Mongolian Horse Head Fiddle and Throat Singing

This is so cool when you see it and hear it live.  Last night (Christmas Eve), we again enjoyed listening to a couple of men play their horse head fiddles.  I searched Youtube to find a presentation so you could enjoy it, too.  Believe me, it's so much better live...like most things...but this will give you an idea of the skill.  Watch the way the hand holds the bow and the way the fingers move on the strings.  The dexterity is awesome.  Then, the throat singing is something totally unique, as well.  I'd never heard it until hearing it here!

Mongolian Horse Head Fiddle and Throat Singing  (click on this link to enjoy the presentation)

Timing is Everything!

Last night we were the host home for our organization's Christmas dinner gathering for 25 people.  I was in charge of baking a turkey.  The turkey was from the U.S., so thankfully, it was packaged as I would normally expect it to be (just thought you'd all like to know I didn't have to pluck the feathers or anything like that!).  Anyway, the gathering was originally supposed to happen a week ago, but one of our Mongolian employees had a death in her family that week, and we post poned the dinner so she could come.   By the time the dinner had been post poned, though, my turkey was thawed, so I thought it would be best to bake the turkey and debone it, freezing it for one week later.  It actually made for a less stressful day for the day of the event!  Let me tell you why! 

We came home from church and had no electricity.  I actually thought the whole building was without electricity, so I was just patiently waiting for the electricity to come back on for over an hour.  However, we realized the elevator was working, and so were the hall lights. This motivated me to investigate.  So, with my Mongolian language dictionary in hand, I went to see our building manager (jujor) who does not know a stitch of English.  I was able to communicate to her that our electricity wasn't working and she was able to communicate to me that we needed to pay our bill.  Somehow, the electric company thought we hadn't paid our electric bill. So, Sunday at 11:30, they disconnected our electricity. Not a good thing to happen when you're having 25 people show up for a 5 pm dinner!


Our conversation was getting complicated, so we went hunting for a translator in the building.  Fortunately, both of our Mongolian neighbors on our floor are also fluent in English.  One was home and helped us through the problem.  As it turned out, we HAD paid our bill, the electrical man came to re-connect our electricity at 4 pm, and he gave me a bill which needs to be paid to re-connect our electricity (is that fair, since it was unjustly disconnected?  Probably allowed in this culture...and it's only about $2.25...but stilllllllllll!).  I was glad I had, #1....baked my turkey last week; and #2.....had electricity just in time to warm up the thawed turkey in my frig!  I made a delicious thin gravy to drizzle over the re-heating turkey, and it tasted freshly roasted.  Several people commented that the turkey was good, and a very honest teammate (who knew my whole story), asked how I got the turkey to be so moist doing it this way.  All I can say, is I'm thankful for perfect timing!

Brrrrrrrr! #2

I recently (November 13) blogged about the large quantity of clothing one must put on before venturing out into the cold.  This is true, no matter where one lives.  However, if one depends on one's legs to get around quite often, one appreciates the extra warm items even more.  So, I had Kevin take a photo of me before I ventured out one morning on a -20 degree F. morning (yes, please note the negative mark before the 20).  We think 20 degrees ABOVE zero feels great, now!



From top to bottom: A Carhartt balaclava (hat w/face mask), scarf knitted by my mother in law (a must to keep air from whisking in at the neck, with the added bonus of looking a little more fashionable since the balaclava ruins all fashion sense), long North Face coat recommended by Sharon W., double layer on my hands which includes some cheap-o gloves bought from a sidewalk stand across the street for a mere 1500 Tugriks which is just a bit over $1 USD, and wool mittens made for me by Dianna P., long johns under my jeans, and finished off at the bottom with my wonderfully comfortable and warm Columbia boots which were advertised to be warm to -40 degrees.  I haven't gotten to test that claim out yet, but they work for -20!  I'm usually not a brand-name shopper, but when you're buying clothing for staying warm in ultra-cold conditions, it's worth it.  Many off-brand items just don't measure up. 

A little cold weather antidote: Last week we walked for 15 minutes in the -20 air.  My eyes were watering from the cold.  Pretty soon, my top eyelashes were sticking to my bottom ones.  Why?  Because the water from my tears was freezing and making ice to stick the lashes together.  I had to take my mittens off to clean the lashes off; there were tiny chunks of mascara-laden ice.  Why do I even bother with makeup?!

Recent Visit

Back in October, we enjoyed a visit from a team of seven people from America.  A few are interested in teaching with our organization and a few were just wanting to see what's happening.  While they were here, we took them out to the countryside the first day.  While there, we went to the Chinggis Khaan monument which is HUGE.  It has displays inside the building, a video of the monument being designed and built, and stairs up into the statue (sort of like the stairs up into the Statue of Liberty). 

There was also the opportunity to ride a camel or hold a Kazak eagle.  Micah and I held the eagle.

At this location (out in the middle of "nowhere"), there is also a ger (known in America as a "yurt") full of souvenirs.  It was a cold day, and a fire was going in the ger, and a baby was nearby keeping warm.  I enjoyed getting to use my limited Mongolian language with the shop/ger owners to ask prices and talk with them about their baby.

Here's our Mongolian friend, Odsaiken, who was our guide this day (he is also our personal driver to and from the airport, and has helped us find both apartments we've lived in here in UB). 

We went on to Terelj, a national park, where "Turtle Rock" exists.  There are many large rock formations that are fun to see.

Also, we took our new American friends to a Mongolian BBQ, a version of our American "Mongolian Grill" restaurants.  It was one of the men's birthday, so we had a beautiful cake delivered to the table along with "fireworks" and singing!

The next day included a trip to several souvenir shops which also led to me meeting an English speaking young man.  He was excited to speak to English speakers and he told us he had been to New Jersey for three months this past summer.  I asked him if he wanted to practice his English more and he was very eager.  Now, he and Kevin are meeting once or twice a week. For those of you who get our newsletter, he's the friend who brought his artist friend to our house.  The artist created the drawing we included in our December newsletter.



I met both of these young men at the souvenir shop.  The one on the left has great English and wants to continue practicing.  The one on the right has limited English, but comes along with his friend every time they come to our house.  The one on the right is our friendly artist.  They visit our home about 3 times a month ever since we met in mid-October.  A few nights ago, they joined us when we were teaching pizza to Amraa and her friends.  As I cleaned up dishes, Ujka told me how he wants to never drink, because his father never drinks.  This illustrates the influence we have on our children!  Ujka does not have this conviction because of any Christian background, either; he is a Buddhist presently.  However, a high percentage of Mongolian men are heavy drinkers.  It is the culture....almost a proof of their manliness.  Photo taken 11-7-2010 (note how our time stamp was rearranged for this photo).



Kneading Dough, Kneading Seeds Into Hearts

Javkah and Byermaa make pizza in our kitchen for the first time.

I recently met a Mongolian woman who teaches at a university here in town.  We met at a "Monglish Club".  This is held at a restaurant and is open to the public, encouraging Mongolians to speak English with English speakers.  The English speakers we met were mostly from the Peace Corp, and some were from other English teaching organizations.  Not all were Americans.  Some were Australian, British, and Euoropean.  Since being introduced to this club, I've made a new word for whenever I say Mongolian words wrong..."Manglish"...meaning I've mangled their language. 

Anyway, back to the Mongolian woman I met!  Her name is Amraa, which means "rest".  Most Mongolians will automatically tell you what their name means, which is quite helpful since we've been learning vocabulary.  So, if I wish you a good rest tonight, I say, "Saihan Amrarai" which I actually do say quite often when friends leave the apartment at night.  It means, "Please have a good rest."

Again, I diverge! 

So, the night I met Amraa, I found out that she had learned her first English from the son of the president of the organization we teach with, several years ago in Western Mongolia (we are directly east of that location by a 20-ish hour drive!).  She raved about how she was so thankful that she was taught English and she is forever grateful to our organization.  It was quite a wonderful meeting.  I also found out she makes beautiful Kazak bag designs. I ordered one from her that night, guaranteeing we'd see one another again to make the purchase.  As it turned out, I ordered three more after that for gifts.

During the exchange of the three gifts, Amraa reminded me that we had talked about how her hobby was this Kazak craft and my hobby was cooking.  Would I like to teach her and a few friends how to make pizza?  Yes!  We decided on a date, and this past week the date came, and so did they. 

Amraa brought four friends with her, two of them teaching colleagues.  Kevin joined in with us and one of her friends was a man who actually wrestled at the stadium at Naadam this past summer.  Only the best of the best get to wrestle at the capital city's Naadam. 

All five of the visitors had varying English abilities, but all could speak and understand a good amount.  Amraa and the man were most fluent.  They ended up rolling out dough with me and the lowest English speaker, while the other two played Yahtzee with Kevin at the table 10 feet away.  The man looked at a poster in the kitchen which had a verse on it.  "Are you both Christians?"  The conversation continued and seeds were planted.  Questions were asked.  Some by me.  Some by them.  There was interest and consideration for one another.  It was a conversation which I sometimes didn't know which way it would go next, but I kept asking for advice from Him as I listened and before I spoke.  He gave me direction.




We took this picture before adding cheese so we could see the fancy design created by Amraa (left).  The yellow and red are thinly sliced peppers.

 We ate pizza and shared more of our lives with one another. Before leaving, Amraa suggested that Kevin and I come to her house to learn to make buuz some time. I think it will happen.
These are friends to remember as we interact with them.



Hot out of the oven...the pizza is ready to eat!

Oh, by the way, the pizza was made from browned ground beef and onion as well as a sausage which looks like our summer sausage, but is made with beef and mutton.  It's not bad, but it still has the after taste of mutton.  The Mongolians love mutton like we love beef...because that's what they were raised on.  A couple flavors that some Mongolians don't like: tomato sauce and cinnamon...and we've decided again, that it's because they weren't raised on those flavors.  The pizzas which were topped by the Mongolians had half the sauce that I would normally use...ahhh, something for me to note for future pizza meals with them, right?

I thought the Husker fans among us would enjoy this cake which was part of Micah's going-away party in November!  We all had a good laugh at the pretty flowers adorning the heart-shaped decoration on the cake.  Mongolia is known for its very fancy cakes; however, be not deceived....the flavor is usually a bit "blah" with about half the sugar than what we're used to and a texture which is more like Wonder Bread than a succulent cake.  Kevin and I refer to this kind of cake as a "hagus" cake. "Hagus" in Mongolian is "half".

Our Last Month With Micah

Micah's school held a surprise going away party for him.  Here's one of the cakes they had.



Here's our team of teaching supervisors (minus Kevin who was taking the picture).  We found a great place in UB to go bowling...as far as we know, the only place in this city of 1 million!  It was a very nice bowling alley, as good as many we've seen in the U.S., and very cheap if bowling during the day ($2.25/game).




Our neighbor had a birthday party for her 10 year old daughter.  Here's some "mantoe" bread which is steamed yeast bread; this is only one of many items served that evening.  I get to learn how to make this next week.





Here's Micah and me three days before he left.  We took him out to one of our favorite restaurants.  It's name is "BBQ Chicken" and the BBQ stands for "Best Believable Quality"....no joke!  We often get a hamburger or a fried chicken patty on a really good bun with lettuce, "special sauce", tomato, and  pickle. This place is only about a 4-5 minute walk from our apartment.


We miss Micah's presence here in UB, but we know he's loving being back in the U.S.  We get to talk with him quite often via skype and email.  I am so thankful for technology!