Arriving in Beijing was a bit of a shock as it had been a while since I had been
in such a cosmopolitan city. I wasn't quite prepared for what a modern, and in
some ways sterile, city that Beijing has become. Instead of markets, hawkers,
and crowded Chinese streets, Beijing is dominated by skyscrapers, trendy malls
with the latest Italian fashions, traffic jams, and expensive restaurants.
Amusingly, San Francisco almost seems more "Chinese" to me than
Beijing.
However, Beijing's long history means that it is well stocked with tourist
attractions, and when digging around the side streets, it is possible to find
more traditional restaurants and shops. Another interesting "Chinese"
experience is heading to one of Beijing's many parks early in the morning to see
people do their daily exercise routine. Exercises ranged from more normal
activities like aerobics and badmintin, to tai chi and more esoteric activities
like the many people doing their laps around the park walking backwards, or one
guy tht I saw going through the motions like he was digging a hole with an
imaginary shovel.
The struggle between old and new ways is often amusing as Beijing makes its way
into the high tech world. The hotel I stayed at had a computer into which the
guests names would be entered and sent by modem to the appropriate government
agency (Chinese guests to one and foreigners to another). Pretty sophisticated.
However, despite the Pentium computer sitting on the desk, the hotel accounts
were penciled into hand-drawn spreadsheets and then added up on an abacus.
Another interesting contrast was seeing the BMWs driving down the streets while
having to get out of a public bus to help push start it.
Tianamen Square makes a great place to start a visit to Beijing as the pictures
of Chairman Mao and the waving red flags are instantly recognizable, and the
square is home to the Mao Mausoleum. Uncharacteristically for China, not even
foreigners are charged for entry to the Mausoleum to see Mao's preserved
wax-like body. The visit to Mao is a very serious affair, and a surprisingly
large number of Chinese buy plastic flowers at the entrance to lay at Mao's feet
(and of course be recycled for the next group that comes through). You are
watched very closely as you enter, and the security guards ensure that your
glimpse of the body under the pale yellow lighting is a short one.
Another interesting sight on display in Tianamen square right now is a big
digital clock counting down a large number of seconds. I looked at it and
assumed that it was a countdown to the year 2000, but was later corrected as
someone pointed out It was counting down the seconds until Macau is reunited
with China.
Just north of Tianamen Square is the Forbidden City which was home to the
Chinese emperors for over 500 years, right from the fall of Mongol empire up
until the demise of the last Chinese emperor early this century. When it was
active, the city was a world of decadence for the ruling emperor and family, and
unauthorized intruders were immediately executed. The place is quite luxurious,
although one big piece of the picture is missing. When the Kuomintang lost the
war with the Communists in 1949 and fled to Taiwan, they removed all the
important artifacts from the city leaving only empty buildings, and the bronze
statues that were too large to carry.
Relics from around the country have been moved into the buildings in the
Forbidden City to at least give you a small sense of what they were once like,
and the intricate metalwork seen in the doors and windows, the green glazed tile
rooves, and the elegance of architecture still make the visit a very worthwhile
one. My only frustration was due to some strange security precautions that were
being taken. As I walked around the complex, certain areas were walled off.
Since there were so many buildings to see, I didn't really think much about it
at first. However, I soon realized that the walled off areas were moving,
seemingly just to foil me. As I would try to work my way from one place to
another, the walled off areas moved to fence me in. Eventually, I was contained
in a small area with barricades all around me. At this point, I figured enough
was enough, and as soon as a path opened up to an exit, I bolted for it.
Another must see attraction in Beijing that takes a little more work to get to
is the famed Great Wall. The hotel I was staying at offered cheap transportation
to the Simtai section, which is one of the more dramatic and least touristed
sections of the wall reachable from Beijing. This was one trip that didn't
disappoint, as the wall looked exactly as you would picture it. Located along
tall forested limestone mountains, the wall snakes along the ridgeline as far as
the eye can see, and impressively, was built along the steepest and highest
points of the mountain range.
When the bus dropped us off, we had a mere three hours to explore. Climbing up
from its lowest point at the valley floor, we made our way up the wall as it
rose up the mountain ridge, climbing from tower to tower. The wall is
surprisingly intact, although certain sections were crumbling and needed to be
walked around. Other parts were not for acrophobics, as there were sheer drops
to the side of the path with no handrails. Having to stop short of the summit as
we were running out of time, we headed back down to the bus and prepared
ourselves for the long trip back through Beijing rush hour traffic.
To reward ourselves for the hike during the day, one of the people on the tour
showed us a local eating hole near our hotel that served Beijing duck. This was
my first time eating the Beijing specialty, which consists of a very fatty duck
that has been pumped full of air and slow roasted for several hours, baking its
skin to a golden brown. The duck is then carved up for you and served with small
tortilla like pancakes, diced onions, and plum sauce. While you munch on crispy
skin and duck fat, the rest of the duck (head included) is cooked into a soup
that is served as a second course. It is a delicious, although very rich dinner,
and one that I sampled several more times during the following week.
It didn't take too long for the thrill of a big city and occasional western
delights to wear off, and I soon began to crave a more rural setting. So, I
bought myself a ticket on the trans-Siberian railway and headed to the Mongolian
capital of Ulaan Baatar.
The thirty hour train ride takes you past the Great Wall and crowded industrial
landscapes, which eventually thin out as the train enters the Gobi Desert. We
reached the Mongolian border around midnight, after which about two hours of
probing by customs officers left me ready to collapse into my comfortable bed.
However, sleeping wasn't so easy as the train kept getting jolted around as the
wheels were changed over to conform to the different Mongolian rail width.
Apparently the Russians (and therefore all its satellite countries) feared an
invasion by train, and purposely designed their rail system to be different from
that used elsewhere in the world.
I awoke the next morning to completely barren and lifeless desert, with only an
occasional two humped camel or a herd of goats to break the monotony. By early
afternoon, we pulled into the Ulaan Baatar train station, and I was welcomed by
some surprisingly warm spring weather. Refreshingly, the station was free of
touts with the lone exception of the mild mannered owner of Gana's Guesthouse
which came highly recommended by other travelers.
Gana collected myself and a group of other travelers, and after a short drive we
found ourselves in what looked like a shanty town. We drove down a narrow road
separated by tall, hastily built fences, before entering an unmarked gate and
emerging into a small complex of ger (Mongolian) tents, and a large building
under construction that we were told would soon be Gana's Restaurant. From the
open air second story of the restaurant, you could look down upon row after row
of fenced off tents in the foreground, and the large skyscraper apartment
complexes that make up downtown in the background.
While Ulaan Baatar isn't a bad place to hang out, it is reminiscent of a
communist inspired city gone bad. The shops have no windows and usually nothing
out front except a sign that says "Shop". Walking inside enables you
to find out what is for sale as you inspect the contents behind the glass cases.
If you want to buy something, you need to tell the person behind the counter
what you want, and if she feels like listening, she yells your order over to the
cashier. At the cashier, you pay your bill and take the receipt back to the
original salesperson to exchange for your goods.
Between the shops are tall and dreary apartment complexes where the majority of
the capital's residents live. Their small windows have bars across them on the
lower windows, and either pavement or gravel separates the buildings.
Occasionally, there would be a playground for the children with some swings and
a slide scattered in the middle of the gravel fields.
While there are tourist attractions worthy of visiting in Ulaan Baatar, my goal
was to get out into the countryside as quickly as possible. Luckily, I arrived
in Mongolia at the same time as Nick from Australia, and Margit from Austria,
and they both had similar travel plans and timeframes to mine.
Public transportation in Mongolia is infrequent and unreliable, and there are
not enough vehicles to make hitch hiking really feasible. This leaves the only
real option of renting a jeep. Nick had met some other travelers in China who
had done a very enjoyable and reasonably priced tour of the Gobi, and he was
able to track down the apartment that the tour leader lived in. She had just
come back from a tour through the Gobi, and put us in touch with a Canadian who
was on the trip with her.
I was quite amused when I bumped into Les, as when we started talking, he said
he was from a small town in Alberta, and that I probably wouldn't know where it
was. However, it turned out that he works very closely with my uncle at the same
small town college. Les raved about the tour with Nassan, and we signed up for
an eight day tour that left in two day's time.
The tour that Nassan runs involves staying with nomad families during the entire
trip (mostly family and family friends), and while they expect no payments for
both food and lodging, gifts are appreciated. We were given a shopping list of
appropriate goods, and stocked up on cigarettes, vodka, candy, crayons,
notebooks, flour, rice, matches, and soap.
We were picked up at the early hour of seven in the morning by our driver Sambo
and his Russian four wheel drive military van. Surprisingly, the van was a lot
more comfortable than a land cruiser as it was spacious with lots of leg room
and even space for one of us to lie down in the back.
The first half hour or so of pavement quickly gave way to the rutted roads we
would be driving on for the rest of the tour. In fact, it is hard to call what
we were driving on even roads as more often than not we seemed to be just making
our own road by driving across the open grasslands. What amazed me the most is
how Sambo and Nassan managed to navigate given the lack of well defined roads,
signs, or even natural landmarks. We would occasionally stop to ask for
directions, but usually only as we narrowed in on a family, and was quite
understandable given that the nomads families we were looking for don't exactly
have a fixed address.
The rolling green grasslands we drove through were broken up by an occasional
salt lake. We soon saw our first wildlife sightings in the form of numerous
marmots. Our Mongolian guides enthusiastically pointed out they make good
eating, and were quite disappointed that it was not "marmot season".
One thing that did surprise me was the lack of people. About every fifteen
minutes or so, we would pass by a couple of ger tents, and with the lack of any
fences, these tents were barely noticeable amongst the vast sea of shrubs and
meadows. This lack of fences also gave the domestic animals a wild feel to them
as you would see herds of horses or two humped camels wandering the countryside
with apparent free reign.
When we arrived at our first tent, we were given a formal look at the Mongolian
greeting customs. We entered the host's tent, carefully stepping around the wood
stove in the center, sitting on the floor in the visitor's area of the tent at
the far back. After some introductory questions asked through our interpreter, a
small bottle carved out of red coral was passed around to each visitor. The
bottle contained sniffing tobacco, and we would each take a snort before passing
the bottle back to the host. Everything was always passed and received with the
right hand, and would always go to and from the host ... never from one visitor
to the next.
After the snuff, we were served some tasty biscuits and glasses of milk tea. The
milk tea was made from part water and part fresh milk, and was boiled with green
tea leaves. I really grew to like it, and it was a welcome way to quench the
thirst after a day in the desert.
While drinking our tea our guide served as interpreter to help exchange small
talk. Our hosts were curious about where we were from and what our countries
were like, and took great enjoyment in trying to guess our ages. In turn, we
found out that nomad families typically have 100-500 animals consisting of
horses, yaks, camels, goats and sheep, and that the families move location about
5 times a year to ensure good grazing for their animals.
While we were talking, more Mongolians began to filter into the tent, and I
began to wonder how big the family was. I was later informed that most of them
were neighbours that caught sight of the van driving in, and came to check out
the strange foreign guests. Two of the more interesting arrivals were from some
ger tents 200km away, and stopped by to see if our host had seen their animals.
They lost a bunch of animals two months before during a storm, and were still
looking for them.
As the visitors left, Nassan informed us that this would be a good time to give
gifts, so we retrieved them from the van and handed them to our host. While I
don't think that the nomads drink alcohol on a daily basis (partly because they
can't afford it), special visitors always warranted the bottle being cracked
open immediately.
The wealthier families that we stayed at had antique elaborately carved silver
cups that were used exclusively for drinking vodka out of. The glass would be
filled with a few drops that would be thrown in the air for good fortune. A
glass would then be poured for the host, and the right ring finger was dipped
into the vodka and flicked to the sky to thank the gods before the shot was
poured back. As with the tobacco, shots were poured and passed from the host to
everyone of age in the room and always immediately back to the host again. There
was definitely an expectation to drink your fair share, and often the host would
not accept the glass back if it wasn't empty. At the very least, returning a
partly full glass would ensure dirty looks.
After we polished off the bottle, we were invited outside to watch as the mother
and children milked the sheep and goats. An interesting technique was used as
the goats were formed into two lines facing each other in close proximity, and
their heads were tied together so that they couldn't move. This then allowed
easy access to the udders as several pails were filled with milk. The ten liters
a day produced by the livestock (thirty during the high season) are consumed
entirely by the family in a diet that relies heavily on dairy products.
The children outside enjoyed showing off for the tourists, and I was especially
impressed by a eight year old boy who would throw a glove down on the ground and
swoop down to pick it up while riding a horse running at full speed. The
children, and Mongolians in general, loved having their picture taken. Unlike in
Tibet where it was difficult to get people pictures, the problem in Mongolia was
trying to explain to people that I was running out of film and didn't need
another picture.
Some of the locals decided that this would be a good time to demonstrate their
wrestling prowess to the foreigners, and before I knew what was happening, I
found myself face to face with a large local Mongolian boy. It didn't take too
long before I found myself flat on my back in a pile of sheep and goat manure.
After the milking and playing was complete, it was dinner time. I had heard
stories about how horrible Mongolian food was, and I expected to lose a lot of
weight here. That is part of the reason I felt guilt free about my three Beijing
Duck dinners in the weeks before. However, not only was the food quite tasty and
heavy in calories, but there was heavy pressure to eat a lot.
The ingredients for nomad meals are quite limited, consisting of dairy products,
flour, sugar, meat (only dried beef during the season I visited), rice
occasionally, water, and salt as a spice. Despite these limited ingredients,
they managed to prepare a wide range of dishes including various types of soups,
fried freshly made noodles, rice pudding, biscuits, cheeses and yogurt
(delicious except for the foul tasting camel varieties), deep fried meat filled
dumplings, steamed breads, and the low fat dish of baked cream either eaten with
bread or just spooned up directly with sugar sprinkled on top.
On this first evening, dinner consisted of soup made from dried beef and freshly
made noodles. With heavy encouragement from our hosts, I finished off three
bowls of soup and washed it down with fresh milk tea.
After dinner was finished and we had some time to digest, it was time for more
vodka drinking. It was explained to us that the vodka is vital for digesting the
rich Mongolian diet.
This time, the drinking was accompanied by some singing, and our host started by
singing three beautiful songs. Afterwards, a bottle of vodka was opened and
drinks were again passed around to each person in the room. Before being allowed
to drink, each person was required to sing a song. Not wanting to drink vodka
was not an acceptable way to get out of singing or out of drinking vodka as both
the drinking and singing were mandatory. However, they were not fussy about the
songs or caliber of our singing, and I would often sing simple children's songs
or Christmas songs like Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer (largely because they were
the only ones I could remember the words to).
Drinking continued until around midnight, after which we were given sleeping
mats, blankets, and a spot on the floor to sleep on. We would get up when the
sun rose, as the family would need to tend to the animals. Despite the fact that
it was almost June, the mornings were surprisingly cold and we would
occasionally wake up to frozen buckets of water outside. Given the shortage of
water in the desert, washing options were severely limited as we would be given
a small teapot of water to share between seven of us.
After washing, we would return into the tent to warm up by drinking some milk
tea, and then dining on breakfast which was either more meat and noodle soup,
breads and baked cream, or my favourite of sweet and creamy rice pudding. When
we had our fill of food, we would say a short good-bye to our hosts and then get
back into the van for another long day of driving.
The next seven days of the tour followed a similar format. While the scenery was
interesting, I would hardly recommend a visit to the Gobi for its natural
beauty. There were some nice rolling mountains, very infrequent sand dunes,
occasional wildlife, badlands, and an interesting canyon with a still frozen
river.
The real highlight was visiting the families and seeing how the people lived.
Their lives seem like they've hardly changed in the past few hundred years, with
the main exceptions being the infrequent ger tent with a generator or solar
battery, the motorized vehicles which some families now use to move their tents,
and Russian vodka.
Traditionally, Mongolians made their own vodka using milk, and at one tent we
were given the opportunity to see this process in action. Fermented camel milk
was boiled in a large wok with a pot of cold water hanging above it. The steam
would condense on the cold pot and drip down into a container hanging underneath
it. We were given some to sample, and I quickly understood why they so readily
switched over to Russian vodka. The concoction we sampled had the sour tang of
the camel milk it was made from, and was about the strength of a strong wine.
One of the more memorable tents that we stayed with was that of a large family
of practical jokers. It was clear where everyone in the family got their sense
of humour from when you met "grandpa" who was a huge bald man with
sparkling eyes and a large gap toothed grin that was always accompanied by
raised eyebrows. At one point, grandpa seemed disturbed by the lack of noise
coming from my cup as I drank tea. He demanded that I slurp my tea, and was not
satisfied until the neighbours 5km away could hear me drink.
I was amazed at how the local people would take advantage of each others
hospitality without thanks being offered or expected. Sometimes, our entourage
would stop at a tent for lunch, place our order, go outside for a walk, and then
come back to wolf down the meal without even including the hosts in the
conversation. I was even told that if a Gobi desert ger tent was empty, it is
acceptable to enter, cook yourself a meal, and then simply leave!
Back in Ulaan Bataar, it was a big relief to finally have a shower. However, we
were anxious to arrange a second jeep tour, so we quickly organized a jeep
rental and guide through our host Gana, bought more gifts for the families, and
soon found ourselves back in another Russian van, and starting a 10 day tour of
the forests and lakes of northern Mongolia.
The variable Mongolian spring weather took a turn for the worse as our tour
started and we left Ulaan Bataar through snow flurries. While the cold was not
appreciated, the dusting of white did add a nice effect to some dunes outside
Ulaan Bataar that we visited.
Our tour took us through Siberian forests and past volcanoes and scenic lakes,
before stopping at Mongolia's number one tourist destination - Khovsgal Lake.
While the large and still frozen lake was very scenic, the large number of
tourists that visit here make it impossible to stay with families and leaving us
to camp. We did, however, have an interesting visit with some Tsataan who are a
minority people in the far north of Mongolia. They sleep in tee-pees and move
every week or so to find food for their domestic reindeer that they depend upon.
From the lake, four days over bumpy rutted roads brought us back to Ulaan Bataar
and to a most welcome hot shower. After some time to do a little souvenir
shopping, I found myself again on a trans-Siberian train headed back to Beijing.
After all the vodka drinking over the previous month, I was looking forward to a
dry 30 hours with plenty of time to pick out the goat hairs that were now firmly
embedded in my clothing. However, this dry and quiet trip back was not to be.
Within a half hour of the train departing, and still only 9:30AM, my Mongolian
bunkmates cracked open a bottle of vodka and shots were again passed around. The
rest of the train ride was a bit of a blur, and I soon found myself back in
Beijing and later on a plane to Singapore.
While Singapore lacks the character and unique culture found in many of the
other places in Asia I have visited, it was a great place to drink good coffee
at one of the many gourmet coffee shops, develop and mail home slides, and
organize the next leg of my trip through Irian Jaya and Sulawesi.
