Fire! Fire!

The normal trash fire that happens every couple of weeks outside my apartment building apparently got a little out of hand yesterday because the fire department was called in.

In a completely unrelated note: I'm currently sitting in my office listening to thunder for the first time since coming to Mongolia and it's awesome. It hasn't started to rain yet though and I will feel a little bad if it does because today is Children's Day and apparently thousands of kids are spending the day outside playing games and going to the sort of amusement park and their day might be ruined if it rains.

Adventures with Melissa

Last Saturday I went with my work colleague/friend to Gorkhi-Terelj National Park. This was one of the stops I had made with my friends the previous Saturday, but this time we got to spend more time and do different things. The whole day was great and I had such a fun time hanging out with Melissa and Max (our driver/sort of tour guide).

First let me introduce Melissa. (I had meant to write a blog post dedicated just to Melissa when she first came to Mongolia during the first week of April but I never got any good photos of her and I got super lazy in April as evidenced by the number of posts I actually put up.) Melissa is a Regional Program Advisor for the Asia Pacific Habitat for Humanity office. She’s currently based in Manila and our Blue Sky Build project in July is one of her assignments. She acts like an advisor and helps us out with anything we might need. She is especially helpful to me because her background with Habitat is in communications. Melissa completed the same MSW program at Boston College as I did a few years ago. For her internship she was placed with Habitat in Cambodia. After her internship she stayed on with them for a couple of years before moving up to the regional office. I love it when Melissa comes to visit because firstly she motivates everyone at work to get more stuff done and be excited about what we’re doing; secondly because I like her as a person and really enjoy her company. She’s incredibly nice and we have quite a bit to talk about. She has had a really interesting life and lots of fun stories.

I suppose that’s enough fawning over Melissa. So she arrived a week ago Sunday and had planned her trip to coincide with our Corner Stone Laying ceremony and the building of the test build house for the BSB (they build one house before the project to work out any kinks and to time it to see where each house needs to be at the end of each day). Unfortunately the test build schedule didn’t go according to plan and Melissa decided to leave a few days early which meant that her Saturday was free to do something touristy. I was more than happy to have a touristy adventure and get out of the city. We looked up a bunch of places to go for a day trip but most of them got shot down by our Mongolian colleagues as being sub-par so we settled on going to the national park.

Gorkhi-Terelj National Park - you can see one of the ger camps in the distance.

 

Our driver for the day was Max, a friend of Billy one of our colleagues. We were especially lucky that Max agreed to drive us because he speaks great English which made the whole day go a lot smoother. Our first stop in the park was Turtle Rock which I loved seeing the week before. This time we actually climbed it (well, some of it).

Turtle Rock, obviously.

Melissa and Max.

Me and Max climbing(ish).

After the rock we went over to the monastery that was on the side of a hill. We climbed all the steps (which really weren’t that many) to the top and enjoyed the spectacular view. We chilled up there for a bit, enjoying the sunshine.

Really not that many stairs.

These were all around the monastery.

Beautiful view

Then we headed to a hotel where we were hoping to have an archery lesson and eat lunch. Sadly the archery was a bust and we didn’t do it. We did however go check out the much fancier hotel next door which was really nice (Melissa and I ended up using their bathroom 3 times throughout the day because it was so lovely and the nicest bathroom I’ve seen in Mongolia).

So then in an attempt to kill some time for a reason that I can’t remember we rented 3 horses for an hour to go riding. Mongolian horses are much smaller than horses that I’m used to. The horse riding experience was…interesting. First my horse wouldn’t go (apparently because it could tell that I was a foreigner), so Max switched horses with me. Well then he couldn’t get it to go and Melissa’s horse liked to run her into walls. Eventually the horse keepers forced our horses to head towards the river. When we got to the river I assumed we’d find a bridge to cross. When I could see no bridge I assumed we’d just walk along the river. Nope, Max told us to just press full steam ahead through the water. Granted it wasn’t that deep, but deep enough for our shoes to get soaked and the current was strong enough for the horses to walk diagonally from one side to the other (I kept picturing John Wayne movies as we forced our way across the river, I thought it was kind of cool but Melissa did not agree). And of course, Max’s horse still didn’t want to go and it was quite the battle for him to get that horse in the water. On the other side of the river things went more smoothly and we just wandered around the semi wilderness. I kept trying to get my horse to go faster but could only manage to get him up to a very bouncy trot. After not too long we crossed back over the river, passing a stalled SUV in the middle of it and went back to hand the horses over.

The horses are finally moving.

About to cross back through the river.

 Our last activity in the park was to have a slightly extravagant lunch at the fancy hotel. It was so nice to get to splurge a little despite the fact that we were all a little dirty. Then we headed back to Ulaanbaatar. Melissa had a couple of hours to kill before her flight so we relaxed at my house and got pizza from a place only 10 min walk from my house (I will definitely be going there again – thank you Jared for the recommendation).  And that was it.

My lunch: I love the fries in the pan.

I was exhausted and a little sunburned (though not as much as I had hoped) and was a little sad for Melissa to leave, but super happy with the day. Melissa will be back in town at the end of June and stay pretty much until I leave Mongolia. 

Yeah for Melissa and getting to hang out with her.

Roving Cold Water

Finally the roving cold water has come to my house like the plagues of Egypt, except I don't have any lamb's blood to put above my door to protect my household (though it probably wouldn't be too hard to get lamb's blood here, I just don't think it would do any good).

For a couple of weeks I've been hearing from my co-workers and friends about how their hot water has been turned off for a few weeks. I even had a friend come to my house just to use the shower because she had no hot water. I've been very content listening to everyone else's comments confident in the fact that my house had plenty of hot water (too much actually but it's better than the reverse). Until last night that is.

When I got home there was NO water in my apartment, so that was fun. After my roommate made some phone calls she found out the the water would be turned back on around 3am (thank goodness I had a large bottle of drinking water to use for brushing my teeth, etc) and that our HOT water would be back on June 11. I've lived without hot water before and heaven knows I shouldn't be complaining when some of my global classmates lived for months without it, but that was generally in hot and/or humid climates, not when it's still below freezing every morning when I leave my apartment.

Apparently this happens every summer in Mongolia (I'm using the loosest definition possible with 'summer' here). Pipes have to be fixed, so throughout Ulaanbaatar the hot water gets turned off for a few weeks throughout all the different neighborhoods.

So basically Mongolians spend all summer preparing for winter.

I still do not understand why people have chosen to live in this climate. I'm talking about the people who were here hundreds and thousands of years ago, why on earth would anyone in their right minds choose to live in the frozen tundra? Granted it is very beautiful and supposedly a pleasant climate for a few months during the actual summer (I'm still waiting to see if this is real), but is that really worth it?

Sorry to all of my Mongolian friends, I'm just not built for this kind of weather. The literally frozen winter was bad enough, but the wind whipping through the city these days is getting unbearable.

I Am a Master

On Monday, May 21 while I was freezing half to death in the middle of Mongolia, I officially became a Master of Social Work (not sure if that’s the correct way to say it but I like the idea of calling myself a master).

I have wanted to be a social worker since I was 17. The summer before my senior year of high school, my friend got me a job working in the Child Care of a temporary home in Norwalk, CA. The temporary home was kind of like a homeless shelter for families. Families would live there on a temporary basis while they tried to get back on their feet. The residents were required to have life/job/finance counseling and were able to use the Child Care if the parents were at work or school. I think my mom saw how much I liked working there and she’s the one that suggested that maybe I should do this for a living, except that I should be running the temporary home and not just working in the Child Care.

I thought about majoring in Social Work at BYU and even took an Intro to Social Work class but decided against it. I didn’t want to have to take all the sociology classes and I loved my Intro to International Relations class more, so I opted for majoring in Political Science. But in my head I still wanted to be a social worker, just now in a more international setting.

After finishing my undergraduate studies I re-focused on social work. I decided that I needed to get a Master’s degree. The problem was that in order to get into an MSW program I needed more experience in the field, but in order to get a job as a social worker, most organizations required an MSW. So instead I stalled my life plans, moved to China and hoped that working as an ESL teacher would give me some relevant experience.

I found out that I got into Boston College’s Graduate School of Social Work while I was in China. I had instructed my mother to EMAIL me when the grad schools I had applied for started sending me letters because good or bad I wanted to be able to process the news before reacting to it. Well she ignored my instructions (which I’m grateful she did) and called me on my Chinese cell phone at 7am. I had to go outside of my apartment to talk because reception was bad inside. When she told me that I had gotten into Boston College, my top choice, I started to cry on the phone while standing outside in my pajamas with no shoes on. I was ecstatic and so relieved that I now had a plan and I was going to get to do exactly what I wanted. Boston College was my top choice because of their Global Practice program, which is one of the leading International Social Work programs in the US (if not the best, there aren’t any official rankings). I also really wanted to live in Boston. I was so excited and nervous that I kind of didn’t eat for a week after I got in (when I’m really nervous [as in miles past tests or papers nervous] I forget to eat).

The first time I set foot on campus was for Orientation. Meeting my classmates the first few days of meetings was awesome. Rarely had I ever been able to talk so easily with a group of people as a whole before. Everyone was so friendly and we were all there because we had a common goal. It was interesting to hear about everyone’s different backgrounds and what had led us to an MSW program. Through the 4 semesters that I was taking classes I formed some life-long friends. We suffered together through some weird and challenging professors, we laughed together about some of the seemingly ridiculous assignments we had to complete, and we enjoyed getting to know each other and becoming friends.

Some of the memories going through my head right now are: All of the free food during September because of all the orientations and meetings; feeling super uncomfortable about being white during Diversity class; feeling proud that I was the only one in my Macro class to have read the case study but feeling uncomfortable that I was answering all the questions (I’m not bragging here, I think I completed maybe 30% of my reading assignments while at BC and just happened to have liked that particular case.); Dr. Tran in Research Methods being annoyed at the guest speaker he had brought in and his hilarious phrases; reading Shackleton, then discussing eating dogs and penguins, then watching the movie and being disappointed that it didn’t include some of the best parts; being told by a professor not to fall asleep in class the second to last class of a semester when I KNOW that I had never actually fallen asleep in that class (or any class at BC); making group posters like we were in 4^th grade; being the only person in class that seemed to be watching and enjoying the movie about the mining union; being told not to settle for being second banana.

Thank you to all of my professors and advisers. Thank you to my friends and classmates. Thank you to Boston College for a great education (even though it was over priced).

Congratulations to the Boston College Graduate School of Social Work’s Class of 2012 and good luck!!!! 

(Sorry for the lack of pictures, I was not at graduation so don't have any personal photographic evidence that it did in fact take place. All those photos I've seen on facebook could have been staged for some elaborate hoax for all I know.)

Oh the Lovely Weather

On Monday we had the Corner Stone Laying Ceremony for our big upcoming project, the Blue Sky Build 2012. We had invited some guests, mainly people who are giving us money, as well as the governor of the district where the houses are to be built. The program was planned to be short and then everyone would get to help lay some bricks.  Well things did not go according to plan….thanks to the weather.

It was one of the most miserable weather situations I have ever had to experience (and I honestly can’t think of a worse situation right now). The wind was atrocious. It was fiercely blowing frigid air. Then it rained. Then it hailed. Then it rained again. Finally the precipitation stopped and it was just the wind but everything was freezing. I had my hood up the whole time and sunglasses on because there was dirt and sand blowing so hard. My hands were frozen and I couldn’t move my fingers very well. I was unwittingly chewing sand the whole time. When I finally got back to the safety of the car after standing outside for 2 hours my face and clothes were covered in dirt and I was damp. Add to that the almost 2 hours it took for us to get home because of traffic and the whole day was terrible, not “I want to kill myself” terrible, more “hysterically laughing because this is so ridiculous” terrible.

Overall the ceremony was alright. A lot of the scheduled guests didn’t come (can’t say I blame them). The bricks got laid, but it was not a pleasant experience. It wasn’t very organized even without the weather’s interference. But it’s over and as soon as I got home that night I got directly in to a really hot shower for 40 minutes.

The bright spots of the day included a. Melissa who is visiting from the regional Habitat office this week. She’s awesome and I love her. 2. Two of my recently made friends were at the ceremony because they were representing New Milestone which is supporting our project. And d. after I got home and showered my friend Flower called me on Skype, but my home computer doesn’t have a camera or a microphone so I could see and hear her but I could only type my responses to her. She had gone to an American import store that was having an awesome sale and she showed my all of her purchases, it was amazing and it made my night as she paraded her spoils in front of the web-cam.

Suffering through the speeches.

Laying the bricks.

Billy (our volunteer coordinator), me and Melissa.

Best Day Ever

On Saturday I had a fantastic day. My friend Flower and Brother Ganbold, the first counselor in my ward both work for a tour company, New Milestone (which if anyone comes to Mongolia they should book tours through them because they're amazing and super reliable). They were taking a day trip to some of the popular tourist sites outside of Ulaanbaatar and taking some of their summer tour guides (pretty much all English speaking returned missionaries) to see the sites so they know what they're talking about when they lead tours. They invited me along mainly because they're really nice but I like to think that maybe I was the practice tourist. Along for the trip was my Bishop, Brother Ganbold, Flower (my friend who served her mission in Arizona), Muugii (who served her mission in France), Marta (who served her mission in the Czech Republic), Tamir (who served his mission in Washington DC), Khisgee (who also served his mission in Washington DC), Nandia (who hasn't served a mission which made me feel a little better but who speaks excellent English), and me. First we went to the giant Chinggis Khaan statue, where we incidentally ran into some of the senior missionary couples who were doing their own sight-seeing that day. Then we went to 13th century, a replica of these ger stations that stood during the 13th century in Mongolia. Apparently they were used as horse changing stations. Lastly we went to Terelj National Park which was beautiful. We did a little hike and saw a few of the sites and it was awesome.

The whole day was phenomenal. I had a great time hanging out and getting to know some of the other YSAs. They were really funny and I haven't heard so much laughter in a car since coming to Mongolia. I love that I can feel totally comfortable and accepted with a group of people that I either just met or didn't know very well. Plus everyone spoke English so it was a stress free day for me.

I'm super grateful that I was invited and got to go.

Chinggis Khan Statue

It was really fun to run into the senior missionaries.

Muugii, Flower, me, and Marta in front of the massive statue.

Muugii and I in front of the 13th century replica.

Inside the center ger they head armor and weapons you could try on.

Beautiful countryside

There were lots of tourists at all the places we stopped. All the school children liked to yell "Hello" to me wherever we were.

We passed lots of livestock throughout the day, here are some horses.

Terelj National Park

Marta and I at lunch.

Some of us going on our little hike.

Muugii, Tamir, Nandia, me, and Marta: I think maybe we were supposed to pose but I missed the memo.

I was so happy that the countryside had started to turn green. Apparently it will be even more beautiful in a few weeks.

Khisgee, Nandia, and Tamir on top of a rock.

One of the ger camps that you can stay at where we had lunch.

Brother Ganbold, Flower, me, and the Bishop.

Turtle rock: it totally looks like a turtle, trust me.

I liked it so much that I consented to having my picture taken in front of it.

This is the 1000 cave (not totally clear on the name), but apparently during the 1930s when the communists were killing religious leaders and intellectuals 1000 monks hid in this cave and survived.

Me, Marta, and Tamir climbing up to the cave.

Khisgee and Tamir squeezing into the cave.

It was kind of cramped and dark in there.

Nandia, the Bishop, and me.

The crew in the back.

Singaporeans

On Friday I went with some people from my office to the dedication of the first house built for this build season. A Global Village team of recent college grads came from Singapore. Unfortunately we were too late for the house dedication (thank you UB traffic), but I still got to chat it up with the GV team for a while which was really fun. Most of them had studied political science and this was all of their first times in Mongolia and working for Habitat for Humanity. It was great for me to hear about their experiences and what they thought of the country and the organization. Also it was awesome to talk with fluent/native English speakers. Most of them thought I was a little nuts for a. going back to school for a Master’s (they just graduated and are sick of school) and b. for coming to Mongolia during the winter. There may be some truth to their arguments.

The GV team and a couple of Habitat staff.

The house they built.

Feeding People = Happiness

I am trying really hard this week (and hopefully from now on) to be in a better mood and be happier. The best way to feel happy and good about yourself is to serve others. So with that in mind when I ran into the Sister missionaries from my ward on Tuesday I promptly asked them when they could come for dinner, and they were available for Thursday. On Wednesday I spent all of 2 minutes on Pinterest before finding a recipe that looked interesting and doable here in Mongolia, I went to 2 different grocery stores to get almost all the ingredients I needed (don't know why I still can't find pepper), then spent about 4 hours on Wednesday night cooking in preparation. The preparation paid off because dinner was actually pretty good. I made this chicken rice casserole thing (so chosen because I could prepare it the night before and just stick it in the oven 30 minutes before eating). It had vegetables, normal rice, wild rice (totally worth the splurge and I feel super lucky I even found some), chicken, and cheese. We had bread and a green salad with it. For dessert I made brownies and we had them with ice cream. The evening was a great success and I had a really fun time chatting with the sisters. One of them is Mongolian and the other is American and we spoke in English the whole time which was fun.

The main dish after we'd finished dinner (I've really got to work on remembering to take pictures BEFORE we eat). Don't let the shiny melted cheese on top fool anyone, it was delicious.  I will probably be eating the leftovers of this meal for the next 5 days. Thankfully I unloaded half of the brownies by sending them home with the Sisters.

Just because of the good mood that it put me in I might try and feed the missionaries once a week from now until I go home.