The first
few days in Chinggis were pleasant, albeit hot for Linda. After the rush and
bustle of UB, it was really nice to slow down and just chill a little. The
first night back, I cooked chicken fettuccine alfredo from scratch.
On Thursday, we were in no
particular rush, so we wasted the morning away, went grocery shopping in the
afternoon, and spent the evening enjoying pizza with our site mates. Linda had
the unique experience of meeting so many of the people that make appearances in
this blog. It was a pleasant evening with friends.
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| From Left: YeoWon, Kyra, Sally, Ophelia, Caleb, Linda |
On Friday morning we went to Kyra’s
school, so Linda could buy some handmade goods from the students and teachers
at the vocational school. Linda found a number of nice wood carved/felt goods
that were far cheaper and more meaningful than souvenirs bought at a store in
UB. That evening we traveled to Sally’s CP Nyamka’s house for a traditional
Mongolian dinner consisting of homemade tsuivan and Korean pork. It was also an
opportunity to work out logistics for our trip to Dadal soum (soum refers to a small community usually
with only a couple thousand people). Nyamka and her husband had agreed to
provide transportation on this adventure.
Khentii Aimag is one of the most
historical provinces in Mongolia. Dadal marks the supposed birthplace of
Chinggis Khan. Dadal soum is located in the northeastern corner of Khentii.
Mongolians all over the country as well as Chinese from what is sometimes
referred to as inner Mongolia make the pilgrimage to this historic site to
celebrate the most famous and infamous Mongolian. To travel to Dadal, one must
take a sturdy vehicle 300 km (188 miles) north of Chinggis sometimes on dirt
roads, sometimes with no roads. The trip is estimated to take anywhere from
6-10 hours based on road conditions, unexpected car problems, and just getting
lost.
When we found out that Linda was
coming to Mongolia, Sally and I decided that this was something we had to do
with her. Knowing that this trip would be exhausting and difficult, we decided
to do it at the half-way mark of Linda’s adventure with rest days on either
end. There was also something poetic in her journey, since it starts at UB,
becomes more rural with Chinggis Town, and finally complete remoteness and
isolation in Dadal. Once she had seen the birthplace of Chinggis, her journey
is one that slowly returns to civilization tracing the same route she had taken
into some of the most sparsely populated ground on the planet.
We left for Dadal Saturday
afternoon. Our journey was beautiful. Khentii is absolutely gorgeous this time
of year. The land is full of rolling green mountains and long flat grasslands.
Herds of cattle, horses, sheep, and goats wander peacefully through the
pastures. The air is fresh and pure, and it is so clear that one can see for
insurmountable distances in all directions. The only signs of human habitation
are the occasional gers that dot the landscape.
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| On the road to Dadal. View while fixing a flat tire. |
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| 7 hours into the ride to Dadal |
It was also a difficult journey.
Nyamka’s husband was an excellent driver, but he could not control the
unforgiving roads. Similar to being on a boat in rough seas, one must focus
often on the horizon in order to avoid car sickness. A sharp rock gave us a
flat about 200 km (125 miles) into the journey. This delayed our trip, because
we had to stop at the next soum in order to find a tire repair shop.
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| Ducks on the Onon River just outside of Dadal |
The last 50 km (31 miles) of our
journey was awe-inspiring. It was around 9pm, and we had been in the car for 8
hours. The day had been cold and uncharacteristically cloudy leading to a
beautiful sunset that seemed to last forever. As we neared Dadal, the landscape
changed. Trees were suddenly visible. The road weaved through dense valleys of
shrubs. Suddenly the dirt road became a large concrete bridge that crossed the
Onon river. Around 10:30pm, after the sun had set we arrived utterly exhausted
at a ger camp in Dadal.
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| Sunset on the Onon River |
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| Linda, Sally, Nyamka, and Nyamka's husband |
Saturday morning was an
opportunity to site-see in the small village that Mongolians everywhere revere.
There was a small pond by our camp. Sally had wanted to feed the ducks, but
that seemed unlikely, so she settled on feeding the Mongolian “ducks”.
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Sally feeding the "Ducks"
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| Linda, Sally, and a duck outside the ger we slept in. |
|
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| Elaborate post inside the ger |
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| Linda investigating the ger stove. |
Our camp also had a massive rock
depiction of Chinggis and a dense pine forest that Sally and I spent some time
relishing. It is hard for us to equate our sometimes dusty and beak town with
the natural beauty of north Khentii.
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| Sally and Linda next to monument of Chinggis Khan |
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| Trees!!! |
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| Downtown Dadal, we are the only vehicle on the street |
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| Linda feels satisfied after her first adventure with a squat-toilet. |
Nyamka and her husband joined us
around 10am and together we went to the sacred Овоо (awaah--sacred site
located on the top of a mountain) that is the celebrated monument to
Chinggis Khan’s birth. The овоо
was on top of a hill on the outskirts of town that was surrounded by immensely
beautiful scenery. Far to the north, we could see the mountains that mark the
Mongolian/Russian border. Linda and Sally took the opportunity to tie Хадаг (hadik are ceremonial scarfs) to the овоо in remembrance of loved ones. Tying a хадаг to a sacred site is a common
tradition in Mongolia to celebrate loved ones who have passed on or to say
prayers or wishes for the future.
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| View from the овоо, the mountains to the right are the Russian border. "I can see Russia from my back yard!" |
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| The Овоо that celebrates Chinggis Khan's birth. |
After the sacred birth place, we
traveled to a spring not far from town. We each drank from the holy spring and
anointed our heads with its water. A sign near the spring proclaimed the safety
of the water with detailed water testing reports.
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| Anointment at the Sacred spring |
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| Sally at the sacred spring |
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| In the distance is Russia. |
We left Dadal around 1pm, and set
off toward home. The return journey was equally if not more beautiful than the
first. It was a typical Mongolian day with warm sunshine and clear skies. We
stopped in the second soum (our 300 km (188
miles) journey traveled through three villages of maybe 2000 individuals)
around 6pm for roadside Mongolian stir-fry. We ordered the egg and bell pepper
stir-fry to split three ways. In Mongolia this means that there was egg or
pepper with copious amounts of fried mutton and fat.
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| Gate marking the entrance to Dadal Soum. Nyamka's husband, Sally, Linda, Nyamka. |
Returning home around 10pm, we retired
to the comfort of our apartment. The journey, while difficult and fast, was an
amazing way to capture the life and spirit of Mongolia in a way that a tourist
would never get to experience.
~Caleb
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