Mongol capital and countryside

Continuing to Ulaanbaatar

To my surprise, we slept really well and woke up around 0900.  We wandered to the breakfast car and found it to be different from yesterday’s.  We now have a rickety but ornately decorated (with carved light wood) dining car.

A breakfast of tea, omelette, slaw, bread and pancaked was CNY60 (NZD10).  Kim misheard and thought it was CNY16.

The scenery was largely the same as yesterday but less industrial.  It was largely brownish-green as far as the eyes can see, with dots of animals (eg. horses, cows, yaks, goats and sheep).

There were some settlements along the way.  As we approached Ulaanbaatar we saw some gers, shantyhouses surrounded by fences and then finally tall faceless Soviet-style apartment blocks.

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Quick exploration of Ulaanbaatar

Arriving at Ulaanbaatar station we were met by our guide Alma-gud and our driver.  They took us for a little sightseeing to a monastery called Gandantegchinlen Khiid.  The Tibetan name translates to the “Great Place of Complete Joy”.

We viewed a small temple there and then a larger one with a huge golden Buddha standing in it.  Alma explained that few years ago, more than 90% of Mongolians were Buddhist.  But now it is about 70% only with the remainder being Christians, due to the influence of Mormon and American-African missionaries.

Seeing Alma give a nod to Buddha in the temple I thought she was Buddhist.  But she’s actually Muslim, an ethnic Kazakh from western Mongolia.  Her grandparents migrated from Kazakhstan during the Soviet era.  It takes her 5 days to drive home because the 3h flight has become expensive.

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Leaving the capital

After a quick trip to the bank to change money, we headed out of town.  It was more than an hour to the Terelj National Park, north-east of the capital.

Along the way we saw some Bactrian (two-humped) camels on the road.  They represented pay opportunities for photos.  We stopped a a little cave where monks hid during the Communist era.  And then Turtle Rock, well … a rock that looks like a turtle.

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Camping in a Ger

From the car I was a group of gers near a sign showing Tsolmon Tours.  My heart sank as it looked scungy with a bulldozer next to it.  That turned out to be a Korean development for a golf course.  Maybe it was the quarters for the construction crew.

The Buuveit Camp operated by Tsolmon Tours turned out rather nice when we arrived at 1700.  We were shown to our ger and were served our lunch.  It was nearly 1800 by the time we finished the bean salad, soup, deepfried dumplings, slaw and pickles.

After lunch we took a little walk up a hill for the view.  It was very quiet, tranquil and scenic.  The grassland was a yellowish, greenish brown.  It would have been even more beautiful after rain when it is green.  The area is riddled with anthills, burrows and granite outcrops.

We were served a dinner of salad (complete with cherry tomatoes and cucumber, both of which are expensive off-season in New Zealand), beef with capsicum followed by a dessert of a yoghurt drink.

Around 2100 when we finished eating, it was still light but starting to cool down.  We chatted to an Australian couple who were in the next cabin on the train.  They’re here on their honeymoon.

We waited for the shower to warm up.  We gave up waiting and decided to hope for the best.  The water was very cold from the hot tap and icy cold from the cold tap!  The floor was icy cold too.  I could only managed a “localised” wash of important bits; not the best after being on train for over 30 hours.

Back in the ger, I appreciated the warmth.  After dinner, it felt like a sauna and we had to open the door to let the heat out.  But after that icy wash, the ger was heaven.

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Snippets of Mongol life

I can see that Mongolia has some very poor people.  I noticed that street vendors sell Chiclet chewing gum by the pellet from a normal pack.  That’s one clue.  The other one that I sometimes use is the sale of cigarettes on a per-stick basis.

Alma earns USD80 per month.  An apartment is beyond the reach of many people at USD16000.

The first American food chain to open in Mongolia is ironically Mongolian Barbecue, rather than Starbucks, McDonald’s, KFC or Subway!  But Mongolian Barbecue isn’t actually Mongolian but Chinese/Taiwanese and popularised in the USA.