At long last a weekend together

SO, first of all, good on all of you for posting to our site. it is really great to read everything. blogging is fun.

So this weekend I (sierra) traveled from my host site to Jesse's house. It is like night and day. Jesse's site reminds me a lot of Addy. Pretty rustic. It was GREAT to see him. We played with his brothers, watched some dvds on my computer (I have a birthday coming up if anyone wants to send some Dvds), and made pizza for his family. at least we called it pizza, it was was more like a bruchetta (spl?)with local ingredients. It was fun to make and i think they liked it too. then we got schooled playing cards with his brother and mom, i think the brother was trying to cheat because we never figured out the scoring system. : ) today (sunday) we are in Darkhan eating tofu and emailing on fast(er) computers.

Mongolian language is going along well. We can now read at a 2nd grade level, can succesfully introduce our family members, and say that they all like fruit. Immersion really is pretty amazing.

The summer seems to be flying by, can't believe it is already the end of the 3rd week. We have a mid training inservice in 10 days, followed by a half week off to celebrate manly sports, and then sort of a whirlwind set of travels and classes before swearing in Aug 20th. We are having a really great time though and are still very pleased with our decision to be here. Much happier after a weekend together.

Jesse got good news today, his MCAT scores are in the 98th percentile (scored a 37) so he is pretty awesome and we are excited.

Technical training is going along. We do cross cultural, sector specific and community development on top of our language. The youth development secotor is really interesting because we are the first ones here. It will be a year of discovery and research before starting a big project i think. For most our our in country counterparts it will be there first time working with americans, and my first time with mongolians. Language will be really important. Also testing the boundaries between what people say they want, what they actually want, and what we are able to do will be an exciting challenge. looking forward to it and ready for the challenge.

Jesse's training sounds super interesting. He is learning a lot about the challenges in the health care system here. It seems like a large number of problems stem from a lack of specialized education and a general want for the specialized diagnostic tools and facilities that we are all so accustomed to in the US. (There are only 3 specialized diagnostic centers in the country). It looks like a lot of his focus will be on reproductive health and nutrition, primarily from the educational side. Although there are some rumors of matching him into a more laboratory setting which would be great. He realized he has a lot to learn but most of the necessary resources are readily available to things should be fine.

One last thing that i thought you would all enjoy. We have ger competencies that we have to learn durring the summer. One is chopping wood, buildng a fire and cooking. I made " boats" with my host mom which are kinda like potstickers. They have a specail way to fold them and it took me a long time to get it. We made about 50 and my host mom said i did 5 good. Ha! We went to the country to chop wood and i milked a goat. It was kinda wierd. But I can do it two handed like a pro. And I was the best wood chopper of our group. I think because I am so short and close to the wood. We also rode horses and ate yogurt, cheese, and hot milk. It was fun.

ok that is all from us for now. will write more in ten days or so.

take care.

The Longest Week Ever

Good to hear about the other side of the world. Keep it coming. Rain and sun here too. Really hot. Boy, I am so excited that you got a new apartment. It is like you are a real person, but I will still think of you as 9. Also glad to hear that you cut your beard down. I have pictures of you in my photo collection here and they don't believe you are my younger brother. Dad they just point and say really, you look alot like Chingis Kahn, I think. and mom they think you are too young. Ha!

Internet is slow here in my town and there are only two computers. Imagine dial up networks in Mongolia, not so good. But I think I can manage a weekly update. Jesse doesn't have email and I have no idea what is going on with him. I get to see him in a week, going to his host family for the weekend so that should be awesome!

This has been a super long week. I have been sleeping a ton. I am slowly learning Mongolian. Learned the alphabet this week (cryllic) and then that day we were reading at a first grade level. So things are moving pretty fast. I am not discouraged yet but I am not that good. Talked to my Community Youth Development people about the type of job I want. I think youth in government would be cool here. I think we will be placed in the capital. Not that excited about it, wanted to live in a ger, but it sounds like they are trying to place jesse in a lab setting. not sure about the details on that but that is what it sounded like. i am guessing the only labs are in UB. and the government is in UB too. So I guess that will be good for when people visit.

I just took a shower at the town bathhouse. WARM water! I think it was the highlight of my week. The soviet apartments don't have hot water in the summer. So it is brain freeze cold trying to wash hair.

Last night we went over to a fellow trainees house and set up the laptop and watched Monty Python. English! Yes! There is a lot of american television and chinese television but it is all dubbed in Mongolian.

Anyway, I should check email before my hour is up. Take care!
s

4 Crazy Days

Hiya!
Good to hear from you all! Jesse and I have had a wonderful time at our host families and training. I will tell you about mine and then let jesse tell you about his.

Sierra:
I live in a town of about 10,000 (including the ger suburbs) but I live in the apartment district. TONS of kids everywhere. My apartment is nice and i like my room, I have a bed and desk. My host family is great, really patient and laugh at me a lot. I have three host sisters and they are wonderful. The eldest reminds me of Abby so that is nice. and the youngest is perhaps the cutest thing i have ever seen. They help me every day with homework and pronounciation. we walk around town holding hands and they are always in my room hanging out. we play a lot of cardds, i taught them egyptian rat screw and they taught me a mongolian game. they are very impressed with my shuffling abilities. they also taught me how to play this game with bones. my host parents are nice and very accomindating. they don't make me eat things i don't like (mostly) and i eat a little meat. the first night there i cooked beef noodle soup from scratch (from the careful instructions of my host mom) and that was pretty cool. the only seasoning is salt or sugar however and my family is pretty keen on mayonnaise in eveerything. language is going slow. everyone in my class is super smart and pick it up right away but i am very slow and still working on it. haven't given up hope yet.

we have limited computer time so i will let jesse get his two cents in...

Jesse: My host family experience sounds fairly similar to Sierra's. I am living in a 4 room brick house in a more countrsidesk location (our fence backs up to a large empty hillside). I have 3 younger siblings that belong to my host family and a multitude of other kids of various ages wondering in and out of our home. they seem to be firm believers in the "it takes a village to raise a child" philosophy here. I live about a mile from the school so I don't seem to have much free time, especially lately with all of the cultural and health related training we have been recieving on top of the four hours of language. when I am at home though I usually have been talking to my host mom (primarily by pointing our phrases in our phrase book or going through the dictionary) I am however begining to learn enough words to make myself understood at least a bit. My host siblings have warmed up to me very quickly, especially the four year old. they are afraid to come into my room as of yet, but I will soon break them of that fear. I haven't had the chance to learn to cook yet, but I did do laundry by hand the other night and also learned the ankle bones game that sierra was referring to. there are so many stories and thoughts I want to share but don't think I have the necessary hand strength to type all of those things. simply stated though I am having a fantastic time with my family, the remind me a lot of my own family when we were all a bit younger, and am loving every moment of my time so far here in Mongolia.

P.S. for those trying to find us on a map. We are both located within 60 km of Darkhan. Sierra is to the southwest and jesse is about 20km to the southeast. both area are little soum (small communities surrounding larger imeg(city) centers) and may not be on any maps except Mongolian maps. If I figure out how to type cyrillic on these computers I will spell the names for those who are interested, but right now I don't have all of the necessary characters.

Host Family Bound

Hi kids,
we are here in Mongolia in a town called Darkhan a few hours from UB. We are off to our host families tomorrow for the next 8 weeks. We have been busy learning mongolian, how to stave off drunks and wild dogs. pretty cool. mongolia is a beautiful place. first night here we stayed at a ger camp (really pretty yurts). it was crazy cold but really awesome, got some good picts. they call it the land of blue skys and it is. gently rolling hills and no pesky trees to block the view. looks a lot like colorado. we are in a town that is the second largest in the country but it is still not that big. takes thirty minutes to walk from one end to the other. lots of throw back russian apartments. jesse is taking to the food but i am considering vegetarianism again. we shall see how receptive host families are to that. : ) went to the black market yesterday and it was a crazy giant flea market. you could find anything there if you looked hard enough. it was really nice because no one was a pushy salesman and there is no barganing. mongolian is coming along slowly. jesse is doing great and i am running to catch up. yesterday my language break through was a rolled "r" so that was pretty cool. we can count to ten, talk about our family, if we like or dont like about 7 foods and how to say hello and good morning. i think there will be a lot of awkward silence tomorrow in our host families.

Jesse is in a town called khongor. His host dad works for a local company driving a tractor. His host mother is a herder. They have three children, all boys between the ages of 4 and 12. He is living in a 4 room wooden house, and is told it backs up to a beautiful hillside. I am in an apartment in Khutul. My host parent own two stores and have three girls between the ages of 14 and 6. I think it will be really good once i learn about 700 more words!

ok, that is all from us for now. feel free to post to this or send us and email (disappointing lack of emails people). we should have internet access weekly or so.

-sierra

On our Way!

We are in Seoul right now, have been traveling for 24 hours. Got the middle seat for half way around the world...doh!

The Seoul airport is full of Duty free shops and not much else but it is nice. Didn't find a "South Korea has Seoul" shirt. I think something is lost in translation.

We arrive in UB (the capital) tonight around 11pm. Spending our first night in a Ger camp and then having lunch with the ambassador. Then off to our new staging grounds about 45 minutes from the capital. Jesse and I will be in seperate houses but they promise we can visit on the weekends, so that's nice.

Pretty much all to report for now. Cheers!

- The weary wanderers