I'm off with Daulet, my driver/guide this morning to Altay Tavan Bogd National Park, someplace between/near Khoton Nuur (lake) and Khurgan Nuur (so you know where to find the body). I don't think anyone will speak any English- my guide understands some, speaks little, and I don't know about the family we will stay with.

I went shopping for food last evening and came away with very little of interest. But it's only two days, so I'm quite certain not to starve.

Staying with strangers in such close proximity (one big room) is pretty far outside my comfort zone. But go I must. Daulet asked (through the person who helped set this up) if he can bring his wife and children along as far as his home, which is on the way. I said no problem but I need to ride up front (and then I mimicked being sick).

I'm leaving behind my bigger back pack and so that involved a complete repacking this morning. I'm on my way out to get water, which I forgot last night, and maybe some breakfast.

See you in two or three days.

Musings on travel and solitude in a crowd

Some errant notion caused me to pick up the magazine out of the seatback, which is written in both Mongolian and English.  An interview with Otgonbat S. caught my eye because he was talking about travel.  This caught my eye - “When we travel, we walk out, but in reality we travel deep inside.”

In the beginning, according to Otgonbat, we travel to see new places. But after a few trips, most people tailor their traveling to their own interests, whether those are taking photos, mountain climbing, trying other foods, studying religious beliefs, experiencing different cultures, or other reasons. I think traveling solo is a variation on that concept.

When you travel alone, it falls to you to figure it out, whether you are sick, tired, hungry, lost- you can’t just let someone else do it for you, because there is no one. Over time this builds confidence and epands one’s capacity to cope. It develops problem solving skills. While I very much enjoy meeting other people when I travel, the characteristics of solo travel suit me very well.

Travel often (not always) makes a person more observant and resilient. I’m not sure if travel makes one more curious or if curiosity promotes travel, but it seems there is often a correlation.

I think generally it also tends to make people a little more tolerant because they can empathize better with someone, even a stranger, who they see struggling in an unfamiliar situation. After having quite literally been soaked with sweat from anxiety and fear, I am inclined to stop and ask if I can help when I see that familiar look of terror.

I’ve met so many people who live in a country other than their country of birth/origin on just this one trip. Many seem not to think strongly in terms of nationality, but view the world as their country. Some have migrated for education, work, love, or adventure, and they took ‘home’ with them. This attitude seems to me to be more prevalent in areas where proximity brings regular contact with other countries. Europeans are a case in point, many being multi-lingual as a practical matter. However, there are many, many Russians and Chinese living abroad as well, and former/current commonwealth countries such as Australia feed that flow regularly as well. We seem to be the minority in our world view, perhaps because we can currently afford to be insular.

A lot of people traveling in Mongolia that I’ve talked to are using guides in each city- the guide picks them up at the airport or train station, their hotels and activities are all pre-agreed. I saw some whose guide came into the Beijing Railway Station (you can only get in with a ticket and ID normally) and walked them to the gate for their train. I can see the value of that, it reduces the margin of error by a great deal, eases anxiety, and makes travel possible for some whose physical condition would not otherwise allow it. I think the reason I eschew such an approach is that in the end, I enjoy the challenge, the process, of figuring out how to land on my feet in a new place. The initial terror fades quickly and leaves delight and satisfaction at being where I’ve never been before. Also, if you have a guide, they tend to follow you around (or vice versa). 

On the train, enjoying very much the mini village that existed on the train, I still began to yearn for time to myself. I find it exhausts me to continually interact or feel the pressure to do so, I need big blocks of time when no one I know is watching me. I solved this on the train by walking down to the dining car, and I sat there in the noise and activity, completely at ease despite the colorful chaos around me, because I was alone in it.

Ulgii

With the early departure, and my other priorities, there was no time to find coffee or breakfast, so when I was handed a cold hamburger sandwich on Hunnu Air, I went ahead and tried it. It’s funny how hunger expands one’s gastronomical field. I’ve also modified my standards relating to coffee as the trip has progressed. I’m at the point where if it’s hot, brown, and they call it coffee, I will happily accept it.

Our two hour flight took us over mountains that went on endlessly, with what looked like huge amounts of sand nestled into the sides and filling up some of the valleys. At one point we were low enough to be able to see a ger camp along a river, far away from any other sign of humanity. Then we climbed and such details disappeared. 

The airport at Ulgii is small and informal. The door to the building was locked so we hung out along the tarmac waiting for someone to come. What developed was that the luggage is brought to the edge of the tarmac where everyone climbs on and over the carts to reclaim their own. Then we all crowd around the locked door and one beleaguered soul checks each piece of luggage against the claim ticket. While we waited I chatted with the Malaysian man from the Chinese border drama. He and three friends are en route to hiking in the Altai Mountains. 

The guide book lied. There are no taxis in this town, not one. Then again, most any car is willing to act as a taxi for you. I got lucky and got a ride in a van with 8 others to the center of town. I paid two thousand tugrik, which is something less than a dollar, I think.

Money makes things go

Our late arrival in Ulaan Bataar (UB) put a real crimp in my plans because I fly out at 6:40 tomorrow morning, and have only this evening to get some key things done. I need to pick up some cold weather supplies, and the only place I have read of in UB supposedly closes at 6. I catch a taxi to the hotel I booked the day I left Beijing, very glad now that I did that and can avoid the dance of finding a spot to drop my bags and run. But it’s rush hour, and we poke through traffic at a maddening pace. Realizing the futility of fighting this, and certain it will somehow work out, I try to observe UB instead. It has a lot more high rise buildings than I had expected; conversely, on the outskirts you see whole neighborhoods comprised of gers (yurts) enclosed in fences, clearly the home of many UB residents.

I was hungry, having not had anything since a small breakfast, and feeling so grungy- my last shower two days before in Beijing, but I scurry back out the door to find an ATM, where I foolishly only take 50,000 tugrik, not yet understanding the exchange rate. To do this I stand in line with others who happily peer over the shoulder of the person transacting business at the ATM, and even reach over and press a button for them from time to time. This only makes me sweat harder.

The traffic officers at busy intersections are masters of their art. Their use of their whistles had an appealing cadence that lent almost an aura of ceremony and performance as they stood bravely in the middle of the intersection in the deepening gloom of night, amongst multiple lanes of traffic, all jockeying for position (lane markers are ignored), and only years of custom must protect them from unvigilant drivers. Other ingrained habits- while there are names for streets on the map, none are marked. I’m told that directions are known by landmarks rather than street names. I used the same system myself coming back from my errands- I soon saw the ultra modern crescent moon-shaped high rise, and knew where I was.

I raced down the street to where my map says the store I need is, and I hear the lock click into place as I reach my hand out to pull the handle. Blessings on the woman who opened back up and motioned me in. I so very much do not want to be cold in the mountains, and I also don’t want to miss out on experiences because I am not equipped to survive them. I breathed easier then, and went back to the room to shower. But first I checked email and discovered that I had a series of work emails demanding immediate attention many hours previously, so I spent my remaining time alternately working, showering, eating bread and cheese (sad, I know- but it was dark, I was in a hurry, and watching the diminishing hours allotted to sleep). I fell into bed at 11:30, exhausted from last night’s sojourn at the Chinese border, and woke up to my alarm a little after 4. Sleep, they say, is overrated. That’s what I’m telling myself for now.

In the process of doing a little repacking this morning, I could not find about $1,000 US dollars that I’ve been carrying with me for use in the more remote area of Mongolia. I was alarmed because I don’t know if there are ATM’s in Ulgii, and I know for sure most places won’t take a card. So I asked the guy at the front desk, who speaks a little English, if he can tell the taxi driver to stop at an ATM. Standing at the ATM, I choked a little at hitting the 500,000 Tugrik button, I now have cash. I stood there with my finger poised over the button, remembering that the exchange rate at the hotel was 2,425 Tugrik to the dollar, I think I took out about $250.

Meanwhile I kept wondering where that money might have been taken, when all of a sudden I remember putting it in my blue document holder. It’s odd, I never carry much cash around at home, but it’s unavoidable on a trip like this, so I try to divide it up and secure it, working at staying vigilant when I’m out and about, and locking my bag before I leave my room. This morning was a bit unsettling, and then it was just humbling.

The morning after

It was a difficult night, with various officials tramping up and down the corridor, the door to which I had left open to avoid the trauma of pounding on the door mid-dream. Alas, not much dreaming anyway. But I got by easily this time, didn’t even have my bags searched. Some were visited multiple times, four Europeans were made to leave the train with their luggage, and the man from Malaysia spent the same night hours standing/sitting in the station house, not being allowed to re-enter the train until after the wheels had been changed.

Our passports were returned a little after 4 am, and we left Erlian 6 hours after arriving, bound for the Mongolian side of the border. They made much quicker work of it, but we are still way behind schedule now.

I had booked a ticket in a four person sleeping compartment (soft-sleeper) to avoid ending up alone in a two person compartment with a man as a precaution - feeling that might be awkward, and knowing that gender is not a consideration in assigning bunks. So I’m in a four person compartment, alone with one other passenger, a man. I have to laugh at how that worked out. He’s very much a gentleman though, so it’s fine. All the foreign passengers have been trading itineraries. I stopped in to see Laizsu and Tony on my way down to the dining car just now, and they showed me their printed itinerary. They’ll be on to Russia by the time I return to Ulaan Bataar so I won’t likely see them again.

We are three hours behind schedule due to the border delays, which takes away the afternoon I meant to spend getting the lay of the land in UB. I fly out at 6 am tomorrow, so not much will get done this evening.

Trans-Mongolian

The very name “Trans-Mongolian Railway” stirs something inside me. It evokes adventure, the unknown, long journeys over land. In reality, of course, it’s just a train.  We rolled out of the Beijing Railway Station right on time at 11:20 am. 

This experience is quite different from some other train travel I’ve done. The majority of the passengers are tourists, and given that the most common travel language is English, they all speak it. There was an immediate commencement of greetings and conversation, which has ebbed and flowed since we started. I had dinner with two other travelers, one of them my compartment mate, and the other a passenger from the next car who paused on his way back to his car, and ended up staying for hours. While waiting at the station I met Laizsu and Tony, who are from the UK, and they came by to visit. I had expected solitary time on this train but that seems unlikely now.

As we got past the outskirts of Beijing, we went into hills and small mountains with a river running alongside for a while. Innumerable tunnels, steep rocky formations and narrow valleys began to give way to patches of sunflowers, fields of corn, and what appears to be grapes. Later as the land flattened, it seemed that every available inch had been planted- most in corn, which seems odd to me (maybe for export?), but I saw amaranth, cabbages, onion and other crops too. Sometimes it would be a big field of corn with a small square planted in something else right in the middle of the field, almost a secret patch that was only visible from the high vantage point of the train.

From time to time there would be someone working in their garden plot, or pulling a cart down a dirt path, and then the next thing, there’d be high towering buildings seemingly out of nowhere, but not really-just the perspective from the train.

We’re due to be at the Mongolian border in the next half hour, and we’re scheduled to spend 191 minutes in Erlian on the Chinese side and 75 minutes in Zamyn Uud on the Mongolian side. I know part of the time will be spent switching out the undercarriage because the rail gauge changes here. When I went through this before, we had to stay on the train and I never could tell when the change happened, it was so smooth. One of my dinner mates, Rob, thinks we’ll be able to get off and walk around the town, but I have my doubts about that. I’ll know soon.

Much drama on this border crossing. Four westerners were taken off the train here at the border, no idea why. A Chinese woman who had apparently tried to sneak through was removed. And a man from Malaysia traveling in this car was taken inside, his fate remains undetermined. The plight of our migrant spirit continues.

Up with the chickens

I managed to 'sleep in' until 4:30 today, the latest yet. I've been getting a lot less sleep than usual but have so far not felt it. I went walking in the little streets around my hotel, watching the city come to life. In every hutong and every block of the main street, there are small restaurants selling hot soup and steamed little packages for breakfast, small shops selling sundries.

There are public toilets everywhere, all of the stoop variety. Those on the hutongs tend to have waist high dividing walls, or none at all, meaning that you can line up with your neighbors and chat while attending to business.

I passed through various police checkpoints walking around, and while most just checked bags and passed you through a metal detector, a few asked for ID. Yesterday, a police officer I approached with my passport took a glance at what I was holding and just waved me on, didn't even want to look at it. I usually don't carry my passport when I'm walking around, but I'd been to the Forbidden City, and needed a passport to get in. The checkpoints seem to be a part of everyday life, and people don't seem concerned about it. Once or twice I saw someone pulled aside, and I'm guessing their experience was a little less uneventful.

I just remembered that Starbucks opens at 8 am, so I'm going to have coffee, on the theory that it will become scarcer as I move away from the big city.

My hotel

Onward

Here are a few parting shots from the streets of Beijing

a day in the life

I walked 150 miles today- you think I exaggerate but let me explain. There are inches, and centimeters, and they are not the same. Then there are dog years, and human years, and they too are not the same. Walking all day on concrete is analogous to living in dog years. I walked 150 miles.its

At times it felt like my feet were about to fall off, but fortunately there was no one around to complain to, and the only reason I was walking was because I had decided to. So.

At some point I stopped for some lunch in a second story restaurant with a picture menu (no, a foodie I am not). I got some delicious spicy lamb and a bowl of rice. They were serious about the spicy part, after a while I started avoiding those red bits. I hate to admit this, but I'm still not very good at chopsticks. I guess when I was young and could have picked up the skill like kids today operate smart phones at the age of 3, I wasn't eating out much, and not at all at Chinese restaurants that might have offered chopsticks. Thus, the cultural deprivation of my early years seems to have permanently stunted my chopsticks skills (I'm kidding ma!- well, not about my skills, but about the source). After watching me for a bit, the waitress brought a ceramic spoon of the type that you eat soup with in a Chinese restaurant but I declined it and soldiered on. It was messy and embarrassing, but I got full.

By the time I got back to my neighborhood, I was in pain, both from the walking, and my legs are also sore from the great climb yesterday- I stopped in for a foot massage, which was wonderful. What I'm not sure about is what is an Enhanced Renal Dynamic Footbath. Alas, my Chinese and her English weren't up to that question, so I avoided doubt and just got a foot massage.

Change, it is coming

My first day in Beijing, I sweated like a race horse, the next day was rainy and cool, but perfect for the climbing involved at the Great Wall. Today it was back to sweating and seeking out the shady side of the street.

Then here's the forecast for Ulaan Bataar. I'll let you do the math.

And just to show you that I brought more than one shirt. The thingy in my ear is a self guided tour, fortunately in English. In fact, it felt like Judy Dench had climbed inside my head and was carrying on a conversation with me as I walked around.

Climbing the wall of my own limitations

I meant to sit down and write about the Great Wall, and some of its history but I'm thinking at this moment of the group of people with whom I shared this wet day. I am not a big fan of tour groups, for reasons such as how the day started, and because I'm not so good at playing well with others sometimes. I very much like to be able to decide what I want to do, and then do that very thing, and when in the company of others, especially a group of any size, deciding to move from point A to B takes almost as much effort as a joint resolution of Congress.

You arrange to be picked up- for me the instructions were to go to the McDonalds at Meishi and Dashilan Streets at 6:30 am. I have no problem with the early hour- it would seem to indicate an early arrival as well. Alas, the benefit of being picked up so early is much like being at the beginning of the school bus route- you get your pick of the seats. The rest is just a long bus ride. We drove hither and yon picking up others, meeting another bus to trade passengers, and arrived at the entrance at around 10 am. Yes, three and a half hours of fun bus riding. It was raining, and the windows fogged over, so there I sat, being about as patient as I usually am, which is really very little.

The guide we had seemed inexperienced, and it took him nearly an hour to get the tickets and get us herded into yet another bus to go to the actual starting point. Then at last, we were free to climb/walk the wall between ten guard towers, and it was quite amazing. By the time we started climbing I had been talking with Katarina, who is much younger and in better shape than I am.

There was a lot of this kind of 'walking' and I gave her plenty of opportunity to carry on without me, but she was kind, and I staggered, lurched, and gasped my way upward.

It was worth it. And in the process I learned more about Katarina, and we met others from our group of 12 at various points in the walk as well. There are 3 men from the UK, a woman from Jerusalem who is originally from Moscow, two women from Holland, two men from Cologne, Germany and a couple from Columbia. We shared a meal after the hike, and did the shorthand introduction that seems to be the way of travelers: Where you hail from, where you've just been, and where you are going from here. 

I'll probably never see any of them again, and while I exchanged contact info with a couple  of them, who knows what may come of that. It was really just today, and that was enough. Decent human beings in all kinds of packages, sharing the space of an experience that we'd all come to intentionally, and feeling that it all has added to the tapestry of my own life- that is a good day.

back streets of Beijing

It's hard to describe the narrow little back streets of Beijing. There are a lot of two and three-wheeled vehicles in use, for obvious space reasons. However, cars also use these streets, sometimes resulting in the need to shift things in order for them to get through. Yesterday as I walked, a car attempting to get through at the end of a hutong was unable to get past a motorcycle sitting beside the road, so a nearby police officer simply lifted the back of the bike up and away, with inches to spare.

I got in on the action yesterday afternoon. I was walking down the narrow street and heard the already familiar toot behind me, letting me know a car, three-wheeled motorized cart,or motorcycle was coming up behind me (bicycles have bells for this purpose). I stepped to the side behind a parked scooter and the oncoming car inched its way past another parked bike on the other side, then came toward my side. After having seen so many passing people directing such drivers as a matter of course, I indicated with my hands that the driver needed to go left, and then when it had cleared the bike, I indicated that as well. Apparently such hand signals are universal, because it worked, and I got a thumbs up from the front passenger as they slid by me.

The community toilets are still common in many of these neighborhoods, and the ones I've used are all very clean, although there is a certain odor that wafts as you pass them.