Well That is October...Einstein is Right, Time is Relative to the Observer

September 29, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.
Today’s Quote: “The greatest sign of intelligent life off this planet is that so far they have decided not to contact us.” –Some smart guy told me that once.

Bought a can of tomato sauce today. Its another one of the canned goods that I did not know my town had for the past year. With that and noodles I sat in my ger, using up most of the last of my water but on a two stover I cooked up a bowl of noodles along with tomato sauce to go with it. It was old as hell, from Russia but basically I really didn’t want to drink tonight so I spent my money on food other than potatoes. Good for me!
I don’t know how to describe how strange I found the sensation to be doing that. Last year when living in my bareboned apartment when I had finally learned how to boil water I would just eat the noodles plain. It would be another month until I discovered the use of butter and another month after that before I remembered that I had bought and brought spices. Back then as I sat in the apartment I felt like a sleeper agent who was spending his time waiting for a phone call where they would give me my activation word.
This evening as I sat looking at the wall of my ger and the pasta boiling on one burner and the sauce on the other I had an even stranger sensation. I felt…normal! Like I was not even in my apartment in Ondortolge from last year, but from when I was living in an apartment alone in the Bronx at Fordham University for the last two years. Seriously as I sat looking at the two stoves burn I couldn’t remember I am living in a tent right now.
When I turned around and saw a stove in the center of my room and the crappy bed I sleep on and not an apartment I was taken by surprise. It was such an ordinary meal for such an extraordinary setup. Im living in a ger, eating pasta that was probably 3 years old when I bought it and pasta sauce from a Russian company that still uses USSR for its insignia. I have been living here so long and in one grand wave of realism I came to the realization that everything I am doing is so one of a kind that I even had a weird burst of giggle in which I sort of blew snot on myself.
…and then I started eating.
Talking about food again, life is definitely boring again. School goes well. Its really easy now that I have adopted a “don’t get angry” policy at pretty much everything I encounter.
Yesterday I submitted my proposal to Peace Corps that we get started filing a documentary so it will be done by the 20th anniversary of Peace Corps next summer in Mongolia. If they read it and said cool or if they burst into tears laughing over and over again remains a great mystery.

….oh yea, despite how crappy it probably was, the food tasted delicious. Totally worth not buying vodka over! Least until the weekend.


September 30, 2010. Bagakhagnai, Mongolia.

They did something really shitty at my school today. It doesn’t bother me as much this year for three reasons. The first is that having been here for a year I knew their default position on this and so I somewhere just knew that it was just a matter of time before they did this. The second being that….okay I know how bad this sounds but im not all that interested in the teaching aspect of my Peace Corps experience this time around. I always like to teach, but I am not using it as an indicator of if my time here in Peace Corps is productive or not. Ill tell you the third after I tell you what they did.
Today and last night my two counterparts in class divided up their 4th and 5th grade classes. I take half the kids, they take the other half…no English clubs so that we could improve the skills of the English teachers to the point that they could actually speak English to their students. No seminars on using new and innovative teaching styles instead of the Soviet model still in effect of writing what’s on the board. No implementation by all students of those laptops they all now own and don’t know how to use. In essence I as a Teacher Trainer (not a TEFL) will do nothing to improve teacher skills in my 2nd year here. Nope, just take half my students Josh and ill see you in June!
…
…
…
…
Nope…not gonna get angry.
…
…
…
But I will say this…
Put aside I was a teacher before I got to Mongolia. Put aside I am a teacher trainer and I haven’t taught a single teacher a single thing in my 15 or so months here. Put aside most of the teachers of last year just dumped their classes on me so they could drink in the lounge. Put aside that it looks like that is what is going to happen now (without as much drinking and more internet useage). Put aside I know some PCV TEFL’s who never taught a day in their life prior to coming here and in their sites not only do they get to work together with their counterparts but they even are getting to organize training seminars to teach something that up until a year ago they had never done.
Put ALL this aside…
…
…
…
No im just not going to get angry at this.
I would sit around being annoying and rude for a few days and in the end I would still go along with the arrangement that they had set up but then they would be angry at me. Then as time goes on I would still be happy that I get to be a teacher as well as the other aid groups and services that I have provided to my community and the like.
So in essence this is going to be one of the first times in my life that I will learn from my past so as to not piss away the present because of something shitty that has happened.
The ger experience from the last year taught me something today huh?
At least my old strategy for classroom management is more warmly received at this school than it had at my last. The teachers here all still hit the kids, and once again its just something im not willing to do. Actually in my time here I have begun to see why they do so, and I begin to see that while I don’t agree with it I understand why its still very much in effect here. Today I had a disruptive kid, just a total ass. They know by now that I wont hit em, but today when one kid decided to defy me right in front of the whole class it was obvious that today we determined who was in charge of the class.
Unlike last year where I spent the first six months shouting at them and trying to move them all around. So today after he looked up and grinned while the whole class giggled I put his backpack on him, and then by the strap dragged him out of my class. When he tried to reenter to the giggles of my class I did something a little more dramatic and once again by the strap of his bag I dragged him out. This time I took him out of the school and ordered him not to come again inside until the next bell rang. I did this in the view of the windows of my class so they all saw it.
As I walked back into the school the teachers all sort of looked over at me and gave me that sort of grinning nod. The “I wouldn’t have done THAT! But im glad you did something look.” He sat outside miserable for 20 minutes and I imagine for the rest of the week the kids will gossip how he was banned from the school. Maybe next time he will not try to class clown it when I am around! Especially as colder weather approaches.
Its not hitting them, but in a country where I cant fail them I guess that will have to do. I miss being able to fail students, such an effective measure against so many! Maybe not all, but at least more than I have control over here. Let em fail students in this country and suddenly corporal punishment will come to a screeching halt.
Im going running…


October 1st 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Wow, it’s the first time in a long time that ive gotten to stay in my town without having to go to UB for some reason for more than two weeks. Kick ass! Now I can sit around and play with my new stove and run consistently and all that good stuff! Weekends rock! I think ill even buy some more tomato sauce and eat something that is not bread, butter, potatoes and plain noodles!
So I still don’t own a dog. The eight or nine or so little puppies of my haasha family’s offspring continue to run around the yard and whatnot. Getting taller and stronger. Ive already asked for one and they said yes, so I imagine when its time for them to euthanize the ones no ones taking they will hand me over one. Its gotta be hard for the dog to sleep outside with how cold its getting.
I could use a dog. Actually I could use a cat, but I think a dog will do what I need for my ger. I currently don’t have a dog or a cat, I have a mouse. I’ve even started to recognize him and it’s the same damn mouse that’s been annoying my ger for the past two weeks. I don’t understand what he is doing in here. There’s no food he can eat or get to (ive checked), the ger is freezing half the time so what the hell is it doing in here?
I guess at night when I crank up the heat he drops in for some sleep. Theres dirt all around the ger so the dude must be one hell of a burrower…or he figured something out, who knows. Point is I am both a cat and a dog person and I even am a hamster person, but the mouse thing is just not working for me. I figure if a half sized puppy takes up space in here he will take issue with the mouse and that will be the end of that. Meanwhile since I no longer sleep on the floor I am not that worried of being bitten or anything and so ill go with it for now.
Friday night. Im short on cash so im on half alcohol rations this weekend (I have money, I just need to wait for the end of the weekend when Khan Bank opens.) Maybe my fellow teacher ladies (im the only male teacher or staff member at the school!) will invite me over for some fun and games, or you know I figure ill get a good hour or two run in as well. The weather is not going to allow too many more of those. I spend the last two weeks finally getting my running legs back and now the weather kicks in.
…if it weren’t this it would be something else huh? Cheers….now im going to watch a Mono movie called Duane Hopwood.


October 2, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Oh gods, what have I done?
We make a lot of “mistakes” in life. You can interpret your mistakes in so many different ways. Buddha had a lot to say about mistakes btw, but lets keep this at a non-existential plane. Some mistakes are casual. Tripped going up the steps. Picked the wrong bottle of shampoo in the shower (ah…I remember showers) Other mistakes take longer to fix. Bad investments, wrong major, things like that.
Then you reach the upper circles where a singular mistake is something that will damage you for the remainder of your life. A watershed event of sorts, where you realize that what just happened has set in motion events that you could live forever and never undo. I personally don’t have too many of these. Only one I can think about is that I went to SE Asia instead of getting a job as a teacher near Vanderbilt after I met Rachel.
Today I discovered a new type of mistake…and I made it…and I have fallen…fallen so very…very…far.
Lets go to the backstory. With the internet now at my disposal after a year without I have found myself often enough with some time on my hands to play around at school. A day or two ago either my sister or a friend of mine named Erin typed in on Facebook “YEAY! The Britney Spears episode of Glee is on tonight!” To which I aptly replied “What the hell is Glee?”
That needs some explanation too. You see when you join the Peace Corps you cant keep up with television like you used to. New television shows have popped up in the past two years I hadn’t heard of that apparently are a huge hit in America. This is not the first time it has happened to me either, as I missed the creation of Survivor as I sat on a tiny little boat off the coast of Maine when Survivor came out. I believe that is why I never got on board with that show.
One of these shows which I then researched when my sister did not respond was Glee. A show in which through both a club and fantasies a group of kids (who actually all appear in their 20’s) dance and sing a lot of pop stuff to work out the toils of their lives. Ah, I can remember how much I thought my problems at 17 actually mattered…im so glad I was wrong about absolutely every single one of them….
So to get back on topic theres a show called Glee that I had never seen an episode of and yet after hearing about it being a show with a lot of singing and dancing its obviously not something for me….but there was the second part of the thing Erin’s post had said.

…Britney…

…Hello my names Josh and I am a 29 year old straight guy who still likes Britney Spears. To the people born after 1986 or so Britney was someone who when she was dancing around at 16 they were 10 or younger. An icon, someone to treat as a role model or something.
Meanwhile when Britney was 16 so was I. This was not a role model for me, this was a hot woman…actually that’s all I really needed. The songs were not all bad either, especially considering at that point all I ever listened to was Weird Al Yankovic (my family can all confirm that) Britney even turns my age of 29 in a month or two. So I watched Britney for a whole different reason…a really really good reason. Nope, not apologizing for it. Been laughed at enough im used to it. I like her, and I found her quite hot (especially that period when we were both around 20-22….yea that was sorta the golden age.)
So with Hulu and high speed internet at my disposal I watched the episode.
…and that brings us back to the mistake I made. The new type of mistake I made. The mistake that goes beyond you realizing that you’ve destroyed the future. Watching this episode certainly did that, but then it also did something I didn’t think was possible…
…
It has destroyed my past.
The concerts I went to see her perform. The CD’s, the ridicule of defending her to my college class in English 101, the uploading of her music from tape to CD to mp3 to Itunes to Ipod itself. Ten or more years of enjoying Britney in so many different ways…
…
and after watching the Britney episode of Glee they make me want to vomit. Especially the girl who loved/hated Britney. I just cant believe I actually found pleasure in Britney in different ways…its just…I…ruined…her. I don’t think I ever want to hear Britney again nor do I think I can recall Britney from my past with a happy thought anymore.
…
And its all because I watched a stupid new American tv show…
…good gods of Kobold…
what have I done?



Morale of this story: GLEE SUCKS!


October 3, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

I got a text message from Esther today. Shes up at the town of Tsaagennuur right next to the Taiga in the north. Its amusing how I was there only two months ago. Well she just came back from the East Taiga as well. Her message made me grin. She had come back empty handed as well. No reindeer. Seriously they just aren’t round in the East Taiga on the main river areas. Now that the snow has come they likely have all backed up onto the secondary rivers that fuel the Tengis river.
So she seems rather annoyed and unlike me she has a tad more time. At points the snow was up to her hip, and given how hard that trail was in the Summer that is some tough stuff! Esther is the type for adventure so she is now headed to the West Taiga to find those blasted reindeer. That’s even harder to get to…Good luck Esther.
Reindeer aren’t real….i knew it!


October 4, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

So I taught solo in the small little classroom outside the main building today. The kids are super jazzed to be taught by the gringo despite how hard it is to understand me or to read my handwriting but still it’s the enthusiasm that is all I needed. So I didn’t get angry and it turns out everything was alright with the arrangement anyway.
YOU SEE!!! I actually learned from my mistakes in the past! GO ME!!!!!
My water container I bought last week has started to leak out all my water. Ive had the thing for less than a month, its done nothing but sit at a corner of my ger and somehow its already become garbage. Ive seen grandparents carting around water containers that looked as old as they were that still held water and mine is already broke. Always something….
Luckily they are cheap. Gonna buy a bigger one next time i am in Naarantuul. That and a chair that doesn’t fall apart like the camping chair I bought.
To cheer myself up this afternoon I went on a five mile run. I love those as the weather is right now that perfect cold crisp feel that’s not like it will be in three months and the sweat that comes out of you then freezes and glasses onto your body and the snot in your nose crystallizes and expands puffing out your nose. You gotta love the winter! It is coming….IT IS COMING!!!


October 5, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Today I was recruited into finding the Monoglian version of the World Cup theme song “Wave Your Flag” That was a hunt believe me. When I finally found it it turns out that I know the band that sings it. Its these four teenagers who are always used to express the diversity within Mongolia and I know the single qualification you need to be in this group (the ability to speak a lot of languages) Ive also been drafted to sing the English version of “Wave your flag” at the World Cup thing my town is throwing this weekend. Don’t get too excited, its basically a weekend of soccer, were just first going to sing.
Ill say this about the world cup, while it provided some great entertainment at beer tents over the summer with travelers of the world (I was cheering for a different team every five minutes) it also has finally replaced the Michael Jackson song “We Are the World” that has been blaring on every single cell phone in this country for the last year.
I got an email back from an old friend at GMU today, Brian Davis. I feel like reminiscing, so let me take you back to a day we all remember. September 11th, 2001. We all know it as a national tragedy. Indeed it was. Yet what happened the next day caused quite a stir at the dormitory I was living in. The RA we had had for two weeks named Josh had cleared out the night of the 11th and written on a piece of paper he stuck to his door. “I have left college so I can read my bible and walk more closely with God” That afternoon I was in Brian Davis’s office, asking to take over the position. They checked my GPA and when they saw I was above 2.5 and I hadn’t answered their questions like a complete moron I was moving my stuff into the RA room that evening. “Funny the Way It Is” never seemed to apply quite so much as to how I stumbled into one of my most successful and enjoyable careers of Residence Life in Higher Education.
Like all of us I wish 9/11 had never happened… yet I cannot imagine my life today if that event had not happened.
Well the man who gave me the job and was my direct supervisor for the next five or six years was Brian Davis. “Big Dog” never suited a man better than he. He was exactly what I needed at that stage in my life. Kept my rambunction in check and gave me the serious look to get me through those rare moments when I actually had to act the part of an adult in my career. It’s during my time as an RA I met my two life friends David and Martha as well.
But back to Brian, that man has been at that school since I was 13, and he has known me since I was 19 years old. Outside of my family, he/David/and Martha are the only ones who have known me throughout all of my 20’s. My oh my how I have changed. I will say though that I am glad were down to three people who knew me back when I was 20. I am tolerable now, imagine me emotionally 10 years younger and you get the idea.
In the email he was full of fun stories from GMU. I didn’t really realize just how much I miss that place until he started talking about it. He mentioned how the dorms they had been putting up brand new when I was 22 are now the buildings that the Freshmen are getting stuck in and how more and more is there that was not before. Unlike all the change that I hate for some reason I don’t mind that about GMU. Its like a happy resignation that I knew my time at GMU was not something that would or even could last forever. I loved all my time at that school, but by far the greatest growth and time of my life came in the summer of 2004 on that campus. The summer of the turn around. The watershed of my 20’s. Where I either got it together, lost the weight, passed the grad school, or fell from pride and find myself in the most standard ways of life. Running everyday, great food, great friends, maturity FINALLY catching up to me, Lord of the Rings out on DVD, …in essence the time of my life. Its probably the first time in my life I am not mad at change, because if it was still there I could pretend to relieve it but it would not stand up to what it was before. Now it’s immortalized. Forever a part of who I am and what I became. And now its something else indeed.
…so yea that email made me miss GMU.
My reminiscing definitely gave the option of “Returning to Higher Education” a few bonus points.


October 6, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Yesterday as I didn’t have classes until the afternoon I took the morning shuttle bus over to Ondortolge in order to go to the bank for the first time since August in addition to catching up with the old staff members at the other school. On our way we had to drive through some of the countryside on the outskirts of Ondortolge and they drove me past an old falling apart building. There are plenty of these and the Soviets had actually used a great number of explosives to leave craters instead of buildings when they left.
This building hadn’t been destroyed in this way but neglect and time left only one wall standing. As we passed it I could see why the wall was still there. On it was a mural drawn. It was something that only time and weather would destroy, but for now the faded image of this mural struck me so soundly. On it was one of the massive Vosstock rockets created by the Soviets during the Space Race blasting off into space. It had the image of a famous cosmonaut on it as well and the great propoganda regailing the heroes of the Soviets. It was a mural to the Soviet Space program. I had thought Mongolia contains only natural beauty. Today I saw something I hadn’t really seen all that much of in over a year. The type of history made by man. Some who know me know I sorta used to worship the space program, and it remains something I most definitely intend to continue to pursue in my quest to be a lifelong learner.
Ill have to go back sometime this year to photograph it. If I could I would take the whole 20 foot by 10 foot wall with me!


October 7, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Good classes today. Work is pretty simple. I got an email from my stepfather today. I hadn’t heard from him in a while and I am glad I got to. He sounded happy and healthy which is just how I like all of my family, and he has also agreed to ship in the next Harry Dresden book. That will be something to look forward to as winter approaches.
The people making the new school directly next to us are still hard at work despite the seasonal construction people usually wrap up at the end of September. These are not your usual blue collar Mongol workers. These guys are the real deal. The type who actually are on a salary and have engineering school experience. That means that what would take 3 summers will actually be done in one year. The school will be up and running just in time for me to leave. I am sure the next PCV’s to work in this community will be all smiles and thrilled to work in it.
I wrapped up my afternoon/evening with a 3-5 mile run. Wow once your in shape I tell ya, NOTHING feels better then running yourself ragged.


October 8, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Today I got an email about applications for being one of the trainers at the IST training for the M21’s. I didn’t get to be a summer trainer, which I thought sucked because I have run conferences before. I was an RD for cryin aloud. So I filled out the application and will try again. Still, if I don’t get the job again I am not going to let that get to me. I really am trying to take a lesson from my ger experience and not getting angry at things that I don’t get immediately. Still, im hopeful. I filled out a pretty good application.
Today at 12 me and my fellow teachers at Bagakhangai were taken on a trip to Ondortolge for teacher training… ill repeat that. I… “I”….a TEACHER TRAINER….went with fellow teachers to be taught by another teacher trainer. Could I just say how proud I am for not getting annoyed by this at all?


October 9, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

So the conference became volleyball, meat and drinking (your surprised?) Nope we arrived, and a school from UB had come to challenge my school to volleyball. All women, just like my school now. All of them were urban and cosmo as well, and in terms of sports my town handed their asses to them. Really, really handed their asses to them. Good thing about that is it meant the rematches were called for in November at their school in UB.
Anyways, we had a dance/drink thingy as we stalled for food to be cooked and the night which was going to be so boring became a blast. By the by, those women from UB are pretty damn cosmo. One woman with legs long enough you could climb up them walked across the room, reached into my pocket, took my phone and punched in her number before evil grin walking away. Damn that was hot!
So that was yesterday, todays a tad different. Today this school has been driving me nuts. I think its now so cold no kid wants to be outside, and with nothing to do and being the only building in the whole town that is heated everyone is in here playing ear bleeding music and wrestling and demanding to know what I am doing on my computer. Actually the kids of the town all used to hang out at the school on the weekend as well, but unlike the massive former sport barracks that was the old school this school is one corridor and four classrooms, throw in the 500 or so kids using the school and this place gets awfully damn crowded.
Then when they see that I am tying a word document they seem to think this is the most important thing they have ever seen and proceede to hover by the dozen. I am not a person who does well with needless attention when I am just sitting at a computer typing up. Especially when people pump in a metric ton of speed metal and screaming voices down the hall. Its my own stress test this year.
I guess the easy remedy would be to do something else on the weekend aside from the school. I used to go to UB but its been over three weeks now and aside from needing a new water container I don’t really see any reason to go into UB these days either. I am sort of waiting for the cosolidation drill that is supposed to take place some time in the month of October and use that to spend some time in a hot water shower and some pizza and burgers and beer….but ill see how I feel next weekend if the call for consolidation does not come.
Who would have thought sitting in a school I always sit in and not doing any real work could bring about stress?

October 10, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Today my town put on a concert. Usually we go to the culture center in Ondortolge for these things but today is a tad different as its all and only for Bagakhangai kids. The theatre in this town is so damn cool. It used to be a garage for those giant oil tankers of sorts, and they turned it into a theatre. This town of mine really makes you wonder what the buildings we use in America will be like when our star is no longer in ascension. It makes you think, and it can scare the hell out of you if you let it. Or you realize that your one of many carbon based lifeforms that will continue to build off that which was left behind until the end of our existence as a whole, be it comet, ice age, solar flare, plague, or good ole fashioned war.
Remember, if the existence of time up until now was measured on a single days worth of time, mankind has existed since 11:59pm and 58 seconds! Blink and youll miss us!
Anyway, I digress…the concert.
Mostly little kids, mostly songs, mostly not that good. I know I know there kids, but I mean it some of those kids weren’t even singing just shouting of sorts. Really? Really?
Still, its Sunday so aside from wasting time on the internet it was not like I had a whole lot to do and such so I sat in the cool oil tanker garage and watched the kids in my town sing. Go life, go Peace Corps!


October 11, 2010.

Its beautiful in my town this week. Its got a cold, crisp feel in the air that doesn’t leave you bedridden as it will in January and February. The trees are all bright beautiful colors and the sun is still out and shining during the day, giving you a warm feeling even in the cold. I love October, it feels like a cold Thanksgiving back in the United States. Yea, that’s a good way to describe it.
Wow, 16 months in the Peace Corps. Seriously? 16 months? Blink of an eye…. 8 months or so of service left. Least until were back to the Summer, with beer gardens and no work. That means it’s the 2/3rds mark. What the hell it felt like the halfways point yesterday!



October 12, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Today we come across what one might call a “game changer” Up until this point I have only used my oven for baked potatoes. Pretty easy to make obviously. Potato and time make baked potato. Good storage food. Today though when I went to get a coke I found something in their fridge that I hadn’t seen before. I sorta kept looking at it and not really believing what I saw. There was just no way. I mean sure my railroad store has all sorts of diverse foods and yea they even have the odd can of tomato sauce…but theres just no way what I am looking at is real.
…
…BAESLICKK!!!!!!!!
…
you call it cheese.
It’s a food so rare in Mongolia that they don’t have a word for it, they use the Russian word for it. Cheese is something your not aware of how much you love it until you don’t have it, then its all you want.
Then I did inventory on what I have available.
I have flour for making dough, I have tomato sauce…and now I have cheese that I can shred up, and I own an oven….
…
…by Zeus and all the Gods…I can make a pizza. Well that’s it. I am never leaving this town ever again.
Okay maybe once or twice for errands to the black market and a trip out to see some friends and an eagle hunt but serious I now have every last whimsical thing I had ever dreamed of. I really may weep.
Now of course, these things are not cheap, but I figure if I don’t drink except on weekends and I keep up the diet of potatoes and noodles during the week then on the weekends I will have the time and the money to treat myself to homemade pizzas. Oh that’s a food blog if I ever imagined one.
Guys…it already was heaven here, now its heaven with the food of the gods…. Though they could use some hummus…wow I could complain until the end of time couldn’t I? A food blog is coming…keep an eye out for it.


October 13, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Well, ive made a command decision. This had a lot of factors involved in it, but no matter, it is what it will be. After looking at Peace Corps webpage and weighing my career options I have decided NOT to apply for any specific Peace Corps fellowships of next year.
The reasons for this are as follows. 1) I can study anywhere and anything, my career post Peace Corps meanwhile will not be as diverse….though I am still unsure what it is exactly that I am going to be doing at the conclusion of next summer its pretty obvious that it will be somewhere area specific. If I start applying to fellowships I will need to bend my career around that instead of the much easier option of bending my academics around a career. If I find myself back in higher education its likely that I will have tuition remission anyways, meanwhile if I work for the government after this I will likely find myself in some kind of urban environment and Peace Corps has fellowships for universities in practically every single one. 2) It’s a little early to start working towards the doctorate…. When Peace Corp ends for me ill be 30. I have been in higher education for over ten years and posess 2 masters degrees. I know that Dr. Jacobs has a good ring to it but that will take time regardless, and meanwhile I am pretty sure that starting school learning again the instant I get back may be over pressuring. Ill see how I feel next fall, I can always audit classes anyway. 3) I may stay with Peace Corps…. If they will have me anyway. Basically I could make some kind of government administrative work my career easily. The trouble is I am not sure which is better…get in entry level, work to mid ground…then get the doctorate so I can get the endgame career options that require a doctorate OR do the doctorate first. Its hard to assess. But I am sure one way or another going for a fellowship right off the bat is a little premature.
Hey look at me…I learned patience! Or at least I learned how to demonstrate patience!


October 14, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

So, its Thursday and tomorrow is the middle of October. Though if it were up to me id stick around im pretty much willing to bet all the money I have in the bank (around 20 bucks) that this weekend will be the consolidation drill where all PCV’s are required to “consolidate” and mine is the PC office in UB. So itll be an excuse to drink, eat and be merry. Good stuff good stuff.
Yesterday it started hailing outside a little, it was a tad weird as that hail along with the snow that has so far fallen has been rather moist. Very different from the snow I recall from last year. I guess its just not sub-zero outside and so the snow is not as brittle as it will be come December or so. Very well…
My teachers all ask me about why I am not lighting a fire in my ger. They seem convinced I cant. I think at some point I am going to invite them all over in the evening so they can watch me make a coal fire so they don’t bother me about it as much. I cant understand why this would bother them so much. It means im not burning fuel and I show up to world alive and healthy each day…whats the big deal? No matter…
I have eaten nothing but homemade pizza for the last two days, and now I head to town where they make even better pizzas…something tells me my diet has just immensely diversified for the next eight or so months!
Oh, heres something funny to end the blog on. On Monday, Thursday and Friday me and Sarangoo teach 7th grade. Sarangoo on the first week told them all to buy the school textbook for the English grade. They all bought the English 7 book. Problem is that they don’t start learning English until 4th grade when they take English 1. That means they all bought the book for the 11th grade. Well, at least they will be ahead of the curve!


October 15, 2010. Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

So last night I was watching a movie called “Duane Hopwood” It’s a really vague movie made about three or so years ago. Unless you’re a real movie buff you have never heard of it and I wouldn’t blame you. Youtube it if you want to see the trailer, you will get the jist. Its not special, famous, or even really that good. It’s one of those films that I call a “mono movie” A film where not a whole hell of lot happens so if you fall asleep halfway through the movie and wakeup (as mono people are like to do) you can just keep watching. The other reason I call it a mono movie is that its really not all that much of a feel good movie. Not like a Greek tragedy, just a movie that wont give you a warm feeling at the end as so many others will.
It’s a movie about a guy whose pretty much aware that his life has turned to garbage and he has no way out. He just moves on from one day to another, drinking mostly because hes a sleepy drunk and so forth. When I watch the movie I sort of realize why I watch it so. I don’t yearn for anything in it. I don’t realize the meaning of life from it or how to live my life differently from it or anything like that. No instead when I watch this I realize just how easily the main character of this movie could have been me. One decision here or there, one lucky break I never deserved to get but still did and I could have just as easily been this guy. Some people lose things to realize how badly they wanted them. I watch movies like this to realize just how impossibly lucky I have been, and how easily one decision your not even aware of would or even could bring me around to a fate like this…
…that’s the kind of movie that makes me think,…
…
…and on that depressing note….im in UB!!!!
I just got out of the shower and let me tell you. That water….seriously aside from my bountiful hair I really have no idea where all that black comes from. Must be the ger living that has really kicked it up a notch. Well consolidation happened. I was first place for the soum consolidators. Little by little we all now trek in. It was the right timing for my once a month trips to the capital. Pizza and decent beer will occupy the rest of my time. Tomorrow I think I will go to the black market to buy a water container that is not leaking as well as look around. I have pretty much everything I need right now but its still not that cold out and so it would do me some good to look around. Ill offer to take a few of the M21’s along with me as well who may not know the place like I do.
Yep, life rolls along, but now with cleaner hair.

I just got some really bad news from my friend Esther….this is bad.


October 18, 2010. Naarantull Market en route to Bagakhangai, Mongolia.


So consolidation went great. Got to see a lot of the old gang, especially some of the Erdene crew I had not had the pleasure of seeing in a long long time. Everyone looks happy and healthy. The first day was lost to crazy conversations and pizzas. Saturday was when Esther arrived and I spent the day talking to her and hanging out. She had some errands to run related to her volunteer work, and an exit visa and all that.
Sunday was when I went back to the black market yet again to buy yet another water container to replace the one I had that was one month old and already leaking. This new one is twice the size and will hopefully cut down on the number of trips I make (I drink a lot of water)
Esther decided to spend her final few days in my town before she makes the long train ride back to Hong Kong. Lucky me. Its been an amazing time with her, and it is what it is I suppose. A really good time between two people worlds apart. It is what it is….i hate that expression! Its like when you tell someone “…oh I don’t know. Does anyone ever DO anything to anyone else???”
I also bought a chair. A really…really good chair for my ger. This is a video game chair. The type that feels SO good to sit on and you are in a relaxed position. It cost me the rough equivalent of a weekend of heavy drinking so I figure that’s a good price.


October 21, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.
Todays Quote: “Were grown men, over the age of 35 who moved in together. Were two tigers away from an act in Vegas.” –House

Ill need to get motivated and clean it soon. Good news is that since I was gone for the weekend noone was around to warm my ger and it looks as though the mice in my ger have starved/frozen to death. I threw out two bodies of them in my garbage this morning. Fun fun! At least I have water though! That helps. I couldn’t find a cart so I had to carry it. 70 liters of water is heavy as hell!
The teachers are all being inspected teaching by the government this week so they are running around in a panic and generally concerned about how things are going. Its strange to see them actively preparing for English lessons and whatnot. It must be what I look like a lot of the time.
I read the PC newsletter for Mongolia and it turns out I was one of the volunteers of the month! Granted I nominated myself, but good for me!
So onto something going on in America. Right now it’s the 20th of October in the United States and so it’s the day we all wear purple to demonstrate to our gay friends that they are not alone and not to let a few assholes get to them by wearing purple. Do you all remember life 20 years ago? Seriously I was nine and I remember how uptight America was. Ellen came out and Newt Gingrich told us it was a slap in the face of family values. Regions of America would not air it! Its less than a generation later, and yes things are better…and as Hillary Clinton paraphrased yes things need to be a whole lot better too! Itll happen, little by little. History demonstrates that over and over again. By the by, everyone is aware we have had gay American Presidents right? Not Lincoln either…look up bachelor presidents of the 19th century, I wont just go out and say his name…look for the pretty boy bachelor, and better still once you find him and see his physique wonder if he was a top or a bottom. It’s a short list you will find him quick enough.
I am a little curious what homophobic people think how this is going to play out. Seriously near the end of current young adults lifetime when their kids are reading history books and the picture of the fence in Wyoming where Michael Sheppard was beaten to death I am a little curious if they plan to omit that they were the ones who picketed gay kids funerals or blocked legislation against gay marriage. No, I imagine much like those who threw food on blacks at the Greensboro sit ins or who swung clubs on Marchers back in the 60’s they will all simply grumble about how terrible the world is and fade away while their kids remain ignorant of what their parents inclinations had been. Just a little annoying that they have clout in this day and age.
Living in Mongolia brings about a different perspective on what exactly homophobia is though. For example, the amount of true homophobia is extremely low, especially outside of the major urban centers. It doesn’t exist, neither in practice or even in a physical word. Our mongolian dictionaries use the word “same love” to describe a homosexual. “Lesbian” is translated either as “Woman same love” or …”Lesbian” spelled in Cyrillic. I live in a town of 3000 people. I don’t know a single gay couple living together. However!...and this is where Mongolia demonstrates its uniqueness… I don’t know anyone who dislikes gays! Its just when your not raised in an urban setting you don’t get told your allowed to express your feelings in the same way. So while I believe I know quite a few men and women (some even I consider my family) who are probably gay, they simply don’t act on their feelings. Better still many of them may very rarely act on them and then simply never tell anyone in any way. Women with jobs and no children over the age of 28 are a red flag. Guys who drink a lot and alone or in a small group of friends he always hangs out with are another likely source.
But like I said unless your in UB no one really notices. Girls dance together, boys sit in each others laps and put their hands on each others thighs…its not the same problem in America, just Mongolias own uniqueness. Luckily since Mongolians take a liberal view to all the rules of their various faiths theres no one trying to stop others from being gay because it is a sin of some kind. At least there is that!
Now in UB, yes like every other city in the world your can find your racists and bigots whose idea of a good time is annoying those who do things that make them uncomfortable. But in a country with only one town bigger than a million people their numbers remain blissfully small.


October 22, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Today was pretty boring in regards to school. I didn’t teach today, because today all Mongolian teachers get inspected by their supervisors and if one is handy an agent from the department of education. All of them used computers, got the kids to work in groups, had a thought out and well calculated plan with a convergent conclusion to what transpired. In essence, it was the most beautiful fake thing I have ever seen. It’s a REAL damn shame that we don’t have anything in regards to this type of teaching the other 300 day of the school year. Cant win em all, and in many circumstances you cant even win a few either!
If I read the signs in the store correctly, they have decided that due to the number of education and government inspectors currently in town they are not selling alcohol. I love that…can you imagine that at something like a college liquor store or bar going (you all have finals tomorrow….no booze until they are done!) Oh that’s bloody brilliant. Except of course that the ladies sell it to people anyway if they tuck it into their dells when they leave. I used it as an excuse not to drink today and instead just chilled out for tonight. Then I started watching tv.
So recently I saw an episode of Modern Family and in it one of the kids (who was the stupidest btw) outsmarted their parents in a bet. The parents renigged on their promise based on the argument “yes but we didn’t think you would actually pull that off!”
Heres one of the things I cant stand about me. ANY other person on this planet could watch something like that and not let it get any deeper into their brain past a “hehe…dumb fake parents” and move on with their uncomplicated lives.
…to me that scene was an activation word…you know, like the one sleeper agents have. And in no time I flashed back to the Spring of 1999. I was a senior in high school and my parents having finally gotten me medicated and mature enough wanted me to graduate high school. I had only just finally gotten some stability in my life for the first time….yea ever and so I wanted to remain another year. They told me to bring a teacher to see if their was any validity to my argument. I brought Mr. Doubleday, my Culinary Arts teacher. Me, Mom, Dad, Chef Teacher and two administrators. Oh it was on.
I still remember my dad not even waiting for the pleasantries. Not rude at all just said before the rounds of hello had finished “So what do we think about Josh staying here for a fifth year?” I knew the deck was against me as I was now making all A’s and my problems were more of the annoying than dangerous type…but I had my ace in the hole. I brought the teacher who went on and on for ten minutes and talked about how benefitial more time at this school would be and how I should indeed be going to a fifth year of high school.
I didn’t know it as he was saying it, but I do recall the look of everyones faces, the administrators and my mom and dad. It was sorta that dumbfounded look that the Modern Family parents had when she outsmarted them. That look of “wow…weve been flanked here.” Then my parents and administrators all thanked Mr. Doubleday and then asked him to leave. After that they did the reacharound talk. They threw out my ace in the hole and it was obvious the rest of this conversation was dedicated to getting me to change my mind and to forget that I had found the exact thing they thought I couldn’t find. It didn’t work, and I remember there came a point where they ran out of patience or just out of persuasion dialogue and went…AND I QUOTE!!!

“….yes but were going to do this anyway.”

It was one of my only known moments of actual childhood intentional insolence when I replied “So then why am I here exactly?”

…I was pissed….i was….oh I wish you knew. My parents don’t even know to this day, but I didn’t tell them how angry I was (based on some drama from the year before I kept my angry thoughts more to myself those days) basically when I realized that they were pulling the adult card on me in a life altering situation (I was 18 by the by) I just rudely dismissed myself (dad kinda scolded my tone too… which I found hilarious given the tactics in the power play they had just done) and let the four of them make my life decisions for me.
Parents don’t have social contracts…they are only as good as their conditions allow them. They only play for money if they get to win. I am so glad I realized before I had children that you just cant win being a parent. You have to be the asshole, pretty much until the end of your life, so that your kids don’t truly fuck it up. Then you gotta spin some story about how they should live out their lives and try to have a social contract and all that psycho-bullshit that we tell ourselves make us higher thought order beings. Parenting must suck a lot!

…and I got all this anger rage and ugly flashbacks from a television show that is supposed to make you feel good! What the hell is wrong with me???

…I don’t forgive them by the way. It was the right call they made and in the long run I am satisfied with how it turned out and Im not angry except in realizing that they weren’t taking me seriously and in some cases I still have my suspicions they don’t and as many of their choices for me in the long run it was probably for the best…but nope, 11 years later and I still don’t forgive either of them!


October 23, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

My ger is teeming with mice. I don’t know where their nests are, my food is all locked in a cubbard, I don’t heat my place during the day…why and where the hell are these mice staying? I need a dog or cat. Some kind of animal that occupies my home and just lets the mice know there is a new sherrif in town.


October 24, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

It came to me in a dream!!! A vodka drunkkennes induced dream but a dream no less. It came in a happy memory dream too! That’s whats so cool about this. I have been thinking of shows to show the Mongolian kids on those rough winter days in February when Tsaagen Tsar and my birthday may not give me the strongest work ethic. I needed something PG rated and not a lot of talking as they kids (or adults actually) don’t speak any English.
The flashback was a trip to a movie theatre I went to with my mother in Washington DC. It wasent a big theatre, in fact the theatre was quite a piece of garbage, because we were not seeing anything famous, we were watching the clay animation movie “Wallace and Gromit: A Close Shave” Oh that’s just perfect! Its full of words they use on a fairly regular basis and would make for an excellent lesson. Additionally, I miss that movie. I remember seeing it, mom in tow. I love how most memories of my past now only seem to be good ones or if they were bad they seem funny now. Go vodka induced dreams! Thanks for the inspiration.
Well today I am gathering up some video clips of songs and things about America as tomorrow my school has “America Day” and they want to show and act like Americans. By the way: got a riddle for ya. What city is London Bridge located in? Its not a trick question. Everyone thinks London except for annoying history geeks like myself. The one everyone thinks is London bridge is actually Tower Bridge! London Bridge was dismantled brick by brick and bought by some Amercian who reconstructed it at Lake Havasu, New Mexico. THAT’S where London bridge is, so technically an American song! Try explaining that to Mongolians!


October 25, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

My family has been asking how is ger life now that it is around 5 degrees Fahrenheit at night. Its one of those times that I tell them the truth that this is not hard and aside from keeping a good fire going at night sleeping in this ger at the moment is not that different from how I have been living the last year. Actually my living arrangement carries with it a great deal more perks. In my apartment I was on the top floor and everyone I knew never came by first of all because my apartment sucked so bad it didn’t even have a bathtub or hot water and also my neighbors sorta expected me to go to them uninvited. A detailed explanation to my neighbors from Peace Corps did not help either. No internet sorta made me a shut in as well.
Now I live in a yard with a family I interact with on a daily basis and the majority of my time outside my ger is me working at school with the other teachers as the school is the most heated building in this town.
So yea, at present life here in the ger of Bagakhangai is tough but good…and I am aware its gonna get a whole hell of a lot tougher. The cold I am experiencing now I could handle standing on my head. Now granted, I have a high tolerance of cold pain but if its anything like the winter last year yea this is gonna get bad! Nothing for it, itll make the snow grainier and the snot in your nose freeze…buckle up! Ill take a picture if the vodka I have freezes.
The other thing that already solidifies at night and settles back but will stay solidified in about a month is the outhouse pile. You see, when its impressively freezing non stop (as it will be for over three months) when you go to the bathroom your droppings build and build off each other because it freezes to the previous waste before it can reach the bottom. Creating the eloquently titled….shitcicle! Is it not amazing what you learn living in a ger?
So today is technically American day in the school system. I was asked to play some American music. I dug up some classics like “Hail Columbia” “We Didn’t Start the Fire” and “Bonnie Blue Flag” I really have no idea how I got to be so gullible that I thought those would be played. They all screamed GA GAG GAGAGAGA!!!!! And after giving up I let them listen to Michael Jackson and Lady Gaga.
Not the lesson I would have done, but hey I guess I should be grateful they like something about America. “The evolution of Dance” was at least not booed off instantly (It lasted one minute)


October 26, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Ah, tonights dinner is baked potatoes. Im saving up a little money as I promised to make Sarangoo and anyone else who drops by Friday night pizza. By the following week I get next months monthly pay and can grab some more cash, so I need to save money now so I can spend it on Friday. Its funny to think that when you “save up” living in New York that means you spend less than 20 or so dollars a day. Here “save up” is around 75 cents a day, and a day where I blow all my money is around seven dollars. A beer at your bar is what it costs me to buy cheese/tomato sauce/ enough vodka to get astronomically drunk and a coke brand coke along with enough left over to buy three cans of beans.
Go Mongolia go!....okay im a little starved/delusional here and I need these potatoes to boil quicker.


October 27, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

So Esther is really gone now. Her last text was at Chinngis Khan Airport headed back to Hong Kong. Her old job awaiting her, an adventure of a lifetime under her belt. I gotta say this is by far the healthiest relationship with a woman I have ever had. Certain people read this blog so I wont go into detail but the reasoning behind why this relationship was so healthy as opposed to others ive had actually fuels my concept of love quite well. This was solely a physical relationship with an absolute whiff of emotion. I think I came to an understanding how if you don’t believe in love it must be quite easy to satisfy oneself.
Have I really turned into that guy from the failed show “Life” Love one that way and then go have all the mad fun you ever could with anyone else interested? Based on what I just did I imagine that would be nice, but for some reason I imagine women would not be so inclined to such a setup and that’s where things turn ugly. Esther might have been a one of a kind/perfect storm type setup. No matter, its over and I truly feel better having had her in my life for the time that she was regardless of what lessons I ultimately pull from all of this.
I imagine ill be getting rather cranky in the next month or so going through withdrawal from a rather enjoyable setup I had with Esther, but the most important part of learning from this relationship is going to be truly and happily letting go of a good thing that I knew was not going to last. The cold will help…


October 28, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

And then there was cranberry juice. This is getting a little scary. You see, a month ago a new brand of Mongolian made and manufactured juice was on the shelves. Its served in a cardboard carton instead of a plastic bottle (easier to burn) and is slightly cheaper than the Minute Maid stuff like orange juice. Additionally, the new Bio orange juice didn’t have any pulp, it was like pouring the painless sun down my throat and reawakening to the bliss of citrus.
So for the last month ive been on a bit of an orange juice bender. A carton a day is the average going rate. Yet today I had drank the orange juice dry because today it was not orange juice…its cranberry juice. I looked at the box and had a great flashback to none other than my 2nd alma matter Fordham University. I think the retired Jesuits have a bladder infection or something because the only juice the school serves is cranberry. So I am now gonna drink the hard berry down. I swear these flavors sorta scare me. I didn’t realize how much I missed them till I started having them in quantities and qualities that I have of late. Its just tastes…so…fucking…good. How the hell did I not appreciate stuff like this before???? I apologize for swearing, just trying to make a point that this really was a true joy to have to drink.
…also it means I can turn vodka and that garbage grapefruit/medley flavor juice into seabreezes…by far the gayest drink I could ever concoct…so instead ill just chug vodka and then take an equal swig of cranberry juice. I got to start making some wine again! Good thursday…good thursday. I swear I really am teaching all these days too!


October 29, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Ugly day, better evening. It was one of those days in which I got to see just how fully I am being utilized around here. Theres something here called “English Olympiad” Basically it’s a chance for everyone who wants a shot at saving some money to go to college in UB by winning a contest like this to write an essay on a theme and submit it. The theme was “books of our times”
As I mentioned before, my town through some gerrymandering got shoved into the UB aimag, meaning when we compete even regionally were going up against kids who lived in cosmopolitian city and get a good grasp of English from a very early age. Meanwhile my quaint little town has an army of people aged 3-18 who all only say “hello” to me and I am pretty sure most of them don’t know what that means exactly. Not stretching that either.
Okay, so the kids who try for these things are gonna crash and burn right? Not a problem, still by all means try. This is where the first aspect of the Mongolian education system kicks up and the kids all cheat. Not American cheat either where they write cram notes on a water bottle label or something, no these kids found an English book about book history and word for word wrote it down on a piece of paper.
My counterpart Sarangoo told me to type up what they wrote. I asked why they could not do so in the towns computer lab and was told that they don’t know how to type and the papers were due at the end of today and that they knew I was good at typing. Lets review, they copied verbatim from a book they did not understand a word of, and then they were going to have me type it so they could submit it on their own behalf…

…
TO DEMONSTRATE THEIR ENGLISH LANGUAGE SKILLS!!!!
…

This is again where I have been called on not to do just stupid work, not even fake work….ive been asked to do someone elses fake stupid cheating work! I think at this part of the day I was not having a stellar time and I was getting a little cranky. I don’t think I had eaten a lot and I have been running all week and I sorta just wanted out of their so I sat down and typed up the first plagiarized writing they put before me. Another girl showed up and asked me to do the same with her plagiarized writing. This girl had selected a piece by an old professor who remarked about how he can remember first touching a book and realizing that someone they didn’t know was in contact with them in a most intimate way. The twelve year old girl in front of me couldn’t pronounce the words she had written down let alone understand their meaning.
It was the third kid that made me lose it. I was full blown angry at this point and though I have done garbage like this before I think my appetite and the degree of abuse had risen just a hair too high even for me at that point. This teenage boy had not even written his down. He had found a pamphlet from a UB public library and said “secretary type now!” and giggled to himself and the two other girls next to him.
I looked up at this kid, wearing fake designer brands of clothes that would make K-Fed blush and the way in which he had spoken to me, a Peace Corps volunteer twice his age with two masters degrees working for around four dollars a day and with more worldly experience and temperance than he could ever dream of and he spoke to me like I was his dancing monkey. Here I was, doing all I can do to help, and this is the type of help and reception I get for it. I get that your not supposed to help in return for something else or its not help, I would like enough dignity from those who seek to abuse my charity so that I don’t feel like a complete fool for what I am doing out here.
I only blew my cool internally….i pride myself really. I should have deleted the other work I had helped for the cheating students and then I should have reported them so that the testers would be certain to disqualify them. Then I should have taken his sideways hat and wiped my ass on it before throwing him against a wall in a Mongolian form of discipline I have seen for disrespect all too often (except for the hat thing)
…instead I gave Sarangoo the two I had done and said to her “tell them to write their own cheating papers” and then stormed out. Sarangoo had been drinking a little that day, but more so I think she understood that she had abused my volunteer spirit and willingness to help a bit too far and let me go…smart woman.
I went back to my ger, lit up a fire and took a few deep breaths. I put myself to work cooking a pizza feast. It was the smart thing to do after a day like that. The difficulty I was enduring was psychological in nature, my body physically had not been aching. So by working hard in cooking I released a lot of stress…


October 30, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

My counterpart Sarangoo left for China today to meet some friends. I love how easy that is for them to do. China….relatively speaking think of China as Mongolias Mexico. Its strange to see a people as progressive as Mongolians express true prejudice but I guess every country has one right? Seriously though, theres a Mongolian actress who was recently practically black listed because she married a Chinese guy. Well have fun Sarangoo. Im spending the weekend living the high life in my town.
Though I will say that today, or rather last night I hit a bit of a snag with my living arrangement. I haven’t made more than a dozen or so fires in the past month ive owned a stove. Not cold enough and all that. Our primary source of fuel is coal, but this is not the Match Light brand stuff. This comes out of a quarry about a mile outside of town and the stuff is blocks the size of car engines. It also doesn’t light on its own very well so to begin with you need a small wood blaze. Not even a big one, I think I pride myself on my firemaking skills in that with a handful of splint pieces of wood I can get coals burning. The yard has a small pile of lumber in it and Ive been siphoning off some the past few days, but last night as I grabbed some splinters my haasha father comes out and starts rambling about how I am not supposed to be using his wood pile.
I sorta scratched my head and said well that’s all well and good, but then how does he suggest that I build a fire without any wood chippings. As usual the uneducated men of Mongolia like him choose more often than not to not bother to try to understand me or to be understood (I am SO glad I was raised to work well in women dominated work forces!) and he quickly rambled that it was his wood and if I had a fuel problem to take it up with Peace Corps and all that. He walked away with the hatchet, the subject obviously closed and he was not interested in talking to me. Now its not that cold out so I can live without the fires, but seriously that was a bit of a douche move by my mechanic haasha dad there. I wasent splintering boards for crying out loud, hell I usually didn’t even use an axe and just took whatever splinters were lying around but what the hell man.
So I guess when Sarangoo shows up and I can be more descriptive then I can figure out if we share the wood pile or if my own private wood stash is en route or something. No matter, just strange to have him annoyed about that.
The first quarter ends on the 10th of November and we get a few weeks off, then thanksgiving kicks in…yea November is gonna fly by…and snow is probably gonna show up and stay next month too. I wonder when we find out if we get to be M21 trainers….i wont get it. My early moodiness last fall may have been forgiven but it does give me a record. I didn’t win the “My Piece of the Peace Corps” video contest. It was won by a teenage girl playing the guitar…I didn’t stand a chance!

October 31, 2010. Bagakhangai, Mongolia.

Well thats another month, time for a blog post. Not the most exciting month, but at long last 3-4 weeks of me just living and being in my small little town. More months to come!