Settling in...

Phew! I’ve completed the second week and am now enjoying the weekend, having a well-deserved rest. The language classes have continued at the same pace, but it’s gradually becoming more satisfying – I’m starting to see some results from my hard studying. However, all work and no play make volunteers dull people, so on Tuesday all 11 of us partied the night away. Fellow volunteer Jon let it slip that it was his birthday, so a celebration was definitely due. It was great to let our hair down for a while, and little did we know what good singers we all were! Other highlights include:

The “Black Market” – the largest market in Mongolia, which despite its name is perfectly legal. A group of us went to visit it on Saturday. The market takes place on the outskirts of the city, but the long walk was worth it. It was massive! We spent a good two hours walking around it and probably only saw half of the stalls. The whole area was packed with people which made for an exciting but also mildly uncomfortable atmosphere - Mongolians don't seem to mind pushing people around! Amongst all the people(!) one could find almost everything you could possibly want. However I was attracted to the more unusual items - traditional Mongolian furniture, every type of cloth under the sun and very impressive, sturdy-looking boots. I'll probably purchase some of these when the weather starts to turn a bit colder...

Diplomatic Ulaanbaatar – Mongolia’s capital city has everything one expects in a capital city, but as the place is quite small everything is very compact. It seems like almost every street has an embassy on it! Looking at the embassies situated here it’s easy to see hints of the nation’s communist history. Of particular note are the massive Russian Embassy and the similarly large North Korean and Cuban Embassies. However, we don’t just have embassies in Ulaanbaatar. I was lucky enough to be present in the city during the state visit of the Bulgarian President. Whilst the president was being driven around lots of police were about and all the main roads were stopped. It’s about the only time I’ve seen Mongolian drivers obey the rules of the road – they’re pretty crazy drivers!

Visit to a “ger” Catholic Church – last Sunday I, together with my fellow Filipino volunteer Jeka went into one of the ger districts (the less-affluent parts of the city where everyone lives in ger tents). We had heard that masses were held in one of the gers in that area. After a bit of searching around we finally found the ger church in question. It was very beautiful and completely different to any church that I had seen before. We arrived just in time for Mass, and sat down next to the somewhat surprised Mongolian congregation (I don’t think they get many visitors in their church, let alone visitors from other countries). The Mass itself was in Mongolian, but the Filipino priest (seeing that a couple of foreigners were in the congregation) very kindly did a short homily in English for us. He also introduced us to the congregation – everyone was very welcoming. After Mass we stayed for tea and biscuits, which made me feel right at home! Next Sunday I’ll be going to the big Catholic Cathedral for Mass, but I’ll definitely want to come back to this smaller church in the future.

Ok, that’s it for this week. Thanks to everyone who has emailed me or left comments on my previous blog entry - it’s great to hear from you all. I hope all’s well and that those of you going back to work/study after the summer break don’t find it too difficult! Best wishes,

Robert