VERY CURRENT AND PRESENT THINGS!

Hello all. I just got done reading my buddy Olivier’s blog and decided it was time to do the responsible thing and put some stuff up here. Just some pictures of the last few weeks and some updates.

My sitemate Esu and I ( ^ ) just spent two weeks out west by the Kazakh border in Baynolgii. We took a four-day bus ride out there to help with the province’s first ever English Teacher Methodology Seminar. The whole thing was a huge success, and it was a great chance to catch up with my pal Laura. She and I trained together in Sant in 2008. We haven’t had much time to hang out over the last two years because of the 1600 kilometers of desert and huge mountains between us, but it hasn’t stopped us from staying in touch. Esu and I stayed in her one-room house with four other volunteers from nearby Hovd. It was a total blast.

Laura and moi at dinner in San Francisco in 2008, just a few days before coming to Mongolia. Man, we were clean back then.

And here we are now.

An English directional vocabulary activity during one of my seminar sessions. The teachers had to take turns directing one blindfolded person around an obstacle course made of rearranged desks.

Baynolgii Aimag, nestled in the gorgeous Altai Mountain Range,  is inhabited by a predominantly Kazakh ethnic population. The language is totally different than what I’m used to in central Mongolia– it was fascinating to hear Laura bust it out every time we got in a cab or needed something from a store. She was our translator the whole time!

Laura's House

Hovd Kat and me

The weather was incredible for the most part. It was so warm on the last day of the seminar that we sat outside in her yard and had a picnic.

Me, Olgii Laura, and Hovd Laura enjoying a late afternoon outside

Nice view of the mountains around Olgii

Statue of some guy shooting backwards while running

Sadly, our other friend from Olgii, Matt, decided it was time to end things a bit early and head to Cambodia for the foreseeable future. We had an awesome going-away party for him at Laura’s house. It’s always a bit sad to see people go, even if we’re this close to the end of our service.

Matt and Laura down by the river on the outskirts of Olgii

After we’d had a chance to hang out in Olgii a bit after the seminar was finished, it was time to come back to Arvaikheer. Esu and I were in a hurry to return, so we decided to skip the last two legs of our journey and come straight home.  We reserved two seats on a bus leaving Olgii for the following Monday for 60,000 tugrug (roughly 45 dollars). We packed all our things up and heaved them to the bus station, where a different driver and a new bus were waiting. The price was also different– 120,000 tugrug per foreign passenger. Sixty for locals, one hundred and twenty for foreigners. We explained that we weren’t tourists, that we were here on work, and that we don’t make any money. Laura’s coworker helped us to communicate this in Kazakh. Her coworker’s husband is also the region’s transportation director, so we figured it would be handled smoothly. There was a lot of laughter between him and the drivers, though, and much to his wife’s fury. In the end we resolved to spend the rest of the day in Olgii, take an 8-hour jeep to Hovd, and wait there for two more days before catching an eastbound bus. A bit pricier than the original 60,000, but nowhere near the 120,000 that the shady driver was attempting to get out of us.

Unfortunately, my camera battery died before I got to Hovd, so I can’t prove how gorgeous it was. We stayed with our friend Cameron in his beautiful apartment for those two days and just ate and hung out. It was actually nice to break the trip up into segments after all.

Like I said, no photos, but I’ll try my best to describe it. Hovd borders Baynolgii along probably one of the most dramatic stretches of the Altai Range. A sizable portion of the elusive snow leopard’s dwindling population lives in these mountains, many of which are snowcapped all year. We made several stops in small soums along the way and marveled at the enormity of the mountains. It reminded me a lot of my time in 2006 in Xinjiang, China, along the Karakorum pass (which, as I may have mentioned before, shares its name with the famed ancient capital of Mongolia in Uvurkhangai!) So, screw it–I’ll just throw some pictures of that in here and you can pretend it’s in Hovd.

…And pretend that everything you see here that’s not sky is a nice reddish color. Sorry..picture fail. And look how much of a skinny baby I used to be:

Anyway, back to Mongolia. Esu and I arrived in Arvaikheer and work reared its demanding head almost immediately. I mentioned in a previous post that Peace Corps approved my school for a SPA Grant, which means our library is well underway. I returned to see a room roughly 1/4 the size of our primary school already undergoing renovations for the new space. I couldn’t be happier!  I rushed to the market and purchased a large tv, a dvd player, and fifteen ridiculously large posters for the room. This Thursday I’ll jump on another bus and go to UB to buy some more city-exclusive items for the  kids (a whiteboard, speakers, and maybe a couch. Cross your fingers I can negotiate reliable shipping!) Some things just aren’t available outside of the capital. It’s ok, though; I’ll kill two birds with one stone and get my front teeth fixed… I may or may not have chipped one of them on a pintglass. Don’t worry about it.

In other food-and-drink consumption-oriented news, Easter  at Amber’s was phenomenal. I shattered everyone’s doubts by whipping up my FIRST EVER SELF-BAKED DESERT: apple pie. I can say, without ego, that it was fantastic. I also made two pizzas. It was a potluck deal, so my sitemates contributed pumpkin bread, deep fried whole peanuts, chocolate chip cookies, eggs, biscuits, yogurt, cheeseburgers, and no-bake peanutbutter oat cookies. I ate for four hours straight without pausing. It’s been a good few weeks for food; Laura fed me so well when I was in Olgii that I gained five pounds, which is also a first, considering I’d only ever lost weight while traveling. GOOD TIMES.

Arvaikheer was gorgeous today. It was raining in the desert to the south, snowing in the Khangais to the north, and about 60 with big billowy clouds in between. And I could see all of it happening around me in a beautiful and dramatic panorama. I didn’t even wear a jacket for most of the day. I decided to lay out on top of my ger in the sun when I got off work.

My back yard, as seen from the top of my ger

Me on top of the ger

OH OH OH And!! Three cheers for my baby sister, who got accepted to nursing school!!!!! I LOVE YOU STEPHANIE!!!

More later.