Mongolian Hot pot - Horhog

Horhog is a traditional way of cooking meat.

First light a fire and heat up some river stones. Be careful not to pick stones likely to explode!!

Cram the meat, typically a dismembered sheep, bones and all, potatoes, carrots and cabbage along with your heated stones into a special type of pressure cooker. Add a bit of water.

Place the cooker in the embers of the fire and hope that the pressure relief valve work!.

Then sit around the fire chatting for at least one hour while the cooking is done. Once cooked, deliver the meat to the table together with the hot stones. Your guests will want to turn the stones between their fingers to benefit from the stones newly acquired health giving properties. A very important part of the Horhog this.

Project Picnic

Beautiful spot by the Tol river,

with the Terelj mountains as a back drop. Lovely

Lay out loads of food.

including some made on the spot with Ariunaa rolling dough and

flame cooked by Sunimal, chief chef!!! Result…… Naan bread.

Then time to relax and enjoy.

Maija and Zoe are leaving Mongolia

Zoe, on the right and Maija complete their one year in Mongolia. Time to say their good byes

This has been Maija’s home for 12 months. All through the –20 something deg C winter too!!! Respect.

The veggie garden in the hasha is at it’s best in August, just before the harvest

 

And with some impressive sunflowers.

 

A horhog to say bon voyage, my own personal best wishes to you both.

New VSO arrive in UB

Twelve new VSO landed in UB over the 18/19^th August weekend. Exactly one year after Gek and I arrived. A bit sleepy and jet lagged but happy to be finally in country. Welcome to you guys, welcome to Mongolia.

Visitors to Lotus

The summer has seen a stream of visitors to the Lotus Children’s Centre and the camp. Prominent amongst them has to been Frazer, an English corporate lawyer from London. He has been in the camp for over 2 months……but let him tell it his way. His travel log at

http://www.fraserstravels.com/blog.html

is a brilliant word picture of his experience here in Mongolia. A must read.

Then there has been the crazy pair, Mark and Andy , who arrived in a 19 year old Ford Fiesta which they had driven all the way from the UK. 32 days. That is some going. And they are driving back!!!! They raised over $10,000 with their effort. Checkout their web at http://www.overlandfiesta.co.uk/

Pictured here with the Centre director Didi and one of her charges. Note the collapsing shoe on the little lad. This is why money is needed. With over 200 people to feed every day, all year, $10,000 represents 2 months’ grocery bill.

Then there were the Singaporean solders. They were in UB for only a couple of day before setting off across the Gobi on push bikes!!!! These guys are full time army and are under orders. Had to be!!!!! But they spent 10 hours at Gek’s newly refurbished building, digging a drainage ditch and clearing the ground outside. Thanks lads.

 

The latest Singaporeans to arrive are Lai Hock’s Venture Asia group (mid August). Pictured in our apartment before setting off to the camp, these young women are here to help look after the kids for the 10 days at the camp. All sorts of professions represented. Nurse, IT specialist, student, all unknown to each other before this trip.

 

The group have bought a new ger, seen here being erected, which they will donate to Lotus when they leave. Kids, never camera shy!!!!!

Well, I salute them all and the many others who’s contributions in time, money and materials make the Centre’s work possible.

TBus 4-002

New TBus on the road. ‘Made in Mongolia’ proudly displayed, in English, across the front of 4-002. Checkout http://ubtrolleybus.blogspot.com/ for more details.

First Job.

A building site, much the same the world over. But this more dangerous. No safety rails and very few hard hats. This is probable the most dangerous phase in the construction. Health and safety as a ways to go here.

 

But we choose to start with bricklaying and concreting because these are the jobs most affected by the season nature of the construction industry. It is against the law to build in winter. Here pictured is …….., one of Grand Perfect’s first graduate trainees in concreting.

 

Together with his colleague,…….., …….earns 200,000 tug (approx.$180) for a month of 12 hour days. No rest day. This was their first task on the site and they have done so well that the company, Jiguur Grand has taken them on to the payroll proper.

 

Other graduating trainees from GP like …..picture here with her trainer…. are on one month’s probation on other companies construction sites around UB. It is not an easy job. We start new courses in tiling, plastering, domestic electrical installation and plumbing at the beginning of September.

Lotus Refurbishment

MCS, the company that market Coca Cola in Mongolia, bought the building next to the Children’s centre for Lotus. Gek is setting up the centre’s craft workshop and visitors shop there. A leaky roof, no heating or water and ancient electricity. No problemo. Enter Gek the construction project manager,

 

and work a transformation. Using money that she has helped to raise herself through the sales of her art work and other projects, the building is well on track to be ready for the children’s return from the summer camp towards the end of August.

 

The heating water is coming from the main building’s boiler and needs to be deep in the ground and lagged to prevent the water from freezing in the pipes at 30 degs below.

 

Builders!!!!! The same the world over. I reckon they are all belong to a secret society……. Torsos.

Salt Lake

A salt lake near to Darkan. The picture was taken by Linda. Such a beautiful photograph.

Darkhan VSO

Cory, the guy with the meaty tea shirt, and crew at his leaving do. Filippino, French (recently of Cardiff, Wales), Dutch, Canadian, Singaporean and English. A typical VSO multi-national group. Best wishes for your future, my boy, and keep writing the songs.

Darkhan

Darkhan old and new with a Buddha sitting between the two. A tidy place with a population of 100,000. Mongolia’s second city.

A symbol of friendship in the centre of a round about. The first impression of Darkhan after the chaos of UB is made by the road system. Everything road seems to be an extra wide dual carriageway with no pot holes and few vehicles,

or the tree lined avenues. The 16 storey tower block is by far the tallest building in the “city” and it’s claim to fame? It has no lift. The most sparsely populated country on the planet, so why build high? To keep warm, silly!

Poole, the major outdoor pursuit. Well it is semi desert all a round. Darkhan is lower than UB sea level wise. Which accounts for the rivers running north into Russia. For some reason, I find that counter intuitive.

No prizes for guessing the inspiration for this little chap. Nice boots!

Going Home

The last meal stop before heading back to UB,

, a final swim in the river Onon.

and a last chance to shop for local dairy products.

The diary products production facilities.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The children were not phased by our sudden arrival, just curious.

Naked Camels

Bare camels. Mother clearly had got the hump at someone stealing her lovely warm coat!!!

Camp Mosquito

A new camp by the river Balj, 17 km north of Dadal. But mosquitoes rule here.

By night fall we were burning dried dung to drive the little beggars away. At one point we took the bucket into the cabin. It worked, giving us a bit free night.

But before the battle of the mosquitoes we had a chance to climb the hill

and contemplate the beauty of it all.

River Balj

The river Balj is a tributary of the Onon, only 2 km from the Dadal. The lads are returning home from the Nadam.

Great place for a picnic.

And Camp. We came across these three gers on top of the ridge between Dadal and the Balj river. Just three gers …..and a toilet!!! Amazingly, we hired them!!!!!

The setting sun illuminated a football match.

and a galloping horse.

Date, 12^th July, official Nadam evening. Party time. Toasts and songs. Car Disco. Flashing indicators and a blasting sound system. Uber’s beating up the countryside but an unforgettable evening. Some of us were slightly worse for wear in the morning!!!!! Someone had to be put to bed!!!!