanchir and then left. The family will go into mourning, no special clothes or anything but I think they eat white foods and refrain from drinking. This is supposed to help send the departed pure into the afterlife. On the 40th day friends and family will gather again, light candles and eat rice with rasins in it. Jesse and I actually did that part yesterday for the past governor. You typically recieve matches and incense as well. The bodies are buried away from the town and depending on your sign and his sign and the month, loved ones may not even be able to visit the burial site. There are only simple rocks to mark a site. Burial sites are not tended to the same way either because there is so much superstition around death and being near death. Usually there are candles lit in the home for rememberance rather than visiting the grave.

There are a lot more funerals here than in the states it seems.

So that was our christmas funeral lesson.

Friends and Family

We wish you a very merry christmas and a happy new year.

We have just finished up training and are back in UB for the day to get some books and food to last the winter. We are headed back to site tomorrow and plan on spending a very quiet christmas just the two of us (our site mates were distracted by shiny things in the city and will not be joining us). New Years should provide a couple of office parties and way too much kareoke.

It is officially cold here and i have gotten my first real cold of the season as well. Yay me. When boogers freeze in your nose it makes it really hard to breath, who knew?

Our other update is that Jesse got into NYU as well. That makes 5 of 7 so far. The other two will come in Feb or March.

Ok then call if you can on christmas cuz it will be depressing if you don't. : )

Hiya,

Just a quick update before my meeting starts. We made it back to Mongolia just fine, and back to our site. It is cold but not the I-stepped-out-the-door-and-jesse's-beard-froze cold...yet. Right now it is more the immediate cough when i walk out the door and the slow freeze as i walk to work.

We are back in the capital to do IST training (in service training) for the M17s. Jesse is in charge of health and i am in charge of cyd. We are putting our sessions together this week and then on sat we start. It should be a busy but fine time catching up with all the newbies and not having to build fires and enjoying indoor plumbing.

Jesse has been accepted to two more schools since i last blogged....Georgetown and U Maryland. We sent in a tentative acceptance for georgetown but declined maryland's offer. We have created a decision matrix to size up all the schools and Maryland was always in the bottom three, so there you go.

I think that is all from us so far. Good luck to you as you do the holiday sprint.

cheers

hi all,

jesse and i have had a wonderful trip to the states. we started in Seattle hit DC, LA, and Denver plus jesse did a couple of quick jaunts to Ann Arbor, Chicago, NY and Palo Alto. He interviewed at 8 schools and has been accepted to two so far, UWashington and UMich @ Ann Arbor. We are waiting on more offers before making any decisions but will keep you posted.

We also had a wonderful time catching up with friends and family. Thank you so much to all of our hosts, without you it would have been one long uneventful trip.

Highlights:

Seattle: good conversations over pho, fakesgiving, LMW reconciliation, first interview, lady

DC: apples to apples, Liz's party, seeing the gonzali, sierra-tinis, tummy noogies, capital adventures

LA: Nana and papa visit, hanging out with dad, wine tasting, aunts, uncles and cousins, bday party and dinner

Denver: hanging with the crazy loar family, thanksgiving, and christmas in november

It is safe to say we are heading back to mongolia knowing that we are loved at home and with full hearts to serve out the rest of our time. This trip was a much needed recharge and we are (nearly) ready to brave another winter.

Cheers to all.

Jesse and I are wishing you and yours a very happy thanksgiving.

Things we are thankful for this year:

Health

Medical School acceptances

Spending time with friends and family

Not eating spam for thanksgiving

New opportunities on the horizon

New friends

Success at work

The support of our friends and family

Happy marriage

Cheers!!

Are you Falling well? Are your animals fat? Are you cold?

Ok so we are super excited now. We have put all our projects to rest for the next month-ish, have gone to our four going away parties, cleaned our ger, put items-not-to-be-frozen at our friends, endured the freezing bus ride with a crazy crying mongolian man and dead sheep thawing all over the seat, and are now in UB waiting the departure of our plane. T minus 24 hours.

We have a 14 hour layover in Seoul and i brought a couple of books, my crotcheting hooks and yarn, the computer with movies, and cards. I think i will make it but it is hard to be sure. I will probably need a magazine or two to come out the other end sane.

The move went well and our new hashaa family has been really nice. Everything looks the same on the inside of the ger but when you open the door it is a totally different yard. Took some getting used to, its pretty trippy. Plus the sounds you hear are all in different spots now. We are closer to the market and things, further from my office and the shower hosue, and closer to jesse's work. I took a ton of pictures and *gasp* we FINALLY got the second pict CD burned so it has a little bit of everything from the last year including the move. We will get on the distributing of it all once we reach the states.

Jesse did get another interview offer, this time to Maryland so that makes 6. 6 seems like a reasonable number and we are looking forward to everyone coming to where we live (wherever that may be). Matthew, lady, and others are welcome! : ) Jesse and i both showered but are afraid the sheep smell might be harder than that to shake so i am guessing people are going to want to leave us alone until we shower some more and wash some clothes and THEN all are welcome.

Look out america the Loars are on the move.

Hi ya'll

So Jesse and I have been keeping busy planning our trip to the states (what to eat, where to shop, what movies to see, did i mention what to eat?) and getting our current projects wrapped up or passed along. Jesse now has 5 interviews (UWashington, Georgetown, U Michigan, U Colorado, and Northwestern). Very exciting stuff, and perhaps a few more will come in before we go...

J has been working with the local AA chapter here and is giving a presentation today to the Technical college about safe and responsible drinking. Yesterday we had a training at a local hospital for new parents. It was a mix of new/young moms and neighborhood health volunteers...good capacity building opportunity. We had a good turn out and ended up on TV. Monday I am doing a training of trainers for my work on the mentoring program so they can do it while i am gone and have been working hard on getting the resource room put together. I think one more day and it's good. Jesse has started a new "wheat fund project" (a grant of $2000 given by the embassy from extra money generated by the selling of america's extra wheat or some such). He did a needs assessment with the community and they identified the open container market as a place they want to clean up. So they are proposing that regular trash pick up and garbage containers go in. The application process is pretty lengthy so he will be working on it in the states i suppose. But it should be good and a nice little legacy if it all works out.

Our world was turned a little upside down last week when we were unexpecdidly told we will have to move. Our hashaa (yard) is being sold and we needed to find a new place to live before we left for the states. We found out on Thursday and they wanted to move us that Sunday but it was too soon. Peace Corps happened to be here doing the fall checks on placements so were able to scope out some possible places. It ended up that most options (there were only a few since we still wanted to live in a ger) did not meet some standard. But we did find a new yard to pitch our ger, jesse's director's yard. Don't know much about the family. They just built a new house and there is the mom, dad, daughter and grandma living there. We move on Friday. We shall see how it goes. I think they will drop our ger, then pack the furniture (with all our stuff stashed in it because there aren't boxes or anything to pack into) and then move the furniture set it back up and then put the ger back up around it. I will take pictures to be sure.

Other than all that things are going well. A little stressful but that is ok. Hope to see many of you soon.

Cheers.

ok not yet but jesse is starting to get interviews to medical school! Yippee.....! Kinda nerve wracking actually. His first interview offer is to Georgetown and the second is to Northwestern. Both really good programs. The interview windows are for october but georgetown said whenever he comes home they would interview him and he hasn't talked to northwestern. so the earliest jesse would be coming home would be the middle of Oct. Few short weeks away. Hard to commit to a time without knowing if more schools will offer slots and when... blah.

On the Mongolia front we have been keeping busy at work. I just went on a trip to the countryside and gave two presentations durring "young family" day in a very remote soum. One was on baby choking and nutrition (sorta related) and the benefits of team building games to youth leaders at the secondary school. It was fun. I am making slow progress on the resource room (waiting on two book shipments and my counterparts to get a carpenter to come in) and am beginning training for our new "Big Brother, Big Sister" mentor program set to start the beginning of October. This weekend we hung out at the trade fair. They had zucchine like last year but this year we bought three not just one. And they had hot peppers so i think we will can some salsa. very exciting.

Jesse has been working hard too. he organized a presentation at the trade fair (one on dairy safety and one as an health info fair). He has also been working on getting some new AIDS programs up and going and getting a project planning workhop off the ground. Rumors of health TV shows also abound. We have both been working with kids at the new english speakers club and get some satisfaction from that.

Nothing new with the ger...we winterized last weekend and then it promtly got warm again but no complaints from me.

Ok I think that is all. Just a quick update.

Cheers.

it snowed yesterday. the wait for winter is over. it is officially cold and windy.

: )

I think waiting for winter will be the title of my book on Mongolia. It pretty much sums it up. We have been enjoying the last moments of summer. School started on the first so everyone is back in town and kids are everywhere! Last weekend I did a girls weekend in the gobi. It was really fun. We ate, drank, and made merry. Went to an oasis and a old monastary ruin in the middle of nowhere. It was surrounded by a nasty bog that we had to wade through. Two people fell in and a couple of near misses. We were covered in mud and laughing our butts off. Jesse did a quick in and out of the capital for a pc training while I was away and then hung out with our new site mates.

We have two new site mates, both english teachers. They seem pretty cool. It is hard starting all over again making friends (especially when they live in the same apartment as our old friends) but it is working out fine considering my aversion to people.

This weekend jesse me and two of our site mates went with some mongolian friends to the countryside. We hiked up a couple of hills that were littered with petroglyphs. Someone did a count (not our group) and came up with a number of around 300. There were some really old simple drawings and some "newer" looking ones with a little more detail that were chiseled into the rock. Then we went on a picnic near some rocks. Had fun just hanging out but then one of the girls we were with got an allergic reaction and we hastily packed up and drove to the emergency room. She sounds like she is recovering ok but it was a little hairy for a while. New resolution: carry first aid at all times.

We are excited to start back to work in earnest and have some fun work projects on the horizon I think.

The weather is already seattle winter level but is just the start of fall. We had a rather wet cold summer so I think winter might be colder than last year. This morning we could see our breath in the ger. So gearing back up for winter and all that it entails but the break in the middle for jesse's med school interviews will help us make it through.

Hope all is well. Gotta get off the internet now.

Cheers!

Hi all,

I am wondering if people who have English Literacy Resource Room materials in the mail or in the back of the closet waiting to be mailed could respond to this post. I would like to get an idea of the types of things coming, amount coming, and timing so I can make plans for the opening ceremony and literacy room events.

Thanks!

So we are I guess officially done with our summer vacation...leave tomorrow to go back to site. To sum it up, it was awesome. Let me give you the low down:

Lady and Ken came in on Wednesday the 5th and I met them at the train station. Lady cried and I just had something in my eye. The next day, with the help of some friend of a friend action we were able to get into a car and go down to arvaikheer. The driver was super great. He was telling Ken all about things as we passed them (in Mongolian) and Ken smiled and nodded. Lady feared for her life in the back seat and we bumped our heads a couple times as the car became air born. At one point we turned around to pick up a dead marmot and place it in between the windshield and the windshield wiper. I think he forgot it was there because he turned the wipers on and the marmot went across the window like a little marmot flag. When we arrived at our ger jesse was there to greet us moments after putting the finishing touches on the ger. We relaxed, opened presents and made some good food.

While in Arvaikheer we had lunch with my boss, toured the children's center where I worked, Ken did music lessons for his new muurn huur, we climbed a mountain to look at petroglyphs (which rock), went to a concert (where the shaman guy caught the curtans and himself on fire accidentally, no one was hurt), and did nadaam for a day.

Then we went to Kharkhorum, the ancient capital and stayed at a ger camp. It was cold. Oddly cold. We hitched a ride with some tour company since we didn't have a driver coming until the next day and toured around the huge monestary. It was beautiful. Tragic history. At one point it had over 10,000 lams living in its walls, now it has like 30. It was mostly distroyed by the russian purges. The next day we took off for White Lake.

White lake was really pretty. Huge lake surrounded by volcanos. We stayed at a ger family camp thing with a couple of other tourists. We had some good cultural exchanges. My highlight was that the mongolians were tripped out jesse was speaking mongolian to them while Ken played the muurn huur and I fed them s'mores. White Lake however was colder and rainer than Kharkhorum so i stayed pretty close to the ger and fire. The boys did do a little fishing and everyone did a little hiking.

Then we headed back to UB but it was a two day trip so we made another stop at ulgii lake. This one has the thickest, largest swarm of mysquitos (sp?) that I have ever seen, so after soaking ourselves in deet we were back outside. Jesse got all wet trying to get some fish and mom and I drank wine and watched. Much better than fishing i think.

When we got to UB the next day we had a nice dinner and just hung out. On Saturday we went to this amazing performance called tumen ekh. They did all the traditional things: throat singing, dancing, shaman dances, all the cool instraments, and contortion. It was amazing. Really the best we have seen. Then right outside there was this kazak ger. So we went inside for another little show. The man told us all about the kazak traditions, ger, lifestyle, eagle hunting, and food things. It was really fun and informative. Then we went out to another nice dinner.

The following day we were scheduled to go to a nature reserve but we wussed out and stayed at the hotel. We were super tired.

Our last adventure took us to gan-galuut nature reserve ger camp. This was by far everyone's favorite I think. It had nice weather, right on the river (but no bugs) and beautiful hills and fun things to do. We did a horse back ride for a couple of hours. My horse was being a jerk. But everyone else seemed to have a good time. Jesse was galloping off (not on purpose) but looking like a master horseman. Ken knew how to ride so had a good time and lady's horse was used to following other horses so she was always riding someones butt. We fished, napped, hiked and ate harhog (the one where they put hot stones and meat in a pot to cook). It was really good.

On wednesday back in UB was lady's birthday. We just kinda dinked around the city and then took her out for a wonderful indian food dinner. Sat in a little tent and lounged on the floor pillows. It was fun, good birthday day.

That pretty much concludes the Loar summer vacation recap. We are now headed back to site and hopefully will be busy for a while.

That is all from us...over and out.

It is so hot today. No joke two weeks ago it was snowing and now it is oppresively hot. Blah.

We are still in Darkhan. We just finished our first week of technical sessions. They are going well. I taught on how to give presentations when you don't know much. Which is most of the time. Jesse taught on health promotion in numerous settings. We both went on field trips to various sites and gave overviews of how it is (generally) in Mongolia. The trainees seem overwhelmed but good.

We have had the opportunity to host a bunch of people who bounce through Darkhan. So it has been fun to catch up with everyone who we hardly ever see. Still enjoying our awesome digs. Besides the fact that it rains inside when it rains outside and we broke the cold water knob in the bathroom it all seems to be going swimmingly.

Claire the puppy is doing well. She is huge. Swear she grew an inch overnight. Her bladder control is better but not perfect. Lots of walking up and down 5 flights of stairs to take her out to "get busy" (that is the go potty command). She sits like a champ and is learning "off" and "wait." Takes a lot of energy to train a puppy. Jesse and I have decided for sure no babies and puppies at the same time. That would equal no sleep and lots of grumpy.

We are quickly approaching our last weekend here. Jesse leaves next friday to return home. I follow a week later with lady and ken. A vacation will be really nice.

I can't think of anything very exciting to write on but that is the update nevertheless.

Cheers!

So it has been a crazy crazy week, or maybe it has been two weeks? I don't remember. We have had very little down time but it has been good. Jesse and I arrived in Darkhan and moved into an apartment. It has a shower and hot water and is pretty awesome. The only downside is that there are only singe beds in seperate rooms. We pulled the mattresses off and are sleeping on the floor in the kitchen, so it is kind of ger like but square not round. We have been in TOT (Training of Trainers) last week and this week. Last week it was a lot of peace corps focused stuff but this week has been focused on getting session outlines prepared for the summer. Last wednesday my group went up to Sukhbataar where the CYD people will be training. It is right on the Russian boarder and is really beautiful. There are trees and a river up there. Almost everyone lives in a house because wood is so plentiful, which is the exact opposite of Arvaikheer. We visisted all of the host families and looked at where the trainees will be staying. Met with a bunch of organizations and I think training this year for CYD is going to be really busy but good. Jesse and I have been put in charge of our respective sectors to hash out training schedule, topics and whatnot. Balancing act for sure.

Today is a holiday in Mongolia, women and children's day. We have a staff retreat and will be going to a children's camp to do group bonding and sports. I have allergies now (never had them in the states) so i may sit stuff out, plus I prefer not to run for pleasure. So we shall see. Jesse has had lots of boy time (all the other trainers but one are boys) and has been playing basketball a couple nights a week so I am guessing there will be a hot game today.

Saturday we saw jesse's host mom and almost didn't recognize her. She lost a ton of weight and cut her hair. She looks good. She is getting another volunteer this year. She gave jesse a 5 minute hug. We are going out there on saturday to see the rest of the family. On sunday I randomly ran into my host sister at the black market. I had a feeling i would see someone and i did. crazy.

Last night we had mexican night and invited over some trainers and some of our new mongolian counterparts. They liked everthing. Amazing. I thought for sure they would just pick at food but everyone got their eat on. Then we watched the story of the weeping camel. Now that i understand mongolian the subtitiles are really funny, not quite a literal translation for sure.

Two nights ago our friends resuced a little puppy and we went over to play with her. They are going to Russia for the next three weeks so we may get to puppy sit. I am excited.

We head up to UB on sunday this week to welcome in the new volunteers on midnight monday. There will be a ton of current volunteers there at the airport. It should be really fun. Then training starts and all our preperations hopefully will bear out.

This has been a really random post and i don't even know if i covered everything but i gotta get in a micro so i will go. Hope the other half is living well. Cheers!

Ok so it is 9am and we are ready to rock and roll our way to Darkhan. We have been in UB for the week doing medical stuff...we are both healthy and cavity free (for once)...and working on our training schedule. It is going to be a very busy time for the new PCTs but i think it will be 100 times better than our training was, or at least the technical sessions that jesse and I are doing. : )

We are training up in Sukhbataar which is right on the russian boarder. Supposed to be pretty but it is 2 hours each way so a little bit of a trek three days a week.

The newbies come on June 5th. There are a ton of volunteers to come up and welcome them at the airport. The M15 did it for us last year and it was crazy. Quite the welcome.

Ok we are loading up our car so i gotta go but will send some updates soon.

We are going to visit host families soon so that should be wierd and mostly good i think.

Cheers.

So Jesse and I sat down this weekend and put together another...drum roll please....picture CD! Aptly titled "Picture CD 2." So we will send it out to the Loars to make copies and pass along to friends and family. You will see amazing mongolian sights and your favorite PCVs. It is going to be huge.

As far as updates not a lot. It snowed yesterday and today so that is random. Working on Jesse's med school stuff and contimplating our lives so that is fun. The phone system is down today so I am going through texting withdrawls, not pretty.

Ok just thought I would let you all know to be anxiously expecting the mailman to give you something great in the next 7-12 weeks. : )

Words of wisdom today brought to you by John "Palindrome" Koehn: Step on no pets.