I will not buy this record it is scratched

Our Russian is terrible.

Example #1
We got on the bus in Ulan Ude, which is one of Russia's Eastern-most cities, reasonably near the border with Mongolia. Having slaved over our phrase book I knew how to ask if the bus went to the place we wanted. However, after hearing my carefully rehearsed line, the driver looked completely confused. This was particularly mortifying as we were going to the main square - ie, a very well known location - so you would have thought a loose approximation of it would have been understood. Embarrassingly he then turned to the other passengers on the bus to ask their assistance in translating my appalling Russian. 20 helpful Russians looked expectantly in my direction. I stammered the same phrase then repeated it in English - after some consultation amongst themselves, they agreed we were indeed on the right bus. I blushed and thanked them - again in English - and stumbled shamefully to the back of the bus.

 (we got there in the end)

Example #2
Still in Ulan Ude, we visited a pub for a beer and some lunch. Armed again with our phrase book, we carefully studied the menu for about 25 minutes. At last we were confident we knew what to order. We'd painstakingly matched it with the phrase book and were ready to go. The waitress wandered over and we pointed to the item on the menu, we were pretty darned sure it was french fries with a slight spelling variation. However, it turns out our Russian had failed us again. The waitress returned with - a plate of prawns for these two vegetarian explorers. Kind of the opposite of french fries for a vegetarian, you swallow their heads and eyeballs whole. We swallowed our horror and thanked the waitress profusely. How could we get it so wrong? Not only did we fail in our efforts to secure fried potato - we managed to get the only thing on the menu with eyes. However, Brett didn't want to let the waitress see our failure. He manfully gulped 8 of the little monsters down. I sidled up to the waitress and pointed out "french fries" in our phrase book. That was what I ate.






















Example #3
On the train. In the restaurant car, again facing a menu filled with Cyrillic. A kindly man came up to help. I said in perfectly-accented Russian "I am vegetarian". The man smiled - "oh, you are Italian!". I gave up and resorted to English and pointing.

We're still working on it though.

Leaving Mongolia

Barely looking at our tickets, some rail ladies knew instantly which carriage we needed to board. That was because our car was the only international one. In Sükhbaatar near the Mongolian-Russian border, when we returned from the station squat toilet, we found our train had been reduced to simply our single carriage, sitting there with no means to move itself. We had heard that the trains crossing this border could spend many long hours clearing customs and that might be why our tickets were cheap ones. We sat at that station without an engine for over 5 hours. And shortly after that, or the otherside of the border we sat for nearly 4 hours.
A long long day, sitting, abandoned.
Being driven a little mad by the rustling of our cabin-mates.
We were worried who we would have to share our compartment with, we feared it would be 2 drunk, smoking, raw beef shot downing human boars. But instead we were relieved to get 2 Mongolian women who were polite and smelless enough. One of them seemed obsessive compulsive, and annoyed Sophie to no end with her careful placement of various packaged foods and drinks on our table, and repacking of her many bags into the night. The reason she did this is because they are smugglers, the spectacular food packages actually held socks, probably Mongolian cashmere. They even asked Sophie to store some socks in her pack. But they got through fine. I wouldn't have minded so much if it weren't for this salami right near my head as I draft this. Which is getting very stinky in the sun. And I don't believe they plan to eat it. I think it's here to add authenticity, and the smell is mingling with the smell of everyone's sweaty feet. But that's alright with me, we've got Chinggis wheat vodka, and at least the train is moving for once.

Mongolian Miscellany

 We visited a few giant things in Mongolia. First we saw a 26 metre golden Buddha hiding quietly in an unobtrusive temple. He was pretty magnificent. We then visited a 40 metre Chinggis Khan statue in a faintly more conspicuous position in the middle of the steppe. You can see him for miles around, triumphantly riding his horse into battle. You go up an elevator and emerge through his crotch to view the landscape. Words really cannot express how hilarious and brilliant this is. We then visited a (sadly closed) tourist ger camp which has giant dinosaur statues dotted around the camp. The dinosaurs are falling into disrepair and have an air of faded grandeur about them. We also saw a giant Chinggis boot and another giant Buddha but you'll have to wait for those photos. We're in Russia now.

Back to School

We got to be ambassadors for New Zealand-accented English language in a Mongolian High School. Our horse-riding guide Nyamkah, who is training to be an English teacher, asked us to come and talk to his students who he said had never spoken to native English speakers before.

Our other guide, Pujyee came and got us. He took us for a beer to steel our nerves.

Then we ventured down some dark seedy alleyways. Where is Pujyee taking us? we wondered. Is he planning to subject us to a cruel scam? Is this talk of our fine English language just playing on our vanity to lure us into the darkest corners of Ulan Bator? But no. We turned a corner and saw a line of teenage girls. And then the high school - looking pretty much like any high school anywhere you can imagine.

As we walked the corridors we got some friendly greetings from the kids who all seemed to think we were pretty novel. Mainly Brett's beard. Then we hit the classroom. It was teeny and we were introduced with great ceremony. We talked about New Zealand and showed our tiny isles on the map. The kids were suitably impressed. We then tried to get a conversation going. We felt a bit like guests of Oprah Winfrey being quizzed by the in-studio audience.

Kids: What kind of music do you like?
Us: Um. Some kinds. What kind of music do you like?
Kids (unanimously): LADY GAGA (they also like Twilight)
Kids: What kinds of sports do you like?
Us: Um. Football?
Precocious Kid: I'm interested in the sea. Particularly the creatures in the sea. Tell me about the ocean.
(Brett then embarks on a lengthy and bewildering explanation involving the map, the shelf off the East Coast, and descriptions of giant squid and killer whales fighting for dominance. Precocious kid and the rest of the class look bamboozled)

















Nyamkah then presented us with some sweet Mongolian souvenirs to thank us and the kids requested our email addresses so we can all be penpals. They then crowded round us to have their photos taken.

As we left the High School the kids in the corridors seemed to gain more nerve and we were treated to extensive greetings and expressions of goodwill. It felt a bit like mild Beatlemania. It was a pretty grand experience all round.

The Open Steppe

Why in all the universe do I not ride a horse more often? We had a pretty wonderful time traversing grassy planes and rolling over infinite hills. Even if it did start snowing on us within our first half hour of riding. Oh dear god of the sky, that steppe sure can get cold! It put even our maximum season count merino tramping thermals to shame. Of our 3 days riding, the first 2 were mostly spent with us paying special care to not let our fingers or toes stay numb for too long. A good trot or gallop always helps. Yes sir, we galloped. We can do that if we want. We gained some pretty sweet skills. You do the math.

We visited the ruins of a monastery that was destroyed by Stalin in 1937. It is set in a deep valley fringed with pines. It is quiet and peaceful and you can see why the monks chose it as a site to ponder upon their Buddhist reflections. We stayed in a ger camp nearby, as the sub-zero temperatures kind of killed the urge to camp out under the stars. Gers are excellent inventions.

Because we started as powerfully weak amateurs, we were worried we might be riding alongside some master backpacking horse knights. But instead we had the great pleasure of sharing our freezing yet fantastic adventures with a Harvard Professor and his Chinese colleague named Dungeon. This cerebral couple had spent a few days in Ulaan Baator (that's UB to us locals) working on UNICEF-related issues with the Mongolian government and had come out to the steppe for some well earned R&R. That's how we formed our horse gang. The four of us bonded over Mongolian cuisine and travel tales (the Prof had visited 85 countries and had piercingly brilliant tales from each one) and the next morning set out to meet the horses who were to be our friends on the wild steppe for the next three days.

Our two guides (who were charming and delightful fellows with top-shelf horse riding skills) unerringly selected the perfect equine companions for each of us. Mine was a hardcore yet wise red-head cool-dude with attitude, like myself. Sophie's was a stubborn introverted chap named Donkey. He mainly wanted to eat and was disinclined to obey anything Sophie said. But she liked him a lot. We all inched carefully out of the ger camp with high hopes and very little finesse. But by the time we galloped on home two days later, we were flying like natural-born riders of the steppe.

When on any horse, you feel elevated and proud, but when you look at our photos please don't judge us by the size of our steeds! The Mongolian breed of horse we rode is a pretty small horse, but very strong. They sure sprinted the last valley when they knew they were almost home to hang out with their horse-homies.

The Mongolian steppe we traversed has a peculiar feel. Even though a certain vast stretch looked empty, there is endless debris from centuries of nomads setting camps and having parties everywhere. We were only a few hours drive from the capital, and you can't go a minute without seeing a skull of a horse/cow/goat or a vodka bottle or the sole of a child's shoe.

Trans Mongolian Railway stage 1 - Beijing to Ulaan Baator

On the K23 train - at last.

Auspicious beginnings: We got our compartment (a four-berth) to ourselves. Score.

Mostly we just stay in our little cabin. We have sweet snacks and music. We venture out for an exploration of the train and a check out the back window. The track runs away behind us. We find the dining cart - it is utilitarian and unlovely. But we have a tasty egg and tomato and rice dinner then scuttle back to our small home for the night.

Outside Northern China slowly dissolves into desert: portions of the Great Wall, hilltop temples, huge windfarms drift past our view.

It's a 36-hour journey from the capital of China to the capital of Mongolia. We cross the border in the middle of the night - woken by customs and immigration officials on either side.

We also experience a two-hour "bogie changing" ritual - where they change the guage on the train from the larger Chinese type to the smaller Mongolian gauge - used only in Mongolia and Russia apparently. They have to detach each carriage and then lift it into the air and change the wheels - the whole process is done with the passengers on board and is an endless series of whistles and jolts and clicks and slams and then whistles again. It feels like being inside a transformer (like a big one, like Metroplex or Omega Supreme) as it transforms.

We wake to see the sun rise over the Gobi desert. It stretches out for epic miles of dust and grass and emptiness. There are occasional herds of cattle or sheep and small clusters of gers but otherwise nothing. There are subtle changes in the colours of the desert and sky as the train glides through - a muted yet dramatic kalaidescope. It is all so wide and huge. Who knew the horizon could be so far away.

We leave our cabin for breakfast and find the sterile dining car of last night has metamorphosed into a beautiful butterfly. Somehow during the bogie changing ceremony they must have switched out the Chinese dining car for a Mongolian one. It is a wonderous surprise. Gone are the white tablecloths and formica walls. Instead, there is intricate wood carving adorning the walls, ceiling and tables. The carriage glows with the gold of the wood. Carvings of stags and other wild beasts of the steppe further decorate the carriage. We have breakfast and linger over another coffee and chat with other travellers, who arrive with our exact same happy surprise mirrored on their faces. We don't want to leave the car. We have a beer. It is a great morning.

 The Gobi slowly melts into a slightly more fertile Mongolian Steppe. Hills begin to roll more and more, every 3 k or so a rail worker is burning the grass by the track, don't ask me why, perhaps to discourage the cattle from impaling themselves on the fence? There sure are a lot of cattle bones by the fence.

Then we sense the hanging fog out there in the middle of nowhere. The hills go on forever, it seems so natural to be a nomadic people here, because we can't think up any criteria to place a city in any one place more than another. And so there it is Ulaan Baator, a city in the middle of some hills, wrapped in shacks and gers and factories. There are crisp white picture-postcard perfect white gers with jaunty painted doors right next to gers that look like they were patched together with trash that has flown off the train. It's a real cool place.

The Long Wall

In China, the name for the Great Wall is apparently The Long Wall. This feels like modest understatement. It is certainly long. But it's also Great and quite Magnificent and Beautiful and kind of Miraculous. Miraculous as in - how the hell did they do it? We visited the wall between Jinshanling and Simatai - six kilometres of wall which stretch up over a craggy ridgeline sitting atop of at times quite sheer drops with thick bush and steep inclines. How on earth did they get the bricks up there?

The answer I guess is manpower. They had a lot of people. But still. It's pretty mind bending.

Our bit of wall was a three hour drive out of Beijing, so slightly less touristy than the bits closer to the city. It was worth the six-hour round trip to see the parts of the wall that had not been rebuilt - crumbling and in parts just big piles of rocks and bricks. We walked through 22 watch towers - as far as the eye could see the wall snaked away ahead and behind.

Our tour group picked up a local guide whose key purpose seemed to be to ensure the group all got to the destination watch tower at Simatai in time to be picked up by our minibus. He would remain at the back to make sure no one got left behind. So it became the lot of this poor fellow to trail Brett, Jeremy and myself for pretty much the entire six kilometres as we quickly fell to the back of the group as we slowly meandered along, breathing it all in and photographing the wall and its populations of insects and birds in minutiae. He became like a secret service agent, loitering behind bricks and peeping through watch tower windows to unobtrusively shadow our progress. However, eventually his frustration shone through and he left the unobtrusive part behind. Finally, his secret service persona was dropped and he was reduced to barking at me - you must walk fast! You have six more watch towers! 17 minutes!

Meanwhile Brett and Jerry were off photographing squashed millipedes* or some such. I could only shrug helplessly - I have to wait for the others. Secret Service Local Guide glowered crossly.

I think the Great Wall is completely Great. I loved it.

(* - Someone say squashed millipedes? Why oh why do the thousands of beetles and millipedes linger on the steps of the great wall? Only to be squashed by exhausted tourists, too tired to dodge the bugs. Are there bodies of workers in the great wall? Perhaps we will never know, but it is definitely 3% squashed bugs.)