Helen: It's how i imagined NZ was going to be. Honestly, it looks like something from LoTR. Except, up close, it's not quite as impressive - it's sooo dry and dusty. it's just the end of winter here, and everything's just beginning to recover from being under snow for the last 6 months. It'll probably all be green and gorgeous in a few weeks - before the temperatures get up to 40 degrees! I just don't know how anyone manages to live here - the climate is so extreme. but they do - in little white felt covered gers. and they are so hospitable (probably because the climate is so harsh). we stayed with families this past week, or in tourist camps which weren't properly open yet, so we had a real insight into Mongolian life in the countryside - mostly it was just us, our guide who spoke english, our driver (who didn't) and some leathery skinned, toothless herders and their families. Mongolian life in the countryside seems to involve a lot of vodka. but you can't just drink it. you have to dip your third finger of your right hand in it, and touch your forehead (for you) and then flick some vodka in the air over your head (for the sky) and then four flicks around you (for the corners of the earth). then you have to down it. girls are allowed to drink less, but men get funny looks like they might be pansies if they pass. c went off with the driver and a herder to drink when the girls had given up. they came back the minute the vodka was finished though. not at all like sitting around with a pint for hours! it's all about the vodka...
felt like townies the other day - we went for a romantic walk along the shore of yet another stunning mountain lake on the morning of our (6th!) wedding anniversary, and on the way back we found a sheep. It was obviously not a happy sheep as it was on its own. Sheep are never on their own if they can help it. And it didn't move when we went closer. Turns out it was stuck in the mud. Literally. So we walked all the way back to the ger and asked them to come and help us get it out (it really was stuck and was going to die if we left it there). Our driver essentially told us that one sheep wasn't worth the effort as there are so many in Mongolia. One of the herders did come with us though (in a standard shopping car, over rocks and bumps, balancing his 1 year old daughter on his lap). He just manhandled the sheep out of the mud by grabbing it by the neck. C and I felt like such townies - we'd expected that it was going to take machinery or at least 3 people and a lot of time. The country way was so much easier and quicker! We drove past the sheep later in the day and she was doing normal sheep stuff (munching on grass) so all was well in the end.
Back in UB now - thankful for the end of the week long meat diet (no goat testicles, but we did get presented with a bowlful of freshly boiled sheep innards on our last day. I was brave enough to try the smallest bit of stomach lining but it just smelled too bad to eat much before wretching. C refused (which is a bit whimpy I think, considering the day before I'd even eaten a whole cherry tomato). And our Mongolian guides looked at us like we were passing up chocolate brownies as they tucked into blood pudding, heart and lungs.)
Not having the greatest day today though - wanted to buy boots at the market (it's closed), go to a free folk music gig this evening (it's sold out), and sit in our favourite cafe while we use the internet all afternoon (internet's broken). Oh well. Meeting up with a friend we met in Bangkok this evening for a curry, and then it's up at sparrow's fart to get the plane to Denmark tomorrow. No one mention trains...
hxx
ps have a good example of Cyrillic for you: PECTOPAH transliterates as RESTORAN - no prizes for guessing what that means!
No comments:
Post a Comment