Thursday, December 20th, 2007
SO, all you anxiously awaiting photos, here is a quick update… I deleted most of the photos I’d posted on flickr because I’d lost track of which I’d changed offline and had to re-upload, etc… So I’m systematically going through them all and adding tags and descriptions and editing a bunch of them. Then I’ll reupload them. So far I’ve gotten through 2 of the few dozen folders… so I have a ways to go, but they should all be up by XMas at the latest. I’ll also probably be posting a copy of the slideshow I eventually make up, as well as a smaller gallery of choice shots to post directly on this site for easy viewing, since flickr can be kind of overwhelming. But, for now you should be able to see them there.
Thursday, December 20th, 2007
So, I took a short break from preparing a mega-slideshow to show some family friends this weekend to put some of the panoramas up with an interactive full-screen viewer that actually does them justice. Be warned, the images are large (up to 5mb), and loading them takes a while even on a cable connection, but its worth it. Click an image to load the viewer, then click and drag to navigate (pan the ‘camera’), or zoom in/out with shift/control. When you’re sufficiently impressed, pres ESC to exit. There will still be a small viewer at the bottom of the page, which might be a bit smoother if the full screen is too intense for your computer. Then click on the panorama you want to see next to load it full-screen!
So far there are 4 or so up, but I have several more waiting to be uploaded… so check here for updates.
Here’s the link: http://mongolia.yulebomb.net/pano
Thursday, December 20th, 2007
Alright, so I guess treat this as a draft, even though I’ve handed it in already for credit, it’s not really complete. But there’s still some good stuff in there. Here is a link to a pdf version which preserves all my sexilicious typographic manipulations, I’ll post one in HTML as well for online viewing, with some typography preserved.
Here’s the PDF: [US Letter] or [A4]
Abstract:
Changers are traders who emerged during the traumatic early 90’s as an organic answer to Mongolia’s problems of economic disconnectedness, revealed by the collapse of the regional socialist framework. Today, despite more than fifteen
years of transition, they remain a vital piece of the Mongolian economy. Connecting herders to factories and to Chinese merchants, they allow for goods to navigate Mongolia’s notoriously sparse landscape economically.
Focusing on one sub-group: those who trade the livestock by-products skins, hides, wool and cashmere, this paper aims to understand them as a phenomenon: how and why did they emerge? What is their role in today’s Mongolia? How has changing evolved, and will its evolution continue? Is there a place for changing in post-transition Mongolia?
Despite evidence of changing’s transitional “ad-hoc” nature, the institution seems to evolving in step with the economy as a whole. The further up the supply chain one looks, and the more volume a changer processes, the more formal their operations. For now, the vast majority still operates firmly in the informal realm, with little official contracts or business agreements, but the future is far from clear. Changers seem to appreciate the benefits of evolving along with the economy; without such evolution the place for these traders in the future is uncertain.
The paper closes with a look to the future: as factories begin to search for formal contractual arrangements to ensure predictable supply, changing becomes a target for formalization and incorporation. What does this mean for the future of these notoriously individualistic and unorganized traders? Will they cease to be changers?
Monday, December 10th, 2007
So. I’m done. I’m now home (actually, at Middlebury) and dealing with re-entry… but I haven’t really written or posted since the beginning of ISP period. Things went pretty well, though my actual final product (the paper) was less than impressive, since my rather absurdly bad time management/organizational skills (or, rather, lack thereof) conspired to thwart my best efforts at creating a polished piece. So, the paper is less than amazing. And my presentation was pretty good, but I was running on not-much-sleep, and according to my host father, it showed (though he said I shouldn’t listen to him since he’s a pastor, and his standards are pretty high).
Anyways, he filmed a bit of the ISP presentations, which took place on December 1st, from 9am-1pm Mongoliatime at the Ulaanbaatar Hotel; notable guests included several of our lecturers including my advisor, Sukhee, as well as Ambassador Mark Minton and one of his staffers, a former SIT student-turned-fullbrighty who is studying NGO ethics for a thesis in Philosophy, my host family from UB, my host mother from my stay in Arvaikheer (the aimag center of Övörkhangai aimag (province)), who has since been promoted and moved to UB (she’s a judge).
So that’s a quick overview, just enough so I can post some documents for your perusal, before I post the ISP itself (i’ll make it more web friendly first), here is a sexy diagram I spent far too much time on, which illustrates the network of changers and the products they trade:
PNG (image):
PDF: 
