Mongolia in June

Sain baina uu!  

I figured it’s about time for another blog post (two a month is good, yeah?).  I’ve been keeping a journal of my experiences here in Mongolia, which I write in most days.  Of course the challenge is what experiences I should include in my blog.

To start off this post I want to quote something I heard the other week regarding the idea of “home.”

“LIFE IS A JOURNEY, AND THE JOURNEY ITSELF IS HOME.”

Home is often viewed, if not always viewed, as a place.  This place is where our loved ones are.  I’ve been challenged with the concept that I’ve been “away” from home, maybe not actually content with my decision to leave my loved ones behind.  This has put a grey cloud of unknowing over the two years ahead and a bright light at the end of the tunnel when I finally come back “home” to Washington.  We can only experience “home”, I’m realizing, right now.  Living situations change.  They always will.  Growing up in Yelm, I always reflect of the “home” that I once had.  The settings of my dreams always originate around the old house on Yelm Avenue.  With Grandma’s passing five months ago, this has made the image of my childhood “home” strongly based in Yelm.  People pass and our definition of home continues to be refined because of it.  I have more than one image of home, however.  When our family moved to Castle Rock in 2008, a new image of home was formed.  When I think of my family now, I contemplate their living in Castle Rock.  Can home be more than one place?  It seems to be for me.  Or perhaps home isn’t a place at all.

Home is not a destination; it’s the journey of the moment.  Each one of us is already “home.”  Every single moment we’re surrounded by Love, that which God is.  It’s right here, right now.  I can still feel the love that is sent from family and friends back in the States at different moments.  Home transcends space because Love transcends space.  The memories and thoughts of my family and friends in the States are no different than the physical experiences themselves when they happened.  I often relive those experiences here in Mongolia, browsing through endless pictures of precious memories.  It’s not just thoughts of the past that bring me back “home.”  It’s any thought, any place, any experience.  Everything is as it should be.  We are where we are supposed to be.  Every moment is “home,” if we choose to become aware of it.  I thought this quote showed itself at the perfect time.

It’s been an intensive week of Mongolian classes and teaching.  The Mongolian language is totally different from English. Having difficulty with Spanish in the past, I needed the fresh start of foreign language acquisition.  Every day at about 8:40 I begin walking to the school, along with my friends April and Rose.  It’s about a ten-minute walk one way.  Walking to school twice a day, we spend about 40 minutes walking a day.  It reminds me of Grandma Iverson’s story, walking to and from school five miles every day.  It also reminds me of Grandpa Rothwell’s childhood days walking to and from school in Alma.  I guess I never really understood what a “walk” was until I started doing it here.  Cars get us everywhere in America.  We even use them to drive us short distances, because we don’t want to waste our time or energy walking.  I’m realizing that walking is a privilege, an opportunity to really get in touch with your surroundings and nature.  It’s also an opportunity for great exercise!  As age begins to win over, walking becomes much more difficult.  We will eventually become immobile.  We must enjoy this privilege while we have it. 

The weather here changes so fast.  Warm mornings have often been met with thunder and lightning storms in the evening.  We have been told to bring our jackets with us even during the hot days because of the rapid change in weather.  I’ve enjoyed the drastic changes.  It’s much different than Western Washington’s consistent rainy, cloudy, or sunny streaks.  I’m really curious about this Mongolian winter that has been underlined by almost everybody.

In one of the culture classes last week we learned that Mongolians put a great emphasis on destiny.  Everything that happens, whether it’s an obstacle or joy, happens for a reason, they believe.  Very rarely do Mongolians get stressed.  I’ve witnessed no situations where Mongolians get worked up over little things.  It is said Mongolians have two times:  before noon and after noon.  This has frustrated many Americans who come into Mongolian with a fast-paced, get-things-done-on-time mindset.  Many PCVs have had to go through adaptations when their Mongolian counterparts showed up hours late to business meetings.  A mindset of destiny versus a mindset of success/failure.  A mindset of peace in the circumstance versus a mindset of stress in the circumstance.  Maybe there’s something to be learned here.  

We’re being fed like crazy here.  If you’re not that hungry or you get full quickly (like me), it’s best to eat your food slowly or you’ll find your plate continuously being filled back up.  Mongolian hospitality is above and beyond that of other cultures I’ve experienced so far.  When you’re in need of something, someone is quick to help.  Walking home from school last week, I decided to practice a little Mongolian hospitality myself.  A vehicle was stuck in a ditch, and the driver couldn’t get out.  I decided (along with my friend Rose) to help the driver.  Two other Mongolians joined in and we pushed the vehicle out of the ditch.  I felt like an official Mongolian!

One night I was awakened by a screaming voice about 2 am.  My host brother, Bapo, had a few friends over the day before, and I assumed they stayed the night and the scream was coming from one of them.  I created a story in my head that Bapo’s friend had to use the jorslung in the middle of the night, and when he went out to use it the dog started chasing him around (the family has two dogs on the property).  Stray dogs are abundant here, and family dogs are used for protection against strangers and other dogs.  Us volunteers received two sets of rabies shots due to the commonality of dog bites (and we have one more coming!).  Anyway, I envisioned that Bapo’s friend was running from the dog and tried dodging him by jumping into the well.  Of course, that drop would have broken his legs.  I presumed the shriek was coming from the kid screaming for help.  Because of the story I created and believed, I wanted to tell somebody.  Everybody was asleep except for me.  I tried to ignore the screams, telling myself that the story was my own creation.  The scream had a consistent pattern, several screams occurring for a few minutes, followed by a break, then more screams, then another break, and so on up until morning.  I put a pillow over my head to try to get some sleep and dozed off several times.  When I woke up in the morning I realized it wasn’t a person at all.  Those screams were coming from the rooster!  I had every intention of throwing him down the poop hole.  Thanks to a fellow volunteer who had earplugs, I was provided with another option.  I’ve been using the earplugs ever since!  Wow!  How my mind wanders sometimes.

On Sunday evening my family took me out to the countryside.  We jumped off sand dunes, took pictures of a giant boulder with writings in the old Mongolian manuscript about Chiinghis Khan, drank from a natural spring of mineral water, saw the Mongolian/Russian border, drank sutatse and ate cheese in a ger, and was cleansed by a shaman.  I also spent a night with my brother at a disco, played soccer with Mongolian kids at the school field, milked a cow and saw a goat butchering.  It was an eventful week.  This weekend I will have been here a month.  That would tie the longest I’ve been in any one country (besides America) without leaving.  By mid-July I will have tied the longest I’ve been out of America.  This has been an interesting stat to keep track of.

Thinking of everybody back home.  Love you all, and thanks so much for the thoughts, prayers and support!

Greetings from Mongolia!

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It’s been two weeks since I arrived in the “land of the blue sky.”  I know many of you have been wondering how I’m faring.  With the infrequent Internet connection here I’ve kept many of you out of the loop.  I’ve attempted to upload photos on Facebook.  So far, ten down!  As the weeks progress and I learn about the schedules and the places I may go for Internet connection, you’ll see more blogs (hopefully) and updates of what’s happening with me here in Mongolia.  Thanks for your patience!

I flew out of Portland on May 28^th, arriving in Washington D.C. later that day.  It was very difficult seeing my family off.  Tears were shed, all of us knowing that we wouldn’t be seeing each other face-to-face for quite some time.  Yes, there’s ways to connect.  I’ve connected back home several times the past couple weeks through telephone, Skype, Facebook and email.  There is also the possibility of coming home at anytime.  I have not moved away forever.  The direct encounter and the familial embrace is what we knew would be absent during these next two years.  It is perhaps this absence that will draw us closer.

I spent two nights in Washington D.C. where I met many of my future Peace Corps counterparts.  People came in from all across the country, from the Pacific and California coast, to the Midwest, New England and the South.  Everybody had their own story, 46 volunteers, all with unique histories that all came together through Peace Corps Mongolia.  We were about to embark on a journey that none of us quite expected.

We flew out of Washington D.C. on the 30^th, making stops in Detroit and Seoul, South Korea.  From Detroit to Seoul it was a 14-hour flight.  Luckily for me, somebody was generous enough to give me a sleeping pill, which put me out for a couple hours.  I sat next to a fellow volunteer named Jennifer.  We kept each other company at times and attempted to sleep at other times.  Flying west, we never saw the sun go down between the 30^th and the 31^st. 

We arrived in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia at about 11 p.m.  As soon as we got off the airplane and through international customs, we were greeted by the PC staff and a large group of current PCVs who cheered for us as we walked through the airport.  When we stepped outside, it was cold.  I knew Mongolia was known for being cold.  Mongolia is supposed to get into the negative degrees during the winter.  Oh boy!  After we got outside, we boarded a bus and headed off to a tourist ger camp.  I was in a ger with four other roommates:  Adam, Aaron, Tom and David.  The ger is a popular housing unit used for thousands of years in Mongolia.  If you’re not familiar with it, Google it!   We stayed a few nights in this camp, visiting the capital city of Ulaanbaatar one day, and having a few sessions led by PC trainers. 

We then headed off to Darkhan, a smaller city north of Ulaanbaatar.  We stayed there several nights, on a tight schedule with language classes and health and cultural sessions.   Our group really got to know each other at this time.  We went out several evenings for drinks and food.  One night I ate cow tongue (delicious!).  My roommate in Darkhan’s name was Adam, a very awesome and entertaining guy.  We hung out along with several others quite a bit.  During that first week it felt like our group knew each other for years.  We all connected so well. 

A Mongolian with his herd crossing the road

On Friday June 7 (my dad’s birthday), our large group split into several smaller groups based on our job assignment.  I along with nine others made up one group of TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) trainers.  Our group boarded a separate van, which took us to where our host families were.  I was nervous.  The entire time I was in Mongolia I was with other Americans.  I communicated with Mongolians whenever an opportunity presented itself.  Now, I was going to be living with a Mongolian host family that didn’t speak any English and whose customs were not my own.  I feared the unknown.  I felt comfort knowing all the other 45 volunteers would be going through the same thing. 

We arrived in a small village outside the city of Sukhbaatar (close to the Russian border) and were brought to the school, where we were introduced to our host family.  When my name was called, I went up to my host father who had a bowl of warm milk (sutatse), which I drank after he kissed both of my cheeks.  That to me was an authentic Mongolian greeting for welcoming me into the family.  His name was Ganbold.  He had a wife, Oyuna, and two sons, Orgil (24) and Bapo (15).  After the introductions, we were sent off with our host families.

I arrived in my family’s home and was given a room.  It was pretty large.  Ganbold is a carpenter by trade, his wife a kindergarten teacher (I feel like a kindergartener all over again trying to learn Mongolian!).  Orgil graduated from the University, and Bapo is still in school (though he looks to be in his 20s).  Right when I put all my stuff in the room, they invited me into the kitchen and we ate lunch together.  Ever since then every meal has included sutatse, known as “milk tea.”  It’s basically warm milk.  It is a staple here in Mongolia.  Whenever I go to visit another home, sutatse is the main drink.  For food we had these little patties stuffed with mashed potatoes and meat.  Other days we had soup and other pastries.  Every meal I was overstuffed.  Whenever you finish what’s on your plate or cup, they would refill it right away.  Whenever I am visiting another Mongolians house, they feed me more food and sutatse.  If I live like this with no exercise, I’d become immobile! 

On Saturday and Sunday, I helped the brothers pull dirt from a hole, filling a wheelbarrow, which was dumped nearby.  One of the brothers would climb down the 15-foot hole, filling up a bucket that was dropped, while I used a pulley to pull up the bucket and dump it in the wheelbarrow.  I asked what the hole was going to be used for, assuming it was going to be used as a jorslung, or “outhouse.”  They laughed and told me they were going to use it for os, which means they were digging for water.  The work was definitely the exercise I needed.  My hands felt blistered, but I felt like I contributed.  Speaking of jorslung, whenever one needs to pee or crap, they would go out to the jorslung, which is a small wooden shed with a hole.  There’s no seat, no cushions, no railings or handles.  You literally squat and hope you don’t miss.  I freak out at times thinking the board holding me up is going to break, and I would fall into the big hole of sewage.  Lucky for me, Ganbold is a carpenter and I trust he builds things pretty sturdy.

On Saturday Ganbold took me to meet up with another fellow volunteer’s family to take pictures in Sukhbaatar.  Sukhbaatar was a leader in the revolution freeing Mongolia from Chinese rule.  The city was named after him, and there are statues bearing his name all around the city.  The fellow volunteer, April, has been my buddy the last couple days as we learned to adapt to the culture shock of living in an area almost absent of English.  Her host brother is an avid guitar player, very good, and upon seeing him he immediately brings me his guitar to play.  He’s only 15, and he’s already surpassed me with picking.  Still, he’s fascinated by the fact that I can play too.  We took several pictures together with both our guitars in Sukhbaatar. 

With all that said, I miss home.  The last couple days I have found much time on my hands, leaving my mind open to wander.  Culture shock has kicked in.  I think about my family.  I think about my mom, my dad, my brothers, my sisters, my relatives, my friends.  I think about American living, how I’m a world away from everything that I know.  Tears have come to me knowing I’ll be doing this for two years without experiencing home.  It’s only the second week, and it seems like a lot longer.  But I also know that I expected this to be part of my journey.  I expected to go through homesickness, through hardships and trials.  Hardships would also come if I were back in the States.  This was my choice.

In life, there are many paths we can take on our life journey.   All paths will have both barriers and triumphs.  Despite the inevitable suffering us humans will go through in life, we have the freedom to choose our path and our attitude.  We are all extraordinary.  My path has decided to take me here, and I’m eager to discover why.

Blessings to all of you back home.  I’m praying and sending my loving thoughts daily.  Summer has just begun!