I had noticed mention of a total lunar eclipse on the web and it looked as if I might be able to see it but I couldn’t find any specifics about Mongolia. Last Saturday evening, the PCVs and I had dinner together and I mentioned we ought to look it up after dinner but we [...]
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Sounds mundane, doesn’t it? But nothing is ever mundane in Mongolia—at least to me. See if this sounds anything like your morning routine: It is December 1 and the temperature is running at a high of 10 degrees above zero during the day and a low of 10 degrees below zero at night (Fahrenheit). In [...]
A father getting his little daughter ready to go out into the cold.
Muron now has not just one, but two, sets of stoplights! Our first! The big deep holes for the poles have been ready for months at the two major intersections in town. People here are used to unmarked open holes here and there but fortunately there were no major accidents that I know of. The [...]
Muron’s own Naadam A five-year-old boy won the prize for riding the fastest horse in Muron’s Naadam recently. Really! If you’ve been reading my blog, you might be asking, “Didn’t you already celebrate Naadam in July?” The answer is yes, but… Naadam is the big summer holiday in Mongolia celebrating the three manly sports: horse [...]
Last Saturday morning dawned bright and beautiful with Mongolia’s incredibly blue sky studded with a few mini marshmallow clouds. Mornings are chilly now, but the temperature would rise to the high sixties later. I hustled to get dressed and gather a few items: my ayuk (cup), an extra sweater just in case, my camera. At [...]
I said I wouldn’t do it, but I did. I travelled to Ulaanbaatar by car last Sunday. That’s about 400 miles and it only took us about 14 hours. We even made 2 short stops plus one for lunch. And fortunately there were just six of us plus a baby in the car. The baby [...]
In the past few weeks, I’ve accosted every non-Mongolian person I see with this question. If the answer is yes, I deliver my little spiel about our craft ger shop where everything is handmade right here in Khovsgul. I invite them to visit the ger open from 9 to 7 every day and filled with [...]
The first winter I was in Mongolia, it turned out to be the coldest winter in some 40 years. What they call here a Dzud. Since I came back in late April, it’s turned out to be the wettest spring/summer most people can remember. I don’t know if it will set any records, but it’s [...]
Spring has arrived in my part of Mongolia and summer is right behind. The trees have leaves popping out and alpine-type flowers are showing up here and there. Our greenhouse has a lot of little cucumber and pepper plants that are now being sold to those wanting to start a garden. Last week as I [...]
“Juuuuu-dy”, someone calls from across the street. I turn to look and a person comes running with big hugs and “Sain b’nu”, welcoming me back to my other home, Muren in Mongolia. It happens over and over again. Some people knew I was returning and some are surprised to see me. Either way, it is [...]
Just a note to say I’m heading back to Mongolia as a Peace Corps Response Volunteer and I expect to be there about 9 months. As soon as I can I’ll post a blog with more details about what I’ll be doing and where I’ll be living. I do expect to spend most of my [...]
Happy New Year, friends, First, just a word to say we survived the Blizzard of 2010 that arrived the day after Christmas dropping 18 inches of snow and leaving us without power and heat for a while. I just dressed as I would in Mongolia and was fine. Neighbors kindly helped shovel me out and [...]
I’ve been home almost three months. It’s been great to see my granddaughters and the rest of my family, to visit with friends, and to see a full moon rise out of the ocean from my own back porch. On the one hand, it has been easy to slip back into an American life. Running [...]
But a little more “jiggety” than I would have liked. I am now back in Marblehead. Tracy came over to spend the last two weeks with me. When she arrived we spent a few days in the countryside at a beautiful location not too far from Muron. Went horseback riding two days. Near the end [...]
One of the things I’ve loved about this land of blue sky is its glorious clouds. Some days every direction you look has a different kind of cloud. Often I feel that I can reach up and pull them down. And at this time of year, the sky is so clear. Tonight I went outside [...]
This will be a short post–wanted to get in at least one more before I leave. Last week we had snow on the mountains here and again yesterday. If this is a sign of winter coming early this year, it’s time I headed for home. My boss came to work the other day and said [...]
I left out one thing in my last blog. It happened during Clayton’s family’s trip to visit me last month. This adventure deserved a blog of its own. If you read the blog, you’ll remember we left Muron to drive north to the town of Hatgol that lies at the south end of Lake Khuvsgul. [...]
Mongolians greet each other this way in the summer months: “Are you summering well?” My answer is yes but, for me, the days are passing too quickly and things are heating up—literally and figuratively. I’ll be heading back to America in September. Tracy is coming over to spend a little time here (I’m hoping we [...]
Peace Corps brought us all together recently for a couple of days about how to handle re-entry into the States. Actually, a lot of it was geared to those who will be job seeking or heading for grad school–I don’t really fit in either category but it was good to see the group together. Hope [...]
I just spent a month in UB working with the NGO, ADRA. They wanted to develop a printed catalog of the crafts that their Self-Help Groups make with the hope that the catalog could be put online at some point. I certainly learned a lot about the backroom issues like shipping, pricing, and payments options [...]
I could hear the sound of a flute outside the local ex-pat food market just as I was about to leave. I knew it was probably a street musician so before I went out I stopped to take some tugriks out of my purse. I always give to street musicians. As I stepped out the [...]
Apologies, the link at at the end of my previous post to the World Bank info on the Mongolian dzud and other problems Mongolia faces has now been repaired on that post…and it is also given here below.
http://blogs.worldbank.org/eastasiapacific/dzud-a-slow-natural-disaster-kills-livestock-and-livelihoods-in-mongolia
Recently, I gave some money to the World Vision office here to buy some food for a herder family out in the countryside (hoodoo). They had lost many animals and deep snow had made it difficult to reach them. A few sunny days here and there and a little melting had begun. [...]
In my last blog post, I told you about the Mongolia’s dzud. Here’s the latest update: According to the statistics of the Food, Agriculture and Light Industry Ministry, 5.067.395 — cows, sheep, goats, yaks, horses and camels — have died so far, with 60 percent of the country still buried under deep [...]
Definition: a natural disaster consisting of a summer drought, resulting in insufficient production of feed for livestock, followed by very heavy winter snow, winds and lower-than-normal temperatures. Unique to Mongolia, dzud results in frozen layers of ice that are impenetrable to the livestock and which isolate herders and villages.
Mongolia is currently experiencing a dzud. This [...]
Three days in a row I was invited out to dinner at friends’ homes and each one was completely different. I thought you would enjoy hearing about them.
The day before New Year’s Eve, a friend and I were invited to Enkhtuvshen’s home for dinner. Enkhtuvshen is a young woman in her
early 20s who has a [...]
I hesitated to post this blog. But please understand, this little story isn’t about me. But the incident so deeply touched me, I had to share it with you. And now, tonight as I draw near the fire on a cold winter’s evening and listen to the carol of Old King Wenceslas playing on my [...]
“Bayr Shin Jeel!” That’s the phonetic spelling for Happy New Year in Mongolian. Mongolians celebrate New Year’s and, to a certain extent Christmas, though more as a secular holiday. Children studying English learn a couple of Christmas songs like Jingle Bells and I Wish You a Merry Christmas and there are even Christmas trees and [...]
Since I published my last blog, Tracy and Clayton have paid their Asian visit. There were a couple of glitches. They flew to Seoul, arriving on a Saturday and found that the flight on to Ublaanbaatar had been cancelled due to the worst storm we’ve had since last winter! So they stayed overnight in Seoul [...]
That familiar phrase popped into my mind the other day for no particular reason, but on thinking about it, it now means something new to me. The language is still a challenge—even the newly arrived PCVs speak better than I do. But I hope that my actions—seeking out ways to help others, just being friendly—make [...]
I had expected to go to Renchinhlumbe in June (see last blog) and then spend the summer right here in my own home in Muron. But since then, I’ve been out of Muron 3 different times and am about to go to Ulaan Baatar for Peace Corp’s Mid-Service Training for a week.
The first trip was [...]
Last week I went to Renchinlhumbe. It took us 15 hours in a small Russian jeep with 9 people over the worst roads you can imagine—make that 10 times the worst roads you can imagine. Along the way we changed 2 flat tires, solved the problems of the innards of a wheel which had to [...]
Saturday, June 20 Summer solstice this last weekend—sun is setting around 10:30. I have to remind myself that it’s time to eat supper while the sun is still high in the sky!
Just had the first local produce of the season! At the zakh last weekend, I saw several women selling bunches of chives or wild [...]
This post is mostly photos because I haven’t had much time to write lately. They record a few events–one is the day after the recent presidential election which seemed not so much a political victory rally as a community participation event.
Then the next week there was Children’s Day–a day that celebrates children (and mothers), again [...]
This is not a political blog, and the following is not a political statement. But after reading the transcript of Obama’s recent speech in Egypt, I can only say that the speech was one of the most compelling communications I have ever heard. There are hardly words to describe it: articulate, forceful, compassionate, courageous, healing, [...]
Spring has definitely sprung here in Khuvsgul—you’ll see by the photos that we now have leafed out trees and little flowers growing here and there—what I’d call alpine flowers. The Siberian iris grow everywhere in town—not the tall ones we’re familiar with but short, stubby clumps of flowers. The fuzzy purple one in the photo [...]
Last Friday (May 1) was a great day—check out the photos below. It was the official opening of our Eco Club— dignitaries giving speeches and tv cameras filming the event, our own logo on a flag waving in the breeze, drums beating, and everyone in Muron collecting trash.
For me, it all started long ago. When [...]
Uuchlaarai!
That means “sorry” in Mongolian. And I’m sorry I’ve haven’t posted to my blog in awhile. Every day, it seems, I’m adding more things to my “To Do” list. I’ve often thought I really need a butler—someone like Bunter from the Lord Peter Wimsey mystery series. Someone who is supremely capable, anticipates your every need, [...]
This blog posting won’t have visuals. Instead you can access some interesting videos on YouTube. They were put up recently by a couple of my fellow PCVs. They show our swearing-in ceremony from last August. A number of people in our group are accomplished performers—and fortunately some people with cameras [...]
The biggest holiday in Mongolia is drawing to a close. Tsagaan Sar, which means White Month, celebrates the Lunar New Year. Mongolians will save up all year for this holiday. Weeks before, they will start making buuz (the little meat dumplings), often more than a thousand of them, along with a variety of other foods [...]
Forget the saying about too many cooks spoiling the broth! Over the past few weeks, I’ve had several cooking experiences, both American and Mongolian foods and had a lot of fun with the cooks. The first one was at the Titanic Bakery, same name as the boat but pronounced Teetanic.. Don’t know the background. I [...]
In a place where it gets very cold for a very long time, wood is very important—if that’s how you’re heating your home. Hope you won’t be bored by my obsession with it! My little wood stove is metal and about 18 inches by 27 inches. It’s supposed to heat 3 rooms with 8 foot ceilings [...]
“The only way to have a friend is to be one.” That’s a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson, one I’ve always loved. Here in Mongolia, it certainly brings results. I was walking to the zaakh (open market) today and began to think about my Mongolian friends. Maybe not friends in the bosom buddy kind of [...]
New Year’s started 13 hours earlier in my part of the world than for most of those who read this blog. I discovered it’s a bigger event here than I realized. I was invited to celebrate New Year’s at the home of one of my English students who celebrated Obama’s victory with me. [...]
Note: Am going to post this on October 24—so a lot has taken place in the last couple of weeks—including single digits for the temperature and 6 inches of snow a couple of days ago. I’ll send a blog update on that soon—but meanwhile here’s the one I prepared a while ago and [...]
This was the week to get the house and now me ready for winter. My woodpile is growing, the windows are getting better, and now I’m being winterized too. Last Tuesday, two of my co-workers and one of my language class students went to he zaak with me. We bought materials to winterize my windows [...]
Part of my wood is now stacked and part is in the house all split. Another load arrives today!
If you can’t take the cold, move to the kitchen!
As the nights get chillier, keeping warm will become more and more interesting! We are now having hard frosts at night though the days often warm up into [...]
While the weather is still pleasant here (chilly mornings in the 40s but warms up during the day), I walk as much as I can in addition to going to the office and back (about 1 kilometer to the office). So one afternoon this past week, I took a late afternoon walk. Lots of school [...]
There won’t be much text in this post but included are pictures of the views from my house. The greenhouse you see in one of the pictures came down today. Bold and Tselmaa have been working very hard bringing the in the harvest. i haven’t seen the fields but Bold brings in cartful after cartful [...]
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