A Bit of Background

I’ve been living in Ulaanbaatar (UB) for one week now. It feels like a small lifetime that’s gone by in the wink of an eye. It’s an interesting place, only 18 years ago Mongolia was still a communist country under Soviet influence (if not rule) so it’s still very much under a transitional system working towards democracy and free markets.

Russian was the second language for decades so most people are bilingual, but English has recently emerged as the sought after language to learn. Yesterday at Bridge School International where I’ve been studying Mongolian a small graduation ceremony took place for a group of Mongolian students who’d invested their last four years in studying English, something you would have never found 20 years ago.

On the surface UB looks like any other developing world capital city I’ve been to. It’s polluted, there’s a rich core with museums, expensive boutiques, and government buildings surrounded by slums (in this case made up of gers – round traditionally nomadic felt houses); traffic clogs the streets, MTV plays on televisions in bars, stray dogs roam around, and street children (who live in the sewers here) know how to ask for money in English.

It’s a strange feeling, it’s apparent that I’m in a developing country but I have all the amenities available to me at home, I definitely know that I have yet to see “Mongolia”.

On April 3rd I’m off to the countryside to start work. I’m going to be staying in Hutul, a town of about 10,000 about 3.5 hours North from UB. I’m going to be working with an organization which focuses on empowering local women in the realms of education, secured livelihood and health awareness. The organization works with the help of several local volunteers and my job is going to be to build the capacities of these volunteers and the projects themselves. I’m being cautiously vague since my job description is not much more detailed and I doubt I’ll really understand and negotiate my role before spending at least a few weeks with the NGO.

One thing that I can say for sure is whatever it’s like it will be decisively Mongolian!