Danielle and I are bingeing again—this time on Scrabble, which we both consider to be a much more profitable thing than say, “Lost” or “CSI” or any of our previous binges… I’ve found, after five years of living in Mongolia, that my vocabulary just isn’t what it used to be—either because I’m used to limiting my vocabulary to make myself more easily understood by English learners, or because certain Mongolian words have crept in and are trying to displace their English “counterparts”—and this is not a good thing my age. We’ve toyed with making “A Scrabble game a day keeps senility at bay” our slogan, but decided that at this point in life, senility and loss of vocabulary are two very different things. At any rate, Scrabble is indeed working its magic as I am finding words like “gist” and “orb” rolling off my tongue. Granted (Mom and Ben), these aren’t high scoring words, but they can prove useful!

I am afraid, however, that the makers of the “Scrabble Dictionary” are biased against Mongolian vocabulary. Why are words like “kumiss” (fermented camel or horse milk—-incidentally there are five accepted Scrabble spellings for this: koumis, koumiss, koumys, koumyss, kumiss) and “yurt” (the Russian name for a Mongolian felt tent) permissible yet “ger” (the Mongolian name for Mongolian felt tents) and “airag” (fermented horse milk) aren’t? It’s rather unfair, if you think about it. Speaking of unfair…Tom thinks it quite rude that Danielle and I don’t permit him to join in the fun, as a result, he occasionally tries to eat the letter tiles.

Spring

It is “spring” here in Mongolia—the season of constantly changing weather and inexplicably tired people. Case in point: today started off beautifully with warm temperatures, little wind, and bright sunshine streaming through my window at 6 AM. By 10:17 it was snowing—yet still so warm that I went out on our balcony barefoot and in short-sleeves and wasn’t cold. Within 20 minutes the only remaining snow was in the shadows of buildings




At 11:35 it started snowing again and it was coming down harder and the wind was colder.






By 1:02 PM, when the last picture was taken, the snow was gone and the sun was back. The afternoon then rounded itself out with two or three dust storms (separated by beautiful periods of light breezes and sun), and a bitingly cold north wind. I’m curious to see what tomorrow will bring.

Ice

The ice on my window has already melted this morning...but I thought I'd post some pics I took a couple months ago.

Making Spaghetti

I discovered that I could make spaghetti when I was in college, so it was ironic that today, while I was making spaghetti, Danielle told me I looked like a college girl. Perhaps it was the super high ponytail (necessitated by an unfortunate overly layered haircut) Or perhaps it was the Wheaton sweatshirt (necessitated by my notoriously messy spaghetti making. I actually got the sweatshirt right here in Mongolia from another Wheaton grad.) Who knows…

Anyway, as I was cooking the aforementioned spaghetti, while apparently looking like a college student (yes, I think I’ve finally hit the age where I take that as a compliment) I was thinking about how many places my ingredients came from. Tomato paste from Italy, oil and bay leaves from Russia, Garlic from China, Onions from Mongolia, the ground meat (horse, because it is the cheapest, that we ground ourselves) from right here in our province. Other seasonings had to be brought from UB, Thailand, China, and the States. The pasta we’ll eat with the sauce came from Italy but was originally meant to be sold in Japan (all the ingredients and instructions on the back are in Japanese and not the usual four or five other languages). What’s in your spaghetti?

Narnia

While in Thailand I was able to see the new Narnia movie in the theater. (It’s always great fun to go to movies in Thailand—not only are they cheap, but before the start of the movie everyone in the theater must stand as a video tribute to the king is played. This fascinates me.) Anyway, Narnia… I have read this book many, many times in the last four years because it is part of the curriculum I teach. I enjoy the story very much, but unfortunately I know it too well to be able to appreciate the movie. Instead I got a bit hung up on the changes…I realize that they have to cut things out to make it fit in a two-hour time frame—cutting makes sense to me—but adding extra things is always a bit weird in my opinion.

My two main questions: Why did they have to add to, alter, and embellish the children and beavers’ flight from the witch and wolves? And what was up with the near drowning of the kids?

And now, a free language lesson: C. S. Lewis is said to have gotten the name Aslan from the Turkish word for lion. Apparently he came across it while reading Arabian Nights… Anyway, the word for lion in Kazakh is also Aslan, and the word in Mongolian is Arslan. In both Mongolia and Kazakhstan this is a perfectly acceptable name for a guy.

A Random Assortment...

Olympics: There was actually a Mongolian news crew present at the 2006 Olympics in Italy. In fact, there were probably more Mongolians present there to report on the events rather than participate in the sports. This time around the Mongolian athletes didn’t do so well (in the biathlon, I think, or maybe it was cross-country skiing), but we’ll be back in ’08 with some excellent wrestlers, I’m sure! Back to the news crew… It was really fun to see them interview athletes in both Russian and English (of course it was then loosely dubbed over in Mongolian). I particularly enjoyed the commentary about various athletes because it gave me lots of practice with numbers—height, weight, birthday, etc.

Olympics (academic): Not a big fan. I may or may not delve more into this topic at a later date. At present I need to finish writing a test for the (secondary school) English Olympics, which will be held this coming week in my town.

Nephews: Maybe I’m biased, but I really think that my nephew is actually getting cuter as he ages—and he was a cute baby to start with! I cannot wait to hang out with the monkey this summer.


Milk: I find it strange that in the land of meat and dairy products I had to go to seven stores today before I found milk. Seven!

Lights and Leakage: I finally replaced light bulbs and put the light fixtures in our bathroom back in place today. New year’s morning we’d woken up to find water dripping out of the light fixtures that are in the drop ceiling in our bathroom. This time it wasn’t even the result of the people upstairs flooding their bathroom—rather it was due to warm weather and melting snow. On January first. In Mongolia. (Have I mentioned that the weather has been strange this year?) Unfortunately, the people who live below us are also having light fixture issues. It seems to be a yearly occurrence that while we are in Thailand, our apartment will have some plumbing issue and will flood the apartment below us. Last year our kitchen sink decided to back up and over flow—even though it hadn’t been used in a month. This year a pipe in our bathroom decided to develop a hole and become a geyser. Needless to say, the people downstairs don’t like us much—even though none of the water leakage has actually been our fault.

You might be in Mongolia if...11-20

(1-10 can be found in a previous post)

11. You associate the word “Olympics” with academic test giving.
12. You think bell peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes are exotic vegetables. (And just in case anyone out there is feeling persnickety—I am well aware that the tomato is technically a fruit.)
13. You know that the difference between “beefshteak” and “cutlet” is the presence or absence of a fried egg on top.
14. Spring is now your least favorite season.
15. You had a choice of watching the 2006 Olympics in Russian, Chinese, or Mongolian.
16. You are well acquainted with the “Numa Numa” song. (Of course, I’ve heard that it was #1 in 27 other countries, too…I think it is actually by a Romanian group.)
17. You can buy music in the food section of your market—perhaps even from the same counter that sells “sausage”.
18. All big events in your town take place at the Wrestling Palace… Or, for that matter, if your town even has a Wrestling Palace.
19. You don’t live in Japan yet, on a regular basis, you can watch sumo wrestling on TV.
20. When reading and writing in English you mix g’s and d’s, p’s and r’s, y’s and u’s, H’s and n’s, B’s and v’s.

Sorry for the lack of posts... I was in Thailand thawing out.