Sunday, September 23rd, 2007
Unexpecting on the Steppe: A Reflection Paper
The following is a paper I wrote following our homestay in Delgerkhaan, as a reflection on the experience, as well as a summary of the results of our two interviews, which we had to complete during the stay. Note that a bit of this is redundant since I borrowed a few pieces from my previous blog post, but it’s mostly new stuff.
I rested my hands on my legs, perched solidly on the footrests of my host father’s motorcycle as we sped through the night. The cool air soothed my skin, each molecule a reminder of the authenticity of the moment, and my very mortality. The motorcycle’s lone headlight danced its way across the steppe; I leaned back, resting my hands on my knees, and gazed up at the endless starry dark. My stomach full of ?????? (boodog, Mongolian roasted goat), ?????? ??? (suutei tsai, milky tea), ????? (airag, fermented mare’s milk) and ???? (arhi, vodka), I smiled at the uniqueness and beauty of this experience, and drank in the Mongolian night.
My time in ?????????? (Delgerhaan) was laced with solitary gems such as this motorcycle ride, amidst a number of much less outwardly positive experiences. Even that very night, I had convinced myself that my host father ?????????? (Enhamgalthan) had gone to the goat roast without me. He had left without warning a few minutes before 9pm, when the event was supposed to start; by 10:30pm, I wrote an angry journal entry and began readying for bed. Yet he returned just as suddenly as he had left, bursting into the ger and declaring, “????!” (Yavii!, Let’s Go!). I wrote another journal entry the next morning, in which I laughed at my own predictability. I was so paranoid at being left out, that I had talked myself into a frustrated rage; counter-productive behavior by any measure. Yet in my defense, I had little reason to take my father at his word, for I had already seen the Mongolian penchant for spontaneity. I don’t know now what I could reasonably have done, other than live in the moment, and take things as they were without angst or drama. Which is easier said than done.
My family consisted of my father, ??????????, mother, ????????? (Ochirchimeg), two seven year old sisters, ??????????? (Dolgorsuren) and ????????? (Lhamsuren), and one year old ??????????? (Lhagvasuren) (nicknamed air-raid siren partway through the homestay). Our ger was the most remote, with no visible neighbors in any direction. We had a solar panel that powered a light at night, as well as a small flat-screen TV and its satellite receiver. The TV was usually on. For transportation we had a Chinese motorcycle, a Toyota sedan with a cracked windshield thanks to curious goats, and an old pickup truck that guzzled gas and was used for mainly for storage and meat drying, as well as moving. My host mother’s parents lived in the ??? center. After a few days, school began, and everyone except ?????????? went to live in town. They returned briefly for the weekend, but otherwise it was basically just ??????????, the herd and me.
Daily life involved lots of sitting around while ?????????? went out and herded his flock of several hundred sheep and goats, and a few dozen cattle. Or going out with him to herd the sheep and goats, or cows. Every morning he would drive them out onto the steppe to graze for the day while I ate breakfast. Then at night we’d ride out on horseback and herd them home. The calves were kept in a pen to prevent them from nursing during the night. In the morning, ????????? would milk the cows, then let the calves out. Other duties included gathering ?????, which is the primary fuel source, either with my two seven-year-old host sisters or alone (after the first few days they went to the district center for school); fetching water, which meant riding on the back of ??????????’s motorcycle to the river, filling up the water jug, then riding back with it perched precariously between my legs; cooking dinner (once ????????? and the kids had gone to the ??? center), which meant peeling potatoes, rolling out the dough for noodles, and slicing onions; and sweeping up the ger. I also appointed myself resident fly-assassin, and spent many minutes pacing in circles around the ger, long underwear in hand, hunting for flies to eliminate. As the day warmed, they would work into a frenzy, turning the inside of the ger into a hellish swarm (see poem). Somehow my family was able to ignore these winged menaces, but I admitted defeat in this regard as soon as I began my quest to eliminate as many flies as possible. I thought about this at the time, but didn’t reasonably believe I could achieve this during my two-week homestay. So the flies had to go. I couldn’t really stand to be in the ger during the mid-day frenzy, so I’d often sit outside on a rug and do my homework. This was another concession as I let the silence of my family, the language barrier, and the flies limit my immersion and connection to the family. On the other hand, most days I was home alone, or with my seven-year-old sisters, who were often playing outside anyways.
As the homestay progressed, I was given more and more responsibility herding the animals. This was at least partly due to our mother being gone, meaning one of us had to stay at the ger to cook dinner. Herding was definitely one of the highlights of the homestay for me. Herding the animals was meditative, especially when I was sent out alone. Trotting behind the jostling mass of animals, I would watch the sky melt into a rhapsody of color as the sun set behind me. I also quickly dispelled any romantic notions of life as a ??????, when I helped separate our herd from another, sometimes twice in one day. Yet the tiredness I felt was far different than that produced by the grind of academia at home; it was physical, and much more satisfying. I could look outside the ger and see the animals I had herded in from the steppe. I knew I was making a contribution, and every ache reminded me so. Also, by the end I had a much less romantic view of the animals themselves: one day I made a note in my field journal, “Poem title: ‘I Want to Kill You, Goat’” (Field Journal, 9/12/07, p.127).
My kinship and family history interviews showed little difference between my host-father’s family tree and one I might construct of my own family. On first thought this was unremarkable to me, but then I realized it really is quite strange. For a people that have lived in the same land for 2000 years to have so little connection to their past is unusual. I think now it may be due to the Soviet policy of eliminating family names and discouraging family heritage. It’s sad to think such a policy would be effective, but from the family tree I saw it appeared to be the case. Then again, my father also didn’t appear distraught at his lack of knowledge, nor eager to find out more. He seemed quite content simply knowing that he was descended from ??????? ???? (Chinggis Haan). No further detail or origin myths were needed.
My free choice interview was about Nationalism and Mongolian Identity and was one of the most frustrating afternoons of the homestay. The quiet nature of my host father made it difficult to get anything more than a few words in response to even general questions. Partly this may be due to the fact that as a herder, he rarely has to think about such abstractions as what it means to be Mongolian. Also surprising was his lack of opinion on most matters, whether it be the future career of his daughters, or city life. Regarding modernization, he showed a very different conception of Mongolian identity. He was clear that clothing, music, even language were unimportant, and modernization’s effects in the city to that regard were not alarming. The one change that he saw as a threat was one of belief; namely, the growing Christian influence. He mentioned his fear that religion changes people’s thoughts, beliefs, and acts as a divisive force in Mongolian society.
Also, the interview gave an interesting view of ??????????’s nationalism and sense of Mongolian identity. He had already mentioned the importance of descent from ??????? ???? in his family history interview, and this resurfaced again during the second interview. In response to the question, “What does it mean to be Mongolian?” he answered that it was to be descended from ??????? ????. As discussed in Johanna Twersky’s ISP, this shows the importance of lineage over citizenship, supporting the primordial definition of nationalism over that of civic responsibility. This is supported by a quote from Twersky’s interview with Lhamsuren, “Mainstream thought is still that a nation is determined by citizenship [as introduced into the Mongolian consciousness by the Soviets], however the Mongolian instinct seems to be to return to lineage” (Johanna Twersky, “Highlights and Shadows: The Development of a Country Fixed in Tradition”, Spring 2005, p.13).
Regarding modernization, ?????????? also had the view that “it is good”. This combined with his sense of nationalism, in his desire to take part in the reawakening of Mongolia, and its eventual return to the greatness of its past. I was a bit confused by this at first, since he seemed to be extolling modernization, yet living the anti-modern lifestyle. Finally, I learned that he intended to pursue education in UB and establish a dairy farm. Yet he maintained the importance of the nomadic life, and expressed his desire to somehow create a hybrid of sedentary farming and nomadic life—a new nomadism. He clearly exhibited a flare for the meritocratic aspects of democratic life, as he mentioned in our interview that Soviet times were better for the lazy. Now, those willing to work can see reward for their efforts, and according to ??????????, can feel proud to be helping make Mongolia the great nation its people still remember in their hearts.
The mapping exercise showed a stark difference between my father’s idea of a map and my own. The most obvious difference is attention to detail, and varying types of accuracy. Clearly, the language barrier prevented a more thorough communication of my request for him to draw a map. While I was instructed to include a scale and proper symbols, he was merely told to draw a map of 150m around his home. Thus, the resulting pictures can’t quite be compared directly. Yet I know I would have drawn a very similar map even without such specific directions, thus much of the analysis still holds. I spent the majority of my time calculating the map scale, and ensuring that my drawing conformed to such a scale. My father excluded a scale, and spent much more time symbolizing the entities, rather than placing them in space. That is, I made sure the square I drew to represent the truck was in just the right place, and was about the right size; meanwhile my father made sure the truck was detailed enough to be clearly identifiable as his truck, as well as differentiable from the car parked nearby. This showed our vastly different perspectives. My map was a vertical perspective, highly abstracted, and highly accurate to ensure the transferability of its information to other contexts. My father’s map was much more human-scaled, and directly relatable to his life, rather than to the world standard of what a map should look like.
My time on the steppe was real. Among other things, it had the important function of dislodging any romantic notions I had of life on the steppe. Much as I hypothesize in my ISP proposal, I believe those who have urbanized often conjure a rosy view of the rural life, especially where such a life is so important to national identity. ?????????? showed that he appreciates the importance of this lifestyle, yet also has a strong desire to modernize, and make a better life for himself and his family. More importantly, he sees this as completely within the realm of possibility, and does not share my fear that the nomadic lifestyle is under threat (except from climate change). Personally, I was tested in many ways, and forced to adapt to a completely new, and sometimes hostile environment. Most difficult of all was checking my expectations at the door, the most nefarious of cultural baggage. I repeatedly found myself frustrated when what I expected to happen—even if that expectation was completely reasonable—didn’t. Learning to cope with these unfulfilled expectations would make life in any culture more pleasant and peaceful, even in the United States where ambiguous expectations may not be culturally accepted, but are still a fact of life.
