Brad’s Blog

There will be travelogues of our time in China and our train trip to Mongolia soon, but those take a lot of work and a bunch of photo optimization.

So for the time being, you’ll have to be satisfied with the news that we went to Karate Kid 2 today at the Urgoo Cinema.  English with Mongolian subtitles.

We knew the movie was in town, but we couldn’t remember the name of the theatre (so we obviously didn’t know where it was either).  And we didn’t know the showtimes.

So we texted someone who could tell us the name, and then found the website of the theatre, which had showtimes (thankfully numbers here are the same as our’s, because we couldn’t read much else – see for yourself).  There was a 16:40 showing, so after checking Google Earth and finding the location, we figured we could get there on time.

But first we needed groceries, so Jack & Tommy & I ran down the 5 flights of stairs, past the smoking police officer, and down the hill to the grocery store (dodging traffic and construction equipment), where we bought the following for 13,000 tugruks (just under CAD$10):

• 10 eggs
• 4 big potatoes
• 2 bunches of carrots
• a 1L box of orange juice
• 6 yogurts (Cherry & Berry flavour)
• 1 loaf of bread

Then we ran back up the hill, up the five flights of stairs, past the smoking police officer and the victims of the crime moaning in the stairwell, grabbed our sweaters and womenfolk (Annie & Lynette, and not by the hair) and ran back down the five flights of stairs, past the police (cigarette was done by now) and the victims and the neighbour of the victims who wanted details, and then around the corner and up the hill to the main road.

Dodging cars, we made it alive to the other side, where I stood facing oncoming traffic, raised my outstretched right arm to waist height, and flapped my hand into traffic.  The very first car swung to the curb to pick us up.  (This is how the taxi system works here – there are no taxis because everyone is a taxi.) 

It was a tiny yellow beat up Hyundai Accent, and we all piled in.  I said Urgoo Cinema, the driver nodded, and we took off.  We never reached a very high speed, but after only 10 minutes of dodging potholes, Toyota Land Cruisers, diesel spewing buses, hoards of minibuses, and pedestrians, while paying some, but not much attention, to the rules of the road, we pulled up in front of the theatre.  The guy’s trip odometer said 3.4 km, so I peeled off a 5,000 tugruk note and gave it to him.  The going rate being 500 tugruks per km, he gave me 1,500 back in change, and off we went.

The theatre could have been any modern multiplex theatre back home.  There were 4 theatres, and everything was shiny and computerized.  You could even buy tickets on your Blackberry (see the theatre website for details in Mongolian). The ticket seller spoke enough English that I knew how much to pay her (17,000 tugruks), she handed me the tickets and away we went.  Another 6,000 for popcorn, a can of Miranda Orange (pretty much Orange Fanta, but Jack says Fanta is better), and a can of Mountain Dew (the kind with all the caffeine like in the USA), and we went off to find the theatre.  There was a video arcade, and there were designer-clad young people everywhere, either talking or texting on their mobile phones.

Moments later, a ticket taker opened the theatre, tore her part off our tickets and in we went. The theatre had theatre style seating, really comfortable padded seats that reclined, and arm rests that went up and down between the seats (like on an airplane) with cup holders in the end of them.  A very nice setup.  Obviously new, and obviously professional.

As the on-screen commercials were about to start, a guy showed up and gestured that I was in his seat.  It turned out the funny numbers we couldn’t understand on our tickets were seat numbers – we had assigned seating.  So we moved from Row 8, seats 4-8 to Row 13, seats 3-7, where we should have been.  This was the back row of the theatre – the sight lines were terrific, and the digital surround sound was great.

After the movie, we checked out the bathrooms – busy with lots of people coming and going – just to see what they had done there.  Hands-free sensors on everything, glass tile on the walls, and nice western style toilets to go with it.  I didn’t even see any footprints on the seats or the rims.  (See my Tajikistan blog entries for an explanation – I’ll post the link when I find it.)

Then we went outside and watched some guys thrash around inside clear plastic balls on a large wading pool (they inflated them with a shopvac in reverse and leaf blowers).  Then we crossed the street (6-10 lanes, depending on the mood and volume of traffic at the time) one lane at a time, and made it alive to the other side.  I stepped up to the curb, flapped my hand like a seal flipper, and a guy in a beat up Fiat got to us first. 

I didn’t know how to describe where we were going, so I showed him on the map.  Off we went.  His gas gauge was on empty, but after 3.6 km (he took up right to the door), we were there.  I gave him 4,000 tugruks, got out, climbed five flights of stairs (stopping to observe the quickie repair job on the door that had been done to the door of apartment 115 after the earlier break in (remember those police that were hanging around)), and let ourselves back into our apartment.  We retrieved the boneless chicken breasts (that Lynette bought yesterday from the neighbour’s friend) that we had left thawing in the sun in Annie’s window, and shortly we will eat some fried chicken with potatoes and carrots.  The kids have had enough Chinese food, and it’s time for some comfort food.

So to sum up:

• Taxi to theatre = 3,500
• Movie tickets = 17,000
• Snacks = 6,000
• Taxi to home = 4,000
• Total = 30,500 tugruks (CAD$23.99)

And through it all, we never did lose either water or power all day. A fine day in Ulaanbaatar, with Jackie Chan.

Internet continues to be a challenge, and when it is not, the heat and humidity tend to suck every bit of moisture, writing ambition, and coherent thought out of one’s mind.  This tends to lead to a shortage of blog entries.

We feel like we barely survived our overnight on the Great Wall, which, when accompanied by the dehydration inducing hike at first light this morning, makes us plenty happy to be back in air conditioned comfort.  We pick up our train tickets today, so we’re off to Mongolia at first light tomorrow.

By tomorrow, I mean Tuesday am local time, which is 14 hours ahead of Saskatchewan.

Well, we made it to Beijing, along with all our luggage.  Connecting to Twitter and Facebook is a challenge here due to certain Internet restrictions, so those updates will come later.

42 degrees with the humidex today – we guzzled water like there was no tomorrow, and our need of the facilities was not affected.  It just came out through our pores.  That much is just like Niger.  The part that wasn’t like Niger is that we noticed, and our clothes were drenched as a result, and I had to keep wiping sweat off the camera.

Agenda for today was:

1. Tienanmen Square
2. Forbidden City
3. Peking Duck Lunch
4. Visit to the Toy Market
5. Acrobat Show

Lots of fun and fluids had by all, but by suppertime, we were ready to crash, which is what I am going to do now.

We are T minus 8 days to departure for Mongolia.  I think there’s not much left to do but pack and leave, except for all the other things that need doing.  And the trouble with having someone housesit for you is that you have to leave the place clean when you leave.  That’s way more challenging than just running out the door and yelling at the neighbour to check your mail while you are away.  You can always email them later to say they’d better drink the milk in the fridge so it doesn’t turn into blue cheese while you are away.

We think that what is going to happen is that we’ll post stuff here and then link to it from Twitter, which will link it to Facebook.  So if you’re already using those tools and you are following me (I saw you – don’t think I didn’t see you) or already my Friend, these buttons below may have some meaning for you.  If you don’t know what I’m talking about, ask a 12 year old.  But you can’t ask mine – I’m taking him with me.

Does anybody have any Mongolian tögrög or tugrik lying around?  I could use some, because I like arriving in a place with some of their currency already in my pocket.  Apparently CAD$1.00 (CAD is the international code for the Canadian dollar, which brings a whole new meaning to “printing from your CAD program – if only!) is equal to 1316.8307 tugriks (sign: ₮; code: MNT).  Which means that after you change less than CAD$760 into MNT, you’re a millionaire, and you can leave your CAD printer at home.  It’s lighter.

Gotta go – I need to practice milking horses.

We are now about a month away from departure for Mongolia.  Things are coming together nicely. 

We have plane tickets, train tickets, Mongolian visas, and we’ve looked at Ulaan Baatar on GoogleEarth.  That should about do it, besides the extra large bottle of Imodium we need to pick up.

Actually, we still need visas for our 5 days in China on the way over.  After a lot of searching, we found a Regina travel agent who could help us with that.  Thank you CAA Saskatchewan.

To get a Chinese visa, you need to have someone hand deliver your application and passports to the Embassy in Ottawa, or one of the consulates (Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver).  And they have to show up at precisely the right time with precisely the right amount of payment and enough left over to pay for the parking meter outside for an indefinite period of waiting time.  Then they need to go back 4-5 business days later, deposit sufficient funds in the parking meters again, pick up the passports, and then courier them back to you.

The Mongolian process was much easier – we just couriered them to the Mongolian Embassy in Ottawa, and the next week we got a package back.  However, this is one of those times you wish you were an American – they don’t need visas for Mongolia at all.  They can just show up.  Hopefully the recent opening of a Canadian Embassy in Ulaan Baatar will make a difference.

It is possible that the kids are getting excited about the trip, but we think they have the last day of school on the brain.  That’s next Friday.  Then the older two go off to camp right away for a week, followed by Tommy’s first ever week at camp the week after.  Then after a week at home all together, off we go.

Plus, it is also possible that the idea of fermented mare’s milk (Honey – it’s time to milk the horse again!) and boiled sheep testicles (I hear they’re offal) has them somewhat wary.  And we haven’t even told them about the deep fried scorpions and grasshoppers you can buy on the street in Beijing.  Gotta save some surprises.

As many of you know, our family makes a point of going overseas each year to volunteer in a developing country.  You can read more about our 2008 and 2009 trips to Niger here, but this summer we are going to Mongolia.

In Mongolia, we’ll work with a microfinance NGO that provides small business loans to Mongolians working to support their families, we’ll provide some planning advice to an agribusiness project in rural Mongolia, and work with government officials to improve their assistance to Mongolian businesses looking to connect with North American companies.

More details are coming soon.

Where’s Mongolia?  Click here for a map.

During our first 2 weeks in Niger, we spent time in Niamey working on projects at Sahel Academy and various SIM facilities. At Sahel, Brad found a high speed Internet connection in the new library and set himself to work on business planning and financial admin issues, and Lynette carried out a bunch of duties, such as supply teaching (grade 9/10 social studies, grade 9/10 English, grade 11 Chemistry, grade 5/6, Grade 3/4 Art, Grade 7 Art, and Grade 8 Art, librarian, playground supervisor, mover (helping a lady unpack in her new apartment), shopper, cook, organizer & administrator. The kids went to school for a few days – Tommy with his 3rd cousin Joel, and Annie in the class with her grade. Jack went to Tommy’s class to help as a tutor.

The boys came back oblivious as to who was in their classroom, but Annie knew all the names of the kids in her class, and most of the details of what had gone on during the day.

School starts at 7:30 am, when it is still sort of cool outside, and ends about 2:30 pm, when it is good and hot. We would eat lunch there with the school kids.

During the off hours, we were responsible for getting things organized for the group of 10 people coming from our church toward the end of our stay in Niamey. So we would run around town collecting various groceries and supplies from various places. Cucumbers from that guy on that corner, pineapples over there, and Coke around the corner.

The cheese came from the store known locally as “White Shack”, which unfortunately for us was neither white, nor a shack, nor called “White Shack”. After several tries and several sets of directions, we discovered that “White Shack” was really “Azar’s”, that it was red brick, and that it looked nothing like a shack. It is owned by a Lebanese guy with the nickname “Cobra” who has a ponytail and sits by the till. Here we bought ground beef (much leaner than the lean stuff we buy at home), cheese, mosquito repellant, rice, sugar and a few other things.

Haddad’s is another place that is owned by Lebanese guys. It is close to the Petit Marche (the little market). The trouble is that we didn’t have a map, and the street it is on is one way the wrong way to get there easily. We ended up just driving around the approximate area, trying to drive in the legal direction of each street, and it was just when we gave up and turned back toward the river and the bridge home that we spotted Haddad’s on the right side of the street.

[photo of Jack in Haddad's coming soon - once FTP works again]

We pulled in and ran into its air conditioned comfort. Inside, it was jammed with people and groceries for sale in a space about 2/3rd the size of a 7/11 store back home. It had carts, so we grabbed one and headed into the store. One whole aisle was dedicated to alcohol, including a $1,500 bottle of cognac in a special display. Oenophiles will like the idea of the $5 French wines further down the aisle, but not caring about the booze, we bought large boxes of Foster Clark’s powered drink mixes from Malta, orange juice from Lebanon, 10 frozen chickens from France, and 15 cans of tuna packed in water from Paris.

The amazing thing about the stores here is the number of diverse places things come from. I saw boxes of Wheat Thins marked Product of Canada next to displays of skin whitening soap from Nigeria and a multi-national Coke display of Coke products in cans. Regular Coke entirely written in Arabic from an unidentifiable Arab country. Sprite in French and Arabic, possibly from Lebanon or Morocco. Diet Coke from Indonesia. In another store, regular Coke in 500 mL plastic bottles from Burkina Faso, Diet Coke in plastic bottles from Nigeria, and cans of Coke from Togo (not the town in Saskatchewan).

By comparison, everything we buy in Canada seems to come from one plant in Toronto, or because of packaging rules, gets to be marked as a product of Canada, even though it came from somewhere else. Now that Canada’s getting a new set of packaging guidelines, I’m looking forward to seeing where the stuff I buy really comes from.