June 27, 2010
This weekend has flown by!!! Friday my site mates and I got to go to Ulaanbaatar! That was a lot of fun! We took the bus into town, which was an adventure. First of all my friend Jo and I ran to my house after language class to drop off our books, so that we didn’t have to lug them around town. BUT when we got back to school our LCF (Language Teacher) told us the bus already had come and gone. Let’s just say I was frustrated. At that point I thought we weren’t going to be able to go but she quickly reassured us that the bus was just going to the other side of our town and then coming back to pick us up. That was a relief! Ten minutes passed and the bus was back for us! I think that might have been the first time since I have been here that I was worried. Anywho, we got on the bus and went to town!
When we got into UB we got off the bus to meet up with some other PC’s to get on a smaller bus to take us the remainder of the way to the restaurant. On the way we saw another PCT on the side of the road walking. That shocked us because none of us are suppose to be in UB and especially not alone. Caroline, our trainer quickly told us that that was our first ET. (Early Terminator) Three weeks in and someone is already going back to the states. Crazy to think that someone is already going home but I am sure there is a good explanation as to why. (We’ll just have to find out later!)
Finally we arrived at the lovely ABAF!!!!!!!! American Burgers & Fries might be my favorite place in UB. Ah that meal was amazing!!!!!!!! I had a coke, cheeseburger, fries, and real ketchup!!! (No mustard unfortunately but the meal made up for it) During the meal I don’t think we spoke a word because we were all so very much enjoying the food! The restaurant owner, who I forget his name, is Korean American and for what ever reason he had the genius idea of opening up this place. I am very grateful for him!
After our lunch we then had the opportunity to meet with three different agencies that we as CYD’s might be working with in the next two years. I was thrilled to be able to meet them all and I am really looking forward to getting to my site to begin working! One of the agencies was dealing with child labor and we got to meet some of the kids who they helped get off the streets. That was really moving to be able to see the accomplishments they have made in their work. I hope to be able to become apart of an organization similar to that one to help prevent further kids from resorting to child labor. A lot of my job will be working with children to help prevent a lot of the issues we have been told about since arriving. My hope is to try and make a difference in my Aimag (town) so that the children see their own potential in themselves.
After meeting with everyone we got on the bus to get back to our little old town. I think myself and site mates included were excited to go home after our long day. When we got back we went to the locale Karaoke café to wind down. We have yet to sing but it is really entertaining to watch the Mongolian’s sing. They get so into it and pretty much scream at the top of their lungs! Afterwards I headed home. When I got home my mom had dinner waiting for me. As I was eating my Mongolian sushi, which consisted of seaweed and rice, low and behold my brother comes on T.V.!!!!!!!!!! (Alicia Key’s latest music video came on) Chad you have made it to MONGOLIA! That was really cool to show my family who you were in the video! I think that they were impressed! LoL.
On to Saturday, in the morning I didn’t do anything too terribly exciting. I basically just relaxed. Then my mom asked me to make lunch. Those of you who know me know that I am not best of cooks but I was so excited to be able to cook something new for my family! I had no idea what I was going to make. She sat out a leg, thigh, winged piece of chicken for me to defrost. The first thing that came to mind was fried chicken! It took me an hour to defat the piece of meat and to cut it off the bones. After that process everything else was a piece of cake! I made fried chicken, French fries, and sweet tea!!! They loved it!
After lunch we had our first community meeting/youth group! It was great!!! I was so happy that people came out to hang out with us! I’d say we had about 15ish kids there. We played uno, poker, guitar, and basketball with the kids. It was a lot of fun. I was surprised there was two kids there that knew English fairly well. It really wasn’t too bad with the language barrier. I am excited to get to know these kids through out the summer, we are meeting every week!!
Saturday evening was fairly laid back. A couple friends came over and we chatted for a couple hours. Then I watched some world cup with my family. I have no idea who was playing. The TV screen was a little fuzzy but it was fun to watch it with them!
Last but not least Sunday, today. Today had been HOT! Seriously I don’t think I have ever been this hot before but I do not mind it one bit. I am taking in all the hot memories I can get! ( I am storing them up for winter time lol) This morning three of my site mates and myself went on our weekly hike. Whooo, what a hike!!!! We hiked for about four hours. The mountain that we hiked to today we could see an over look of UB. There are a ton of mountains around here and our goal is to a hike every weekend!
After we came down from the mountain we decided to continue our hike over to the town’s water hole. Haha it really is a water hole. It is so small yet the coldest water I have had in Mongolia. It was a lot of fun because there we so many animal around like goats, cows, horses. They were just hanging out. Then I got to hold my first goat!!!!!! It was a baby and the cutest little thing!!!!
When I got home I was exhausted! My dad made me lunch and I went to my ger for a nap. I also realized I got really sun burned today. I didn’t think about putting sun block on today. Oh well, after my nap I awoke to find prolly the biggest bug I have seen in Mongolia. I quickly got my dad and he took care of it for me. Thank goodness he was around.
Well that has been my weekend. Full of random and exciting things! I am going to go have dinner now.
Love,
b
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Body Language is Universal
June 24, 2010
This week has flown by! We, my site mates and I, went on a day trip on Monday and Tuesday to a near by town to have a couple of classes on TEFEL for NON-TEFEL. Basically that is where we briefly learned how to teach English as a second language. Those two days were a lot of fun because we go to interact with some PCT’s (Peace Corps Trainers) who we don’t get to see too often. The rest of this week has also been very busy with language lessons, CYD Sector meetings, and Cross Culture meetings. AND tomorrow is going to be a very very exciting day because WE get to GO to the BIG city!!!! My sitemates and I are going to UB! (Ulaanbaatar) We are all very very excited!!!!! Not only do we get to go to a big city, but we also get to meet some very important people whom we will be working with in the next two years. We are visiting several agencies that we will be working for in our sector. AND we are going to ABAF!!!!!!! That is American Burger’s And Fries for you non-Mongolians!!! I am so excited to have yellow mustard…I can’t wait. I might not even get any sleep tonight because I am that excited!!!!! (Seriously)
HA, anyways…this week has also been eventful in my growing with the Mongolian culture. First of all I wait FOUR days till I took a tumpin bath! I think that might be the longest I have every gone with out bathing. Let’s just say I felt a tad bit gross! Oh and I FINALLY milked the family cow! That was an adventure!!!! It is so akwkard trying to hold the bucket, while sitting on a bucket, while crouching under a cow, while milking. But I did it…even if it was only for five minutes, I can now say I’ve milked a cow. Umm what else…today the power was out for most of the day. I think my mom was trying to tell me there was some sort of damage…I’m really not sure. BUT this comes into play when I tell my next story.
So today was extremely warm. I mean I was sweating up a storm all day long. SO when I got home for lunch the last thing that I wanted to drink was hot tea. I decided I would teach my family how to make sweet tea. I was so excited about this. I even found ice cube trays in the freezer, which just made my day!!!! I put on a pot of water to boil while I cleaned out the ice trays. As I am waiting for the water to boil I explained to my mom that I was going to make ice tea. (I think she understood me) Finally I looked at the water pot (which is basically a water heater) and realize that it is not on……then my mom informed me that the power was out. Let’s just say I was a tad bit disappointed!! BUT I am going to try again another day.
To continue on the subject of a hot day and my sweating, I have to say that body language is universal. All who know me well know that my feet sweat. I mean whose doesn’t? But I suppose on a sweaty day like today it was to the extreme. So in agreement of trying to follow the culture here today I realized that in my family’s house they take their shoes off when going into the living room/bedroom. I just realized this today. Now I knew that it prolly wasn’t the best idea to take my shoes off at this point but I wanted to be respectful. I took by black flats off against my better judgment. As I sat on the floor with my feet out stretched my brother came over with his machine. (Toy truck) At this point I was thinking to myself well maybe he won’t notice. He didn’t…for a bit. But as he was driving his machine around the living room floor he encountered my feet. Let’s just say I think y’all can image his reaction. He covered his nose while saying something in Mongolian and proceeded to run out of the room. So when they say that Body Language is universal, it’s true.
Hope y’all enjoyed that story! Lol.
Love,
b
This week has flown by! We, my site mates and I, went on a day trip on Monday and Tuesday to a near by town to have a couple of classes on TEFEL for NON-TEFEL. Basically that is where we briefly learned how to teach English as a second language. Those two days were a lot of fun because we go to interact with some PCT’s (Peace Corps Trainers) who we don’t get to see too often. The rest of this week has also been very busy with language lessons, CYD Sector meetings, and Cross Culture meetings. AND tomorrow is going to be a very very exciting day because WE get to GO to the BIG city!!!! My sitemates and I are going to UB! (Ulaanbaatar) We are all very very excited!!!!! Not only do we get to go to a big city, but we also get to meet some very important people whom we will be working with in the next two years. We are visiting several agencies that we will be working for in our sector. AND we are going to ABAF!!!!!!! That is American Burger’s And Fries for you non-Mongolians!!! I am so excited to have yellow mustard…I can’t wait. I might not even get any sleep tonight because I am that excited!!!!! (Seriously)
HA, anyways…this week has also been eventful in my growing with the Mongolian culture. First of all I wait FOUR days till I took a tumpin bath! I think that might be the longest I have every gone with out bathing. Let’s just say I felt a tad bit gross! Oh and I FINALLY milked the family cow! That was an adventure!!!! It is so akwkard trying to hold the bucket, while sitting on a bucket, while crouching under a cow, while milking. But I did it…even if it was only for five minutes, I can now say I’ve milked a cow. Umm what else…today the power was out for most of the day. I think my mom was trying to tell me there was some sort of damage…I’m really not sure. BUT this comes into play when I tell my next story.
So today was extremely warm. I mean I was sweating up a storm all day long. SO when I got home for lunch the last thing that I wanted to drink was hot tea. I decided I would teach my family how to make sweet tea. I was so excited about this. I even found ice cube trays in the freezer, which just made my day!!!! I put on a pot of water to boil while I cleaned out the ice trays. As I am waiting for the water to boil I explained to my mom that I was going to make ice tea. (I think she understood me) Finally I looked at the water pot (which is basically a water heater) and realize that it is not on……then my mom informed me that the power was out. Let’s just say I was a tad bit disappointed!! BUT I am going to try again another day.
To continue on the subject of a hot day and my sweating, I have to say that body language is universal. All who know me well know that my feet sweat. I mean whose doesn’t? But I suppose on a sweaty day like today it was to the extreme. So in agreement of trying to follow the culture here today I realized that in my family’s house they take their shoes off when going into the living room/bedroom. I just realized this today. Now I knew that it prolly wasn’t the best idea to take my shoes off at this point but I wanted to be respectful. I took by black flats off against my better judgment. As I sat on the floor with my feet out stretched my brother came over with his machine. (Toy truck) At this point I was thinking to myself well maybe he won’t notice. He didn’t…for a bit. But as he was driving his machine around the living room floor he encountered my feet. Let’s just say I think y’all can image his reaction. He covered his nose while saying something in Mongolian and proceeded to run out of the room. So when they say that Body Language is universal, it’s true.
Hope y’all enjoyed that story! Lol.
Love,
b
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
H2O
June 20, 2010
What a morning! I sleep in to 9 a.m. thankfully! Then I had bfast, which consisted of bread and tea. Afterwards I wrote some emails. While I was writing my emails I had some music on which I think attracted my family. I don’t think they like it very much, prolly because it sounds so different from theirs. Anywho then I started my laundry. Hand washing! I really don’t mind it because I hand washed a lot of my clothes back in the states. The only thing I do mind is the water situation. In the states if you need more water you just go to the sink. Here it is a process. My family has a water bucket. So I take my bucket to their water bucket to fill, with a small pot. Then I carry my bucket, which is heavy, to my ger. Then I have to fill the water heater by spoon, to heat the water. This way is faster then my distiller that I have. My distiller takes like 8 hours to filter the water.. the family water heater takes like 5 minutes. Then I fill my wash bucket with soapy water. That’s a lot of steps to take before I can actually wash my clothes! But that’s not it! The process starts from square one when I need to rinse my clothes to get rid of the soapy water. Lets just say it took about an hour and a half to do a very very small load. But all in all its really not too bad. I guess I have the time to spend. Today I am going to meet up with my site mates to study and work on some things for the upcoming week. Off to lunch!
love,
b
What a morning! I sleep in to 9 a.m. thankfully! Then I had bfast, which consisted of bread and tea. Afterwards I wrote some emails. While I was writing my emails I had some music on which I think attracted my family. I don’t think they like it very much, prolly because it sounds so different from theirs. Anywho then I started my laundry. Hand washing! I really don’t mind it because I hand washed a lot of my clothes back in the states. The only thing I do mind is the water situation. In the states if you need more water you just go to the sink. Here it is a process. My family has a water bucket. So I take my bucket to their water bucket to fill, with a small pot. Then I carry my bucket, which is heavy, to my ger. Then I have to fill the water heater by spoon, to heat the water. This way is faster then my distiller that I have. My distiller takes like 8 hours to filter the water.. the family water heater takes like 5 minutes. Then I fill my wash bucket with soapy water. That’s a lot of steps to take before I can actually wash my clothes! But that’s not it! The process starts from square one when I need to rinse my clothes to get rid of the soapy water. Lets just say it took about an hour and a half to do a very very small load. But all in all its really not too bad. I guess I have the time to spend. Today I am going to meet up with my site mates to study and work on some things for the upcoming week. Off to lunch!
love,
b
June 16, 2010
A great end to a productive day!
I finally learned how to say goodnight in Mongolian!!!! It is so easy. Basically it is Sayhan Nursery!!! For me the best way to learn and remember this language is to associate the words with English words, especially because a lot of the words sound familiar. I feel like today was a very productive day for me, aside from my waking up late issues. (Which I hope to resolve by tomorrow!)
To begin, this morning I believe there was some miscommunication between my host mom and I. Yesterday I told her that I was going on a trip on Wednesday. In addition, I told her that I need a packed lunch and that I was leaving at 11. Well I think that she thought that I wasn’t leaving the house till 11 because when I went to the house this morning for breakfast she didn’t make me anything. Which was fine because there was some bread on the table, which sufficed. (Plus she was busy bathing my brother in the kitchen) Anywho, I quickly ran to my school…which I was a few minutes late. .I am going to try to work on getting there 5 minutes early from now on. However, in Mongolia I find that time is not an issue like in America. People are in no hurry, which is nice but when it comes to class I need to be more mindful of my classmates.
Class this morning was short. We had about 2 hours of Mongolian Language where we worked on our greetings and possessive pronouns. Then we piled into cars for our trip. When I say piled I mean PILED!! LOL. To begin the trip my friend Shar was basically laying on top of the three of us in the back seat. About half way through the trip our driver (who is Shar’s host dad) stopped the car so we could rearrange. Then I got to sit on top of Mama Jo (Joanne’s) lap. (which for me was nothing for in my younger days I was used to always being the one to sit on someone’s lap….siblings you know what I am talking about!!!) Anywho that was comical for all the people in the car, 7 people in a 5 person car.
The reason for our trip was to go to a nearby town to received…..MORE SHOTS!!!! Fun Fun!!! My total for shots in Mongolia is up to 8!!! Hopefully I won’t be getting sick anytime soon!! Oh and silly me pulled away during receiving one of the shots so I was scrapped a bit by the needle which was no fun!!! Lets just say my arms hurt a bit tonight. It was a great trip because we were able to see other trainees who are staying in that town whom we haven’t seen in a week. Plus I got to mail out my 11 letters!!! (Which was expensive!!) Oh and I got to get online..to those of you reading my nonsense go to my facebook to view pictures. It is a lot easier to post pictures on Facebook then to post them on my blog.
Then we ventured back to our home sweet home. Upon returning we had another CYD session. That session was helpful because we were informed a little bit more on how to be successful in our final sites come August. Let’s see what else…oh we are planning a community meeting for Friday so that we can have a ‘needs assessment’ which members of the community to see what we can do through out the summer in our town. I am really excited to see who turns out for the meeting!
When I got home I ‘mongolian chatted’ with my fam a bit. Then my friend Shar came over and we decided to go check on another site mate who was sick that day. Her name is Brittany as well. Thank goodness we went to see about her because she was not feeling well at all. I took her temp and called the doctor to see what em (meds) to give her. I think that she got sick because of what she had for bfast, which was rice milk tea. Ironically my mom tried to give me that for dinner but I politely refused. ( I was worried I’d be sick too!!!)
So one of the reasons I am really excited about my day is because I feel like my family is really starting to understand me and why I am here. One of the Peace Corp goals is to teach other cultures about the American culture. SO…I asked my mom if she likes to exercise. She said yes. So I told her that I like to do yoga and asked her if she wanted to try it. SHE AGREED!!! We decided to try it out in the morning! So I am really looking forward to that. THEN another Peace Corp goal is to learn the Mongolian culture. SO…I asked my little brother to teach me a Mongolian song. He understood me but ran away laughing. Lol. Then my mom told me that she would teach me because my little brother prolly wouldn’t do a good job. Still I am so excited to learn!!! Finally the last of the three main Peace Corp goals is to create world peace through friendship and I feel like I have made a great friend in my neighbor..(her name sounds like Delgima) I asked her if she wanted to learn English and she does. So when I teach my English class to adults I am going to make sure she is apart of that! Oh and my little sister (who is 2ish) is letting me hold her!!! That just makes me smile!
Anyways if you have made it this far into this blog thank you for reading my rambling!!!
Love,
B
A great end to a productive day!
I finally learned how to say goodnight in Mongolian!!!! It is so easy. Basically it is Sayhan Nursery!!! For me the best way to learn and remember this language is to associate the words with English words, especially because a lot of the words sound familiar. I feel like today was a very productive day for me, aside from my waking up late issues. (Which I hope to resolve by tomorrow!)
To begin, this morning I believe there was some miscommunication between my host mom and I. Yesterday I told her that I was going on a trip on Wednesday. In addition, I told her that I need a packed lunch and that I was leaving at 11. Well I think that she thought that I wasn’t leaving the house till 11 because when I went to the house this morning for breakfast she didn’t make me anything. Which was fine because there was some bread on the table, which sufficed. (Plus she was busy bathing my brother in the kitchen) Anywho, I quickly ran to my school…which I was a few minutes late. .I am going to try to work on getting there 5 minutes early from now on. However, in Mongolia I find that time is not an issue like in America. People are in no hurry, which is nice but when it comes to class I need to be more mindful of my classmates.
Class this morning was short. We had about 2 hours of Mongolian Language where we worked on our greetings and possessive pronouns. Then we piled into cars for our trip. When I say piled I mean PILED!! LOL. To begin the trip my friend Shar was basically laying on top of the three of us in the back seat. About half way through the trip our driver (who is Shar’s host dad) stopped the car so we could rearrange. Then I got to sit on top of Mama Jo (Joanne’s) lap. (which for me was nothing for in my younger days I was used to always being the one to sit on someone’s lap….siblings you know what I am talking about!!!) Anywho that was comical for all the people in the car, 7 people in a 5 person car.
The reason for our trip was to go to a nearby town to received…..MORE SHOTS!!!! Fun Fun!!! My total for shots in Mongolia is up to 8!!! Hopefully I won’t be getting sick anytime soon!! Oh and silly me pulled away during receiving one of the shots so I was scrapped a bit by the needle which was no fun!!! Lets just say my arms hurt a bit tonight. It was a great trip because we were able to see other trainees who are staying in that town whom we haven’t seen in a week. Plus I got to mail out my 11 letters!!! (Which was expensive!!) Oh and I got to get online..to those of you reading my nonsense go to my facebook to view pictures. It is a lot easier to post pictures on Facebook then to post them on my blog.
Then we ventured back to our home sweet home. Upon returning we had another CYD session. That session was helpful because we were informed a little bit more on how to be successful in our final sites come August. Let’s see what else…oh we are planning a community meeting for Friday so that we can have a ‘needs assessment’ which members of the community to see what we can do through out the summer in our town. I am really excited to see who turns out for the meeting!
When I got home I ‘mongolian chatted’ with my fam a bit. Then my friend Shar came over and we decided to go check on another site mate who was sick that day. Her name is Brittany as well. Thank goodness we went to see about her because she was not feeling well at all. I took her temp and called the doctor to see what em (meds) to give her. I think that she got sick because of what she had for bfast, which was rice milk tea. Ironically my mom tried to give me that for dinner but I politely refused. ( I was worried I’d be sick too!!!)
So one of the reasons I am really excited about my day is because I feel like my family is really starting to understand me and why I am here. One of the Peace Corp goals is to teach other cultures about the American culture. SO…I asked my mom if she likes to exercise. She said yes. So I told her that I like to do yoga and asked her if she wanted to try it. SHE AGREED!!! We decided to try it out in the morning! So I am really looking forward to that. THEN another Peace Corp goal is to learn the Mongolian culture. SO…I asked my little brother to teach me a Mongolian song. He understood me but ran away laughing. Lol. Then my mom told me that she would teach me because my little brother prolly wouldn’t do a good job. Still I am so excited to learn!!! Finally the last of the three main Peace Corp goals is to create world peace through friendship and I feel like I have made a great friend in my neighbor..(her name sounds like Delgima) I asked her if she wanted to learn English and she does. So when I teach my English class to adults I am going to make sure she is apart of that! Oh and my little sister (who is 2ish) is letting me hold her!!! That just makes me smile!
Anyways if you have made it this far into this blog thank you for reading my rambling!!!
Love,
B
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Delayed Post
June 10, 2010
WOW. A lot has happened in the past couple of days! First of all this is the first time I am turning on my computer since Saturday…and it is about to be Friday. One week without a computer I must say is quite liberating! Ok so to give the run down of the past couple of days I will briefly inform y’all on my whereabouts!
To begin getting to Mongolia was LONG! After arriving in South Korea we took off on MIAT (Mongolian Airlines) and let me just tell you I was very tired. I believe I was a tad bit slaphappy because I was laughing hysterically at everything. For example my new friend Sharaya was sitting next to me and we were ‘trying’ to talk to the flight attendant whose name was Doggie and lets just say it was interesting experience. To say the least he did not speak a lot of English. Anywho eventually I passed out on that flight. Arriving in Mongolia the first thing I noticed was there were no people! Seriously none! Typically every airplane ride I have come off of there is someone around. Not in Mongolia! We, as a group preceded towards customs and waited in line to enter the country!!! That was a piece of cake then there was Peace Corps Personally inside the customs room. Paul (Health Personal) and Lisa (Country Director) greeted us with a lovely Peace Corps nametag. Directly after I retrieved both of my bags (thank goodness there were NO baggage issues!!!) THEN craziness began…the moment I left the baggage claim area there was a tunnel like (think VOL walk) welcome in which I walked through and about 100 people cheered for me!!! It was awesome! The feeling that I felt was really overwhelming. I was so happy to finally be in Mongolia and surprised to see everyone cheering for my arrival! Then I went to my appropriate bus and proceeded to pass out again for the drive to our training town. When we finally arrived at the school dorm it was pitch black out and Sunday morning..keep in mind I left San Fran early FRIDAY morning!! So we all went to bed.
Sunday morning we all woke up at the crack of dawn. Let me just say I haven’t really ever had any issues with jet leg but now I can say I have truly experienced it to the fullest. Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday were jammed pack with meeting galore. Every type of question one would have in regards to the Peace Corps, Mongolia, or anything was covered during these days. Oh and I received four more shots…I have no idea where my shot total is but I feel like it is getting up there. So yeah these days were a lot of fun because we as a group got to know everyone pretty well and I must say there are some fabulous individuals along for the ride!!
Mongolia in general from my short experience thus far has been terrific. I do have to say that already I can tell that I am going to like this place. It is beautiful here. Now it has been raining quite a bit since we have gotten here but I have to say the ‘blue sky’ rumor is true! J In regards to what I have encountered thus far..well I’d have to say that it is quite primitive in that there really isn’t a lot going on from what I can tell. The people are very interested in who we are and extremely nice. The language is going to be rough. But I am on my way to being a novice in Mongolian! The animals are everywhere….I can’t pet the dogs and it hurts not to be able to do that! (Ashley and Kristin you would not survive) The dogs here are guard dogs. If you approach them you will die. (Lol, Not really but you do have a 100% chance of getting bite) Oh what else…there is a lot. But I will continue to give everyone insight.
On to the more exciting stuff, my GER!!!! Today we all moved into with our host families!!!! I took a bus with 8 of my other site mates to a town close to the orientation town. Lets just say if you think that any city in America has a pothole problem…it is NOTHING in comparison to Mongolia. Thanks to my mountain/off roading experience it was no big deal for me! We quickly arrived to our town at the school in which we will be training all summer. All the families were waiting outside for us! It was a crazy feeling once again because finally reality was setting in! NO MORE ENGLISH!! AHHH!!! They had an amazing welcoming ceremony for the 9 of us. Filled with candy, lemonade, cow milk tea, and kagdag (spelling?). The kagdag is where the families gave us all a scarf looking thing which represents a welcoming and the blue skies. (in addition to a couple of other aspects) My host mom and host brother came to welcome me! It was joyous! Then they helped me with my stuff to load it into their CAR! (I was not expecting them to have a car!!) Lets just say I am going to have to learn Mongolian quick because this communication barrier is already getting to me! Taggee, the mom, then drove us home! So the home set up is pretty sweet!!!! We have a yard with two cows, a house, two gers, and an outhouse. Ladies and Gents a true outhouse!! (I used it for the first time today and I thought my host brother was going to come in with me…that was interesting) Ok so basically my host mom gave me a snack and I sat awkwardly in the living room for a bit. Then I decided to try to figure out how to say gift….I came up with something in which she understood…which allowed me to go to my ger to get some of the toys I brought to give to the kids. I think that really broke the ice!!! Once I gave the little boy and girl their gifts I was golden!! LOL. I think I am really going to like my kasha family! After figuring out some words my host mom made me soup…which was good. Then we went outside to play Frisbee and my host family helped me settle into my ger!!
I will talk more on this in another blog. It is late and getting cold so I am going to get into my sleeping bag!!!
Za!
B
Friday, June 4, 2010
On my way!!!
June 4, 2010
AHHHH!!! I am in the airport in San Fran and I am waiting for my plan to Seoul!! Yesterday I arrived in San Fran and was in meetings all day long for what is called staging. It was a really long day but it was fabulous to meet everyone that will be traveling to Mongolia with me. I was really shock to see just how many people are actually coming! I was expecting 30ish people but come to find out there is about 80 of us going together! Just meeting everyone was a huge relief because I feel like we all have the same things going through our heads. I feel like we are already family.
After staging we went out for our last meal in America. There were eight in my little group. We went out for burgers and fries. I think I enjoyed my love for mustard for the last time…it was awesome. After that we went back to the hotel. I finished up packing my things. I needed to do some rearranging because when I got to the hotel earlier that day I literally collapsed into the lobby. Seriously it was ridiculous. To say the least I needed to rearrange then I went to bed. Our day started really early this a.m. Gathering everyone for the airport was an adventure in its self. Come to find out it was just us volunteers going to the airport. No technical leaders just us. Once arriving to the airport going through the line to check our bags took a tad bit. When I finally got to the guy one of my bags was exactly 50 lbs BUT my other bag was like 62lbs!!! From my rearranging last night and I guess my bag grew…IDK* So I stood there trying to continue to rearrange. I ended up attaching my sleeping bag, air mattress, and TWO pair of shoes to the outside of my bag. Lets just say my shoulders already hurt from the weight. But it will all be worth it! Oh funny story when I went through security the lady took one look at me and was like Where are YOU going??? I laughed. Anywho I just had bfast. Now I have about 50 minutes till I board the plane to South Korea! Going to get my last cup of coffee.
Love,
B
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Day One..
HEllO!!!
I have stayed up ALL night finishing up saying my goodbyes (aka see you in 27) as well as finishing my packing. I know, I know crazy to think that I was not packed for TWO years! Hey, its a hard job to handle!! Luckily I had the help of my wonderful sister, and friend Tara to help me cram every last sock into my bag!!! (Thanks again guys!) When I got to the airport my winter bag was 44lbs and my summer bag was 49lbs!!! Right under the limit, THANK GOODNESS!!!
Now I am waiting for my connecting flight to San Fran to begin my first day for the Peace Corp!!!! Let me just say walking clear across this airport with my carry on and 'purse' was a tad bit difficult...perhaps it is due to my extreme tiredness. Oh joy just heard that my flight is delayed. Perfect. Well just a bit of an update..
Love,
B
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Hi All!
Ok so there has been a slight change in my address. Keep in mind this will be my address for the three months of training then I move so there will be another one come late August.
Brittany Ann Neace, PCT
Post Office Box 1036
Central Post Office
Ulaanbaatar 15160
Mongolia (via China)
Thanks!
-B
P.S. Craziness has began to set in....I can't believe I leave in just twoish days!!!!!!! AAAHHHHH!!!!!
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