We pulled into Ulaanbaatar and everybody disembarked. All the other foreigners were met by their arranged host, while our arranged host was nowhere to be seen. Ahh, an adventure. This was the day of the 800th anniversary of Genghis Kahn, celebrated with the Nadaam Festival, a Mongolian Olympics of wrestling, horseback racing and archery. Every hotel was booked full, and way overpriced. A few people were at the station, with slips of paper advertising their ‘guest houses’ – we took them all, then found a taxi to take us to the travel agent who had our Moscow train tickets. After that, we hunted for the agent who had booked our stay in Mongolia, but not arrived at the train station, with no success. We decided to use the slip of paper given to us by a sweet young woman.
Her guest house was in the slums of Ulaanbaatar, dirt alleys, barefoot urchins and all. It was in the shadow of the Tibetan Monastery. When at last we found the right door in the wall, we went in to find a haven for hostellers. At $3/night, we had a springy bed in a bunk room, with travelers from all over Europe. For $5/night you could stay in their ‘ger’ – the felt version of a yurt. This family was well educated, and set up a stay as comfortably as they could without running water. They did have power, but the sink to wash you hands was a tin can with a valve on the bottom. Rainwater, or clean delivered water goes in the top, and you press up on the bottom, much like a soap dispenser, and water pours out.
We found the agent, in a French bakery-café downtown. She apologized, and made arrangements for us to leave the following morning for our ‘homestay.’ We took a public bus, getting there early so that we had seats. This turned out to be vitally important as the bus got more and more crowded. The aisles became so full that our seat was soon shared by several more people, everybody on laps, elbows and hips and shoulders became our preoccupation. That is, until we reached the national park of Terlij.
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