spectrum 8 - the whiner

WARNING: the following is about snot and phlegm…and a little pee.

this is terrible and possibly insensitive and i shouldn’t even write about it. but i will anyway because i can’t get over it and hopefully this helps (every city has its grime, right?). it is impossible to walk in the city without stepping in another person’s fluids. there, i said it.

snot rockets – an inelegant yet precise term – seem to be the most widely used method here for clearing out the nose. and although i’m impressed by the efficiency of it, the sight and sound really just makes me want to barf. the steps outside the school where i teach are dotted with frozen globs of what i hope is mostly spit. and even the stairs inside the school have puddles here and there every once and a while. i haven’t actually been spit or snotted on, but have caught various backsplashes and narrowly escaped a few ill-timed and ill-aimed wads. it’s only a matter of time, though. i’m a little paranoid.

unfortunately, if you are not stepping in one thing, you are stepping in another. for me, it’s mostly pee. example: on my way to work i pass a bus stop, the back of which is generally used as a toilet. i usually try to avoid walking back there, but it’s a busy stop and i’m not always lucky. i just try very, very hard not to slip and fall in this particular area.

ok. i’m done. i’m over it. i promise.

spectrum 7

on the last night my friend Tamara was to be in Mongolia, we decided to meet for a chat at the “Café Amsterdam” downtown. i thought i’d take the bus instead of a taxi even though i was running a little late and it was somewhere around -20 outside. as far as i knew, the ride was going smoothly, but suddenly the bus stopped in the middle of traffic. the driver then climbed out of his seat holding a skinny little wrench in his hand and then exited the bus. moments later he was back inside the bus still holding his skinny little wrench. and there we sat for about 5 minutes in the middle of traffic while he revved the engine a dozen or so times. eventually, we started moving again and the rest of the ride went fine.

i’d really like to know what the driver did with that skinny little wrench.

spectrum 6

i have experienced my very first hockey game today. and I almost froze to death. it was an outside rink and barely above 1 degree. aside from the fact this was taking place in Mongolia and having no previous experience to compare it with, i believe it was fairly akin to most other hockey games. there were fights and checks and penalties and crazy plays and screaming and to spice it up some foreigner decided to come armed with every naughty four letter word he knew and a couple cans of beer. once a referee was smacked in the face with a flying puck that split open is chin. later I discovered that referees are supposed to wear helmets just like the players in case anything like this happens. none of the referees there felt this was a necessary precaution.

at home i stuck my feet in between the rungs of the radiator and waited for the feeling to return to my toes. i took quick note that two layers on bottom and five layers on top plus a hat, scarf, mittens, and wool socks simply aren't enough for outdoor-stand-around hockey games in the middle of a Mongolian winter.

but i was still happy i went.

spectrum 5

i walked out of the apartment on my way to pay the phone bill and get some groceries when i walked into a small group of street kids hanging out in the stairwell. immediately, they stopped what they were doing and pushed their little hands in my face squeaking out : “money? money?” they put on their most pitiful faces and one even latched himself on to my leg and wouldn’t let go. all the while, i felt little fingers searching for tugruks in my pockets. eventually, i pried the one of my leg and when they realized i had nothing in hand they lost interest.

i’m always a little torn inside after things like this happen. i’m never quite sure what i should have done when i think about it in retrospect. one side of me thinks i should have had more compassion, the other side of me wonders if i was even compassionate. i’m trying to understand how to love with wisdom. why is it such hard work?

spectrum 4

earlier in september i had gone downtown to buy some things that i needed to send home. i decided to catch a bus back to my apartment rather than trudging the half hour walk with bulging plastic bags hanging off me. i was very grateful when a virtually empty # 13 pulled up.

however, the driver must have been 14 or so because it was jerk-stop-jerk-go every two seconds all the way home. i was fumbling around with my stupid bags, grasping for a bar or a seat to hold on to as the 14 year old driver learned the gas, break and clutch...all of which was not going well.

then, an older Mongolian man offered me his seat. it was quite comical the process of actually sitting down. i politley refused, but he insisted - hoisting himself up, at one point dangling by one hand gripped tightly on the bar above his head, both of us frantically grabbing at things so as not to fall over, just so i could sit.

i was (and still am) a little shocked at such generosity. such genuine generosity: he didn't hit on me, he didn't try to grope me, he didn't rip me off, he didn't steal from me. what a fallen world it is when one can assume as much about another person in the course of applied kindness. he did it because he was nice. and of all people, he did it for a foreigner - who clearly looked like a tourist at the time. and tourists are always annoying.

he got off the bus at the next stop, tapped on my window and gave me a thumbs up with a huge grin which made me laugh. in retrospect, he was probably signing "good luck," because at the next two stops all of mongolia decided it needed to take the #13 bus. i barely squeezed myself out the rusty doors, all body parts intact, when i reached my stop.

spectrum 3

I now live on the fifth floor of an apartment in the middle of ‘Little Russia.’ I don’t think it’s officially named that, I only call it Little Russia because a lot of Russians populate this particular area of UB. Russians and missionaries.

I have a pretty good view from this apartment. I just look up and there are mountains less than three miles away. Coming from an area of the US where cornfields are the thing, I never get tired of this scenery.

The thing I hate looking at though, is the drunk, homeless man passed out on the filthy ground behind the garages.

Spectrum 2

One evening I was walking downtown when a man in a wheelchair whooshed by. He was rolling down the center line of one of the most congested and busy roads in UB. But he just kept going, arms pumping furiously, completely focused on keeping center and probably hoping to not get plowed into by a commuter bus or some driver too busy talking on his cell phone to notice a wheelchair hurtling down the road. No one else around me seemed to look at this scene with the same astonishment as I. I’ve observed bicyclers and mo-peders do the same thing: squeezing between trolleys and SUVs, narrowly escaping a very messy and unpleasant end. But this was not a rickety old piece of transportation – which is at least capable of dodging traffic. No, this was a wobbly, hand propelled wheelchair, which at best can perform about five primary functions: increase speed, decrease speed, turn corners, go straight, move backwards. It certainly was not built for riding the line down Peace Avenue in downtown UlaanBaatar. I have to admire him for taking a risk and looking as if he’s done it a million times.