Mongolian mayhem

Trip Start Aug 27, 2008
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Trip End Ongoing


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Thursday, September 18, 2008

Anna's luck with trains now includes international trains as well (Els and Ali you'd joked that getting the trans sib with my luck with trains was a bad idea- you were probably right). We were woken up on the train expecting to have arrived at Ulan Bator. Unfortunately we were woken up by banging on the side of the carriage. As Anna's luck with trains would have it, we were stuck somewhere in the middle of Mongolia and our carriage had broken down. After changing carriages and removing the broken carriage we arrived in Ulan Bator 5 hours late.

Ulan Bator is a weird city. It's tiny city yet it manages to generate a hell of a lot of noise - mainly due to the fact that drivers decide to toot their horns when they are about the doing a particular unusual maneuver (this includes overtaking despite cars coming towards you on the other side of  the road and then inability to drive in one lane). We were just glad that we weren't driving.

Mongolian's traditionally lived in yurts (otherwise known as big tents). I presumed that they no longer lived in these things and they any of them we'd see were just set up as tourist gimmicks. Turns out I was wrong. Mongolia is full of these things from the countryside to the city centre. Pete and I were amazed when we wondered through the city to find little plots of land with a yurt sat in the middle. Even more amusing is the fact that outside this yurt is usually a massive satellite plate - I can only presume that inside has all the mod cons.

Yesterday was our chance to try out living in one of these yurts. It wasn't very successful. Firstly we arrived and there was no door. Thankfully family we were staying with kind of fixed the door so that it almost shut. We decided we'd live with a little bit of  draft and just light the fire. So we lit the fire - it went out. We decided to leave it and go for dinner. When we got back I complaint hat it was absolutely freezing and that we had to put the fire on. Big mistake. Pete managed to get the fire going. Unfortunately the stove wasn't all that good. Within minutes the stove was billowing with smoke (instead of it going up the chimney) and the whole tent was full of smoke. We then realised why the door was off- clearly it was the only way of managing to have the fire on and generate a bit of heat without gassing yourself in the process. After getting rid of a bit of the smoke we decided not to add anymore wood to the fire and just live with being a bit cold. Yurt living clearly wasn't for us.

Tomorrow we get on the train to China to try proper crispy duck in Beijing!
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