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Into Inner Mongolia
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The day where we don't ride camels, Andrew wrestles a mongolian, we eat strange spicy food and sleep in a yurt.
Whilst we were on the train we were approached by a girl with incredibly long hair touting tours of the Inner Mongolian Xilamuren grasslands. We took a flyer and had a look. According to our LP it seemed to be quite a good price, so we signed away 400Y each, and then instantly wondered what we had let ourselves in for... terrifying images of following a coloured flag and megaphone around for three days entered my mind! We were distracted by a group of students from Hong Kong, who greatly enjoyed reading our guide books as they were studying English. They apologised that we wouldnt be able to understand them as they were speaking Cantonese... we tried to explain that we didnt speak any chinese... no, not any at all, and when they eventually understood they thought we were crazy! Quite a lot of people had this reaction, most of the young travellers we met had been on teaching projects for a few months so spoke a bit of Chinese, they all thought we were absolutely bonkers travelling round China without a word of Chinese between us, but we seemed to muddle through ok.
As promised we were met by a tour guide in traditional Mongolian dress on the platform in Hohhot. We were taken off to meet the rest of our group, 3 Japanese guys, 7 chinese and one American guy, with, thank god, his partner, a Chinese-American girl - yay a translator!! She proved to be very essentail since our guide spoke only hellohowareyou English. Thankfully there was not a flag or megaphone in sight, and our tour guide even offered to book our onward train ticjets for us whilst we wre out in the grasslands! Just one problem... we needed to pay for them, and so it would appear, banks in Inner Mongolia do not cash travellers cheques! EEEk! We were stuck in Inner Mongolia with only our emergency dollars, gaffa taped into the insoles of our boots, which all together would just scrape one train ticket out of there! We went to both the Agricultural and Industrial banks of china and were polietly, but firmly turned away (I never found the 'students bank of china'...). Returning to our 'base' in a mild state of panic, we found everyone else on the minibus, waiting for the stupid foreigners (thats us). After a few minutes of sweating, someone suggested we try the posh hotel across town. We hailed a taxi, jumped in, realised we had no clue where we were heading, grabbed the chinese guy who suggested it, put him in the taxi and told the driver to step on it, hardly neccesary in China! We arrived, and a very smart doorman opened my cab door for me... but they wouldnt cash our travellers cheques. At a last ditch attempt we tried the ordinary bank of china (for non agriculturists or industrialists one presumes) and amazingly they did it with no problem! Either nobody told them about the wierd mongolian rules, or everyone else had been very confused! Anyway we headed back to our impatiently waiting group and finally set off.
Our minibus left the city and wound up and down tiny roads in the middle of nowhere for hours. It was really nice to be out in the open countryside after suffocating in Beijing. I had expected a barren harsh environment, but the grasslands were really lush, with trees and patchworks of fields in different shades of green. There were loads of large characters carved into the hillsides, I was really intrigued as to what they said.
Our destination turned out to be a small village with a site full of permanant yurts - the traditional tents of mongolian nomads. We were shown to a yurt whch we were to share with David and Michelle - the other english speakers. It was really comfy, almost all filled with matresses, once the door had been laced shut very warm and cosy, and with the most amazing views. We were then invited to our Mongolian lunch - a selection of traditional Mongolian fare, including 'finger mutton', dough balls, lots of spicy meats (David doesnt like spicy food, 'is that spicy?' 'do you find that hot?' 'what about that, is it spicy?' he ate A LOT of rice!)and the piece de resistance, a sheeps brain, served out of the split open skull. Well, you have to try these things once! It was very chewey and garlicy, and once was definately enough.
Trying to learn Chess rules
After lunch we were due to go camel trekking, but it cost extra and 3 hours of bum-bumping agony on a camel did not appeal so we decided to give it a miss. We went for a wander around the village and found a small old temple, which at 50p was a much better investment! It was really cool as they seemed quite shocked that any tourists had turned up, and was very genuine, with young monks sat in the corner trying to learn their prayers and everything. We span a few prayer wheels and were looking around the main temple when a woman started tapping me on the shoulder and motioning vigorously for me to go outside. I was terrified that we had done something wrong... but it turned out that we were just required for a photo shoot! Clearly we were the first white people she had met, and she finished off her film taking varioius photos of us with the kids, with dad, grandad and any other friends she had around!! Very strange experience. We then retired back to the yurt to try and learn the rules of chinese chess... starting with trying to work out which each of the pieces were! Michelle couldnt understand how we couldnt tell... 'but it looks like an elephant!'. It certainly does not look like an elephant!!
Man United in Mongolia!
The next entertainment was in the form of a horseriding and wrestling display. One of the small boys riding was wearing a Man United shirt!!! Absolutely amazing. The wrestling was really good fun, they wear big leather studded waistcoats. Audience participation was actively encouraged, and Andrew managed to hold of the guy for about 30 seconds before being floored. One of the Japanese guys was huge, and won just by lifting the Mongolian wrestling daddy off his feet!
Wrestling
After another Mongolian meal (is that spicy?) we were treated to a Mongolian party. We couldnt quite work out what was going on... they cant possibly have put on the show every night as it was a huge affair with a full lighting rig and all sorts of performers. Just before the start a big car drove up across the plains with a full escort of men on horseback with banners... I guess he must ahve been pretty important so it may have been for him!! We had lots of cheap beer, cowboy fireworks, dancers, operas, and nasal mongolian singing, which was all very impressive. At one point during the performance the 'important guy' was presented with a ceremonial 'wine'(tastes like paint-stripper vodka). Then they turned to do the same for us... not the whole group just Andrew, David, Michelle and I... obviously esteemed western guests. It was quite terrifying being surrounded by people chanting and watching, and I had no idea what I should do! Luckily Michelle whispered in my ear, we had to flick a bit up to the sky, wipe some over our brow and then down the rest! At the end of the night lots of firecrackers were set off and everyone went into Mongolian kareoke, whilst the boys all stamped on the insects which had fried on the lighting rig and fallen onto the red carpet below to turn it almost black. A pretty amazing night all round, and we got to sleep in a yurt!
Top Tips
- You cant beat a Mongolian at wrestling
- Chinese Chess is not easy, but learning gives you something to do, and makes you lots of old man friends on long train journeys
- Yurts are well comfy!
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