Sunshine on a Sunday

So I’ve been in Mongolia almost 3 weeks and yes…this is the first time I’m posting a real update. But on the other hand…hey! I’m posting a story for you! :) Oh and by the way, in case you haven’t noticed yet, I like to write a lot of words all at once. So grab a cup of coffee and get comfortable…

So yesterday morning (Sunday, that is) I got to sleep in until 8:45am. By the time I got up the sun was shining as it almost always does here, but I never grow tired of sunshine. It was about 60 degrees outside (very warm for October in Mongolia!), I was well rested and quite at peace.

Church here in UB (a.k.a. – Ulaanbaatar) starts pretty late. I’ve been touring different Church groups until I decide to make one my “home” while I’m here – anyways, all the Church gatherings I’ve been too have started at 10:30am…at the very earliest. The latest I’ve heard of starts at 2pm. Mongolians like to sleep. I completely agree with them.  :)  

My friend from the office didn’t pick me up until 10:30am (although it was actually 10:40am because in Mongolian time it’s pretty normal to be a little late) and then we walked to the bus stop. I live in downtown UB, but she was taking me to her church on the very north side of the city called the “Ger District”. (By the way, a ger is a traditional one room round felt home. Some people know them as “yurts”.)

I hadn’t been to the Ger District before so I was really excited! That part of UB used to be a patchwork of ger neighborhoods that all fused as one giant…ger area. I say ‘area’, because though there are random narrow winding dirt alleyways, there aren’t really any divisions between neighborhoods. Each home has a tiny dirt yard surrounded by an uneven wooden slab fence. And each side of that fence is also part of the next ger’s fence. But they’re not lined up evenly as neighboring yards in American might be. Which is why I referred to it as a “patchwork” of gers as well. Anyways…

Now, many families have built a more modern house in place of their original ger, although there are still some gers here and there. So as I looked out of my bus window, I felt as though I was beginning to see a taste of the “real” Mongolia. UB is very modern and westernized (albeit with tons of Soviet influence passed down…) and so the traditional culture is very hidden to me. But there in the Ger District something was different.

The houses were mostly small simple two story homes made of either old weather worn wood or rough red-orange bricks with chipped mortar in the cracks. The roofs were almost all metal and very colorful: blues, greens, reds, and oranges. The older gers were gray with dirty and dust. The newer ones were still white. Or perhaps, the whiter ones were just cleaned more often…??? The Ger District extends for miles and miles and the houses are all lined up next to each other up the mountain sides and up to the sides of the road. And then, I finally felt it.

My heart twinged and I felt stone melting into flesh again. I was excited, in a way the city has not yet excited me. Don’t get me wrong, I love the excitement and success not getting lost downtown (If you know me well…you understand!), but the city here has never had my heart so to speak. And here in the ger district my heart felt for the first time. I’ve been so busy with planning for the five English classes I’ll be teaching, learning my way around the city, and getting to know people here, that I lost my focus. And here God brought me right back.

I’ll openly be the first to admit that I’m a slow learner. God has shown me time and time again that I am a cripple at heart. Without Him, I can’t walk and I have no strength in this life. So when I fall down, he gently picks me up and lets me lean on him while he holds my hand. But as soon as the sting of the fall is gone, I let go of his hand and try to walk all by myself again. But I’m a cripple. No matter how hard I try, I do not have strength of my own. I start to feel all dried out and strained in heart without Jesus. And though I tell you this now…I still haven’t learned it permanently!

So these past four weeks, I have tried to do it all in my own strength. I shot a few prayers God’s way for sure…but I never took hold of his hand again and rested in His presence and strength. So my heart got all dried up again…I didn’t feel a thing at being here. Not excitement, not fear (which is a good thing though), not love…not anything. I was so numb. But there in the Ger District something happened. God reached into my heart again and pulled some strings. Because it’s places like the Ger District that make me feel alive. These are the poorer people of the city…on the outskirts. These are the kind of people that my heart loves and bleeds for before I even meet them. The people that might be overlooked in some circles…

The gathering of Church that morning (well afternoon actually…it didn’t start until noon in true Mongolian fashion), was so wonderful. The whole group is maybe 40 -50 people when they all come, but this Sunday there were maybe 25 of us. It was truly a little gathering of God’s family in that little cement building and quite beautiful inside. That little representation of Family, sang songs of praise to my Healer and this one dear old gentleman sang with quite of lot of off key gusto! It made me smile the whole time!

My friend translated everything for me so that I could understand. It was really humbling. The man who taught out of the Bible didn’t say anything life altering, but I was very encouraged to just remember what Jesus gave up for me and just how much he gave up. Truly we have a God who loves us dearly! Then I learned that this little group of Church prays for Family in a different country each week! I wish my large gatherings of Church back home would do this.

Anyways, afterwards we stayed to have hot milk tea (steamed milk, tea leaves, and salt – also in true Mongolian form) and cookies. I met a young woman who spoke very good English and we talked for a while and then we prayed for her family in the countryside. I don’t know how to rightly express it, but being able to have that kind of connection with someone I’ve only known for 5 minutes is…it is beautiful beyond words. This girl is my sister, though I may not see her again this side of Heaven.

The rest of Sunday was just a lot of fun. My friend took me to a fast food restaurant – where she ordered a burger and I ordered mutton dumplings…ironic no?! Then we climbed up about 613 stairs (I lost count somewhere between 300 and 320 and had to guess where I left off!) to the top of a mountain on the southern edge of UB. At the top is a memorial to all the Mongolian soldiers from the early 1910’s to the Soviet era. It was really cool! It’s a giant circular thing lifted above people’s heads with tile mosaic pictures all around it. I wish I could have taken pictures, but my camera has finally gone and died …so I’ll be getting another one soon I hope! I could see the whole city from the monument and it was enormous! A gorgeous view to close a gorgeous sunny fall day. Nothing better than sunshine for the heart either. :)

The Logistics

Day 18. Where to begin. There is so much to share and tell. I’ve been in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia for almost three weeks now. I’ve met wonderful people, eaten new foods, and had many surprises. I haven’t even gotten lost yet!

More personal stories to follow, but here’s the gist of things to get you oriented:

The food: Think mutton. Lots of mutton. (I rather like it actually). And fat. Sometimes attached to the meat, sometimes just in separate chunks. Also potatoes, noodles, eggs, bell peppers, carrots, apples and onions are common in a lot of dishes. However. In the City (also called Ulaanbaatar or UB), you can find just about anything to eat. I’ve had tacos, pizza, sloppy joe’s , BBQ chicken, salad, milk, yogurt, cheese, and all kinds of other “western foods”. I’m gonna like living here I think.

The cheese: Will be updated on the “Cheese Page” of course! Haha!

The beverages: Milk tea is probably one of the most common drinks besides good old fashioned hot black tea and sugar. Milk tea is simply steamed milk with some sort of black or green tea and salt. It’s pretty good for the most part. I personally have been drinking a lot of hot tea just in general.

Current weather: Well. It’s fall here. It’s been as high as 70F and as low as 30F. Mostly it’s in the 50’s and 40’s I think. I was here for the first snow of the season which made me so so happy! It melted the next day though. UB is almost always sunny it seems, but the smog makes it seem hazy a lot.

The City: UB itself is quite hard to describe. There are modern glass skyscrapers amidst a sea of rectangular flat-roofed Soviet issue apartment buildings. Most are covered in decades of dust, soot and are a little “well worn”. The balconies are mostly covered with windows, making them a sort of three-season room. There are also hundreds of construction projects. Some half built concrete structures are abandoned for lack of funds, others will actually be finished. There are some houses and gers on the outskirts of the city as well. (Gers are the round felt traditional country-side Mongolian homes).

I live in the downtown area of town in a little second story two bedroom apartment. The area around my apartment has some museums, a giant five story department store, the government buildings, a children’s amusement park, a couple live theatres, and countless restaurants, grocery stores, and shops.

Traffic is a little crazy some times! Crossing a four lane street is like playing frogger! There are tons and tons of Toyotas, Hondas, Suzuki’s, and other Japanese cars. Although, some have steering wheels on the left side and some on the right side which may account for the crazy driving!

The fashion here sort of blew me away at first. I would say that almost all the women about 40 or younger in the city, are really stylish. Skinny jeans and leather boots are huge here. As are fancy scarves, sweaters, etc...Very chic and modern. However, most everyone wears neutral colors instead of the constant kaleidoscope of color on my college campus.

The office I work at is really wonderful. It feels like a family among the staff there. Every morning before the office work begins, someone share’s what God has been teaching them recently. It’s probably my favorite part of the day. Then I go off to plan English lessons. Turns out I will be teaching 4 or 5 English classes depending on how many people want to come. My students range from vet students, to the small animal clinic staff, to preschoolers! It’s a lot of work for sure and I have gained a whole new respect for teachers! Once a week I get to help out at the small animal clinic, but I’ll save those stories for the veterinary page.  :)

I hope that gives you a small picture of where I’m living for the next 8 months in any case. I know it’s not the most insightful or interesting of my posts, but it is what it is I guess. I know I wouldn’t be here except for your love and support, so thank you again and again!

Just Some Tidbits

22 days. That's barely 3 weeks. And by that time, I'll be on a plane somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. In those 22 days this is what my "To Do" list looks like:

Finish up work on a high note.
Throw a Going-Out-Of-Town-For-A-While Party. (After all, I'm not really going away, I'm just moving locations.)
Say all my "See-You-In-8-Months" to my friends and family. (I'm not gonna lie, I'm going to turn into a sappy emotional mess at times.)
Drive 15 hours by myself back home for a few weeks. (If you see sleep deprived zombie driving a white stick-shift station wagon on I-80...that's me.)
Buy all the extra durable winter wear I'll be needing to start packing. (P.S. - Really good wool socks are 20 bucks a pop! I've never paid so much for socks ever! It's crazy.)
Actually get packed. (Two suitcases at 50 pounds each for 8 months? Yeah...I should be able to handle it.)
Make one of my best friends in FoCo get set up on skype. (Hint, hint. You know who you are!)
Finish the online TEFL (teaching English as a foreign language) course that could take 6 months in 10 days. (Can you say procrastination? I may have dug myself into a hole with this one. Good thing I have over 15 years of procrastination skills to fall back on!)
Finish my 4 applications to veterinary school. (So, not excited about this part...)
Make sure I have all the various travel documents I need printed and on my person. (More complicated than it sounds.)
Find a way to stash some real cheese to make it across the borders. (Ok. I'm not serious about this one, but I wish I could!)
Complete my "art project" that I have been working on for almost a year. (More on this as my departure date grows closer...)
Have some bonding time with my cat. (You only think I'm joking...she's the best foot warmer I know!)
Have some personal moments with Jesus...a lot of them in fact. He's the only one that gets to go with me, so I figure I better get on the same page as Him. Also He's just good for me to be around and I rather enjoy being with Him.

 For me at least, that's a long list of things to do with a lot of different emotions wrapped up in each item. You'd think I'd be stressed or worried or going crazy. I think I will eventually. Right now September 20th seems so far away. I know I have a lot to get done, but I have this assurance that it will all get done eventually and in the proper time. It has yet to sink into my conscious reality that I am about to leave. It didn't sink in that I was going to China until the plane took off! I am leaving my dearest friends and closest community -those my heart longs for and those I call my sisters. I'm departing from my culture and language. I'm setting down my family and security. I temporarily renounce my rights and privileges as an American to become just a servant of the Mongolian people I'll meet. Some of it I don't mind at all...other parts are going to be harder to let go of for a while.

Honestly, I'm not sure why I'm going there. I have no idea what I'll find and how exactly my time will be spent. All I know is God has called me here for this season in life. I don't know why...but He has called me without a doubt. He has a purpose to my time there and as of right now, He alone can see that purpose.

Jesus once compared working for Him to farming. He has called those who follow and love him to be ambassadors...that is to tell others about who he is, his deep sincere love for them, and the amnesty he offers them. Sometimes, being God's ambassador is like tilling up dirt in a corn field that has been hardened, dried, and cracked over a long winter. Sometimes it is like planting seeds in the tilled soil under the hot spring sun- bending and stooping over and over again. Other times it is like watering the seed in the soil and hoping there is enough moisture to make the seed grow. And still other times, the farmer gets to harvest the crops and bring in an abundance of food to the table. All in all...being Jesus' ambassador means most often not getting to see the harvest of the crops...instead you do your work and trust that it will produce something edible in the end.

Why am I going to Mongolia? I really don't know. What's my purpose in being there? If you find out before I do, pass on the word. Will I get to see if I "make a difference" or "leave a mark" on peoples'  lives? I have no idea. Is it worth it? You betcha. Because, wherever God calls me is exactly the best place for me to be. He is a better planner than I am, so I'm leaving the details up to him. He'll make sure seeds are sown where the ground is tilled, that the soil is watered as it needs to be, and that there will be crops to harvest in the end, even if I'm not there to swing the sickle. I am learning to let this truth ruminate in my soul and produce peace within my heart.

P.S. - Good news! I got my visa and vaccinations! So all the major hurdles are cleared...just have the details to finish up now. 
P.P.S. - Anyone know how to get cheese through customs?  :)