had my breath taken away so many times i am surprised im still breathing at all.

late night blogs

Oh man. I haven't even been busy. This is what happens when I slow down. So does my efficiency.

It's been storming of late - it's so lovely. Rumbly thunder, big strikes of lightning, rain on the roof. And muddy wet ground courtesy of no (I mean none at all) drainage.

I've been working and organising stuff for when dad gets here. Organising flights to Khovsgol, organising myself for my imminent trip (in 6 hours) to Selenge. I'm not even sure what's in Selenge but I know I'm leaving at 6:30am for another long drive. It's only three days and the director is coming so we get to stay in hotels. With showers!

Tegan, Ebony and I are a bit closer to organising Christmas. I'm also going to head home for a couple of weeks in November. I haven't asked for time off work but it'll have to be okay. I'm going to hopefully fly in on the same day as Tegan so we can be picked up together to save mum two trips.

I've had the house to myself which was surprisingly lovely. I don't know why, it hardly made a difference - but it was just nice. I had lots (okay, two) visitors and we sat and ate dinner and watched movies and ate icecream on a couple of different nights. It's really nice to do that with friends!

I got my parcels - that was exciting!!!! I got my patterns from the USA so I can start to make some pretty dresses. Mum's parcel with my bracelet (that I ordered in February - it went from China to Brisbane to Mudgee to Mongolia and I've finally got it!) and a magazine; Gma's parcel with a cute lil egg warmer and some much-needed pink Mary-Kay cream.

I don't have anything worthwhile to report, I just won't be reporting back until Sunday because I'm not taking my laptop with me. I considered it but .... nah. I should survive without blogging or facebooking for three days. I'll just write my daily updates down, and then when I get home I can type them up and you'll get the same thing just a delayed response.

oh, and the Blues beat the Maroons. Sucked in!

An overall win of a day

Hiking just out of UB VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

This morning was great – this afternoon was greater. Dad’s coming to Mongolia!!!!!

I left work after lunch today to go to talk to the Mongolian students. There were 30 of them – all my age and older which was slightly intimidating but only a little bit. They all spoke perfect english. I just talked about me and where I’m from – and showed videos and photos of Australia. They asked some questions and I talked to them – quite openly – about Aborigines, how to get a job, what university is like, where to live in a city, how to go on holidays for cheap….. Mongolians don’t seem to mind talking when others are talking. To me it’s extremely rude. Nevermind. I took a different approach and just stopped talking until they all listened, and if they started to chat I’d change the topic as it obviously wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea.

The course conveners were surprisingly happy to see me. I don’t know why. I mean, I’m a nice person and all but I’m not THAT exciting. I have a feeling that it was nice for a young professional (me) to talk adlib (is that a word?!) about things that are relevant to the students.

Within seconds of me arriving I was offered marriage – I declined and continued to show photos and videos. I started with a photo of me and the girls and then progressed from there. In hindsight I would have done it slightly different and now I feel….. dirty, I guess – for talking about myself for so long. I was hardly talking about myself (maybe the first 10mins) and I was hardly talking about my experience – it was just my basic Australian knowledge they were after.

1.5hours later we wrapped up and I think they were grateful. I feel like I hardly scratched the surface of what they need to know. Hopefully, if they liked what I had to say, I can go back and we can do smaller group work that is more specific. But, oh man – what an amazing opportunity. They were all so cool – I hope I get to see them again!

I ducked home to get changed and caught mum and dad on Skype (such an amazing invention, by the way!). I told dad I had to leave because I was going to book my flights to Khovsgol and he said ‘you better book me a ticket too’ and I almost cried. It’s going to be GREAT! I knew it’d be a last minute thing and if I left the decision to its own devices, the right answer would prevail. This time it was totally in my favour! And now, after an hour of figuring out flights, times, prices and people, our flights are booked ($260 return)!

I also managed to score myself a winter coat and boots (important to get asap as once you’ve got it, you don’t need to worry about it and it is definitely necessary!). I think I’m almost all set!

Birthday parties and hikes

Dessert - lots and lots of cakes, cupcakes, icecream and fruit salad

Cake cutting time!

The dinner party went off like a fire cracker. Maybe? I'm not sure that's right, but it was a lot of fun. We had about 15 people over and feasted on home made salsa, green curry, beef stirfry and lots of dessert. We drank beer, wine, vodka and lots of tea (okay, maybe I was the only one that drank lots of tea).
We sang happy birthday. Unfortunately I was a little too happy and upon setting up my video camera to film the singing of Happy Birthday, we promptly found out all chances of that happening were ruined because we had no battery.
We ate and talked and chatted and drank tea all night being merry and laughing and having a lovely time. By midnight the house was empty and most things were clean. I slept well - I was pooped! Sarah got some great presents and seemed to thoroughly enjoy herself! All in all, a successful night!
Saturday was the laziest day I've had for ages. I didn't get out of my PJ's until we went out at night to a farewell.

Sunday was going to be a nice quick hike and then a day of rest. Rest it was not. We hiked up a mountain behind UB. We hiked up and and up and up and up. I'm fairly fit - unfortunately not hiking fit. Anyway, after hours of hiking UP we made it to the top, sat and ate lunch for a minute and continued on. We started going down and down and down. My knees got sore and sore and sore. And then we saw a marmot who was a long long long way away but was still cute. Marmots carry the plague (as in Black Plague) and are thought to be the originating source of the plague, so a long long long way away was fine by me.
Seven hours is a long time to hike for and I am definitely feeling it today. The beauty can only be described in picture; I will do my best to add a couple more you haven't seen.

Wait. sorry. I'm running late, I'll have to put more photos up tonight. xox

Lots of wins!

Lots of wins! I'm at work today - it's an Australian public holiday (Queen's birthday long weekend) and most volunteers have organised the day off. I didn't. Half because my boss is away so I couldn't ask, and half because I don't really believe that we should be getting Australian public holidays when we're living and working in Mongolia. But I kind of contradict myself - when it comes to Christmas and Australia Day, I'll be taking the days off.

So that doesn't seem like a win. But in the space of 20 minutes, I just talked to my kind-of-boss about getting time off to go to see the Reindeer Herders (Tsaatan people in Northern Mongolia). He also updated me on what our field trip is on, I got an actual itinerary WITH our hotels (which means we're getting a shower!) and found out we're diverging a little to go and see something different. Originally we were going to go to see a hospital, vet practice and some kindergartens (the group I work with supports different projects to do with Mongolian livelihoods; I just work in the farming sector). Instead we're going to see a group that have kicked up a stink and are making a complaint against us. Not as much fun and not as interesting but definitely more related to work.
Next win: I ordered some business cards AND figured out what I'm going to do with my time this week. I met the aimag (like, state) coordinators of our projects. I introduced myself (it was translated) and one lady asked to see some videos of Australia. Prepared I am - videos galore. I will make some decent videos and make a little powerpoint to burn to CD and send to ALL 21 aimag coordinators. It'll be a little bit of 'Australia' with a little bit of sheep, cows and dogs (courtesy of dad). I'm pretty excited. Apparently they will be too.

This afternoon I'm going to talk to a group of Mongolians who are moving to Australia courtesy of the Australian government - to study for a couple of years. It's a wonderful program and delivers so many opportunities to people who wouldn't otherwise have them. They've been learning english and I'm just going to chat to them about me and Australia. Whoah. Tricky. The lady organising it is very grateful - I'm not sure she knows what she's in for. I do have a time limit though, which is good or they could get their ears talked off.

I have a time limit because myself and two others are going to book our flights to Khovsgol. It is the northern most aimag of Mongolia and is where reindeers roam free. The Tsaatan people RIDE the reindeer, eat the reindeer, use the reindeer for everything. We are going in the last week of June and I am also hoping (with fingers and toes crossed) that dad can come too. It's short notice but it's the best way. He'd LOVE it. But he knows it so hopefully it'll happen.

Major win of the day will be dad saying yes to coming to Mongolia. It would just be SO much fun. It's okay if he can't come - but it just means he'll have to come at a shittier time of the year.

Oh yeah. ANOTHER win - I got THREE parcels! I haven't received them yet, I get them tomorrow. I am showing restraint and learning to be patient and will pick them up tomorrow when it's easier for everyone. There are two from Australia and one from the USA. Two I imagine are from mum and Grandma, the other one is my patterns from McCalls, which means I can make dresses very soon! I will have to wait until I get back from the field but that's okay. I'll get material on Wednesday and then think about how I'll make everything. I always seem to sew better if I've had 'thinking' time.

Three hour hike

Excuse my lack of commentry; I am POOPED. Our three hour hike turned in to a seven hour hike. And it wasn’t just ‘hiking’. We were practically racing up a mountain littered with angular, fresh, colluvially deposited rocks. My legs hate me right now and my head’s so close to hitting the pillow I could zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ