Friday, November 9th, 2007
PART I.TURBULENCE
With perestroika and the decline of Soviet power in the late 1980’s, Mongolia entered the first period of its post-communist development. This romantic period was a time of hope; Mongolia was to become the next Asian Tiger. Yet with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and the halting of related aid money, newly democratic Mongolia was faced with an economic crisis of epic proportions. The fruits of democracy were enjoyed as well; newspapers sprang up, their variety reflecting the budding of Mongolia’s new multi-party democracy. Churches tripped over each other to send missionaries to cultivate her fertile sands, and Buddhism re-entered the public sphere. However, the lack of visible progress led many Mongolians’ to enter into state of now-familiar disillusionment.
Elections brought the young Democrats into power, who hastily implemented an intensely neo-liberal plan to shock the Mongolian economy into complete liberalization. Despite optimistic forecasts from policymakers, the life of the average Mongolian took a serious turn for the worse. Problems that had been forgotten during the times of Stalinist ‘utopia’ ravaged the country. Unemployment, massive inflation (as much as 350%), shortages of essential goods, and an almost complete collapse of the Mongolian economy were among them. Social ills soon followed, with Mongolian males and their fragile egos faring worse that the women; alcoholism and violence, especially, spread amongst the growing population of unemployed young men. Such chaos swept the MPRP back into power, beginning another dark era of de-democratization, though with some economic recovery.
PART II. AWAKENING THE TIGER
Big Brother is watching, don’t say the
Wrong thing, look the Wrong way.
Traditional systems dis-
Integrate. Morals, ethics, freedoms and structures of life on the steppe.
Yet what happens when Big Brother falls?
The veil is lifted, euphoria blossoms;
The image of the Tiger mesmerizes,
Nurtured by romancing Western winds.
Yet change proves illusory, as do the goods
That once lined the oppressive shelves of state-owned stores.
A dissatisfied electorate speaks with their vote;
Old are replaced by new: the heroic Democrats
Stumble forward.
The electric paddles they hold still drip saliva,
Fresh from the drooling mouths of the waiting West.
With the suavity of a toddler’s first step, they apply the shock;
Sparks fly, illuminating their fresh faces frozen in naïveté and terror.
With the ferocity of a dead fish the Mongolian economy coughs,
Collapsing into torpor.
PART III. THE PERILS OF FREEDOM
With the fall of the soviet-installed communist system, freedom was thrust onto the Mongolian people in every capacity. Suddenly, Mongolians were free to think, worship, vote, move, and work (if they could find a job) as they pleased. Yet with this freedom came an immense individual responsibility, to make it in this new system without the help of the state, a drastic change to say the least. Also, these freedoms came without any tradition—after 70 years of socialism, only a faint memory remains of what came before. Some consequences have been rapid urbanization, pastureland degradation, over-hunting and over-harvesting, and generally unsustainable patterns of development. Where a cohesive state plan once was, is now blind free market, “me first” capitalism.
According to various religious leaders, the economic crisis was, and continues to be accompanied by a moral crisis. Alcoholism, crime, and violence all became endemic, though whether this was due to the abysmal economic conditions and lack of law and order, or the supposed demolition of Mongolian morals by the Soviets is not clear. That the moral structure was destroyed by soviet policies and oppressive moral policing makes sense only if people were truly too scared to think independently (like East Germany with the STAZI). Nonetheless, Mongolians clearly have a dark history behind them, one that must be confronted if they are to move forward, “Here in Mongolia… I think only with dealing with the reality, also admitting what went wrong, they can really find out again what they are, and what they want to be.”
In greatest danger of degeneration by the toxic societal climate are the nation’s young men. Faced with a crisis of national identity, these young men and their already fragile egos must come to terms with the anarchy unfolding around them. The easiest way is to find a scapegoat: the Chinese (and Koreans). Thus groups of young men have formed together under the financial and moral manipulation of powerful politicians, to carry out a campaign of terrorism against foreign-owned businesses and their employees. Powerful messages of militarism from abroad catalyze this transformation. Yet they are just that, pawns of people with money and an agenda.
It is not only the young men who face the new deluge of media imagery from abroad. Where they were once shielded by an overprotective government, Mongolians are now left completely exposed to a barrage of alien culture, “Its not just the lifting of the pressure, it’s the moving of a completely different world, with all the television, with all the Western, European, American values and which come in a completely unrealistic way.”
PART IV. IDENTITY
The Christians say, “Of course! This Beast is Lost,
Searching for the Something more.”
The Mormons wait with their sharp suits and
Clean-cut lines. What happened to that
Which once filled this place? A Buddhism since
Gutted by the years of not-so-subtle stifling;
Banished to a realm of irrelevance. Yet does Christ,
And those who use His name, truly fill this void?
Do the 50% under 25 really know
That to which they subscribe?
Or that over which they passed
To accept this foreign faith?
PART V. POINT OF NO RETURN
“The free market is blind, following it blindly leads to collapse.” –Ganbaatar, CEO Confederation of Mongolian Trade Union
A look around Ulaanbaatar is all one needs to sense anarchic levels of freedom. Buildings sprout from a cement sea like the grass that once grew beneath. Chinese workers scurry about, erecting monuments to the new Lords of the Land: the ₮ugrik, the ₩on and the ¥uan. Law and order resonates nowhere; the MP’s poaching marmots send a clear message to the rest of their people. The insanity that is traffic in UB reflects this; why obey traffic laws when those who write them show such blatant disregard? Walking the streets, one sees street children begging for food from well-dressed businessmen and politicians as they descend from shiny land-cruisers. The emerging Mongolian middle class makes UB feel like the capital of a much more prosperous country than it is. One need only travel in any direction outside the city center to witness the kilometers and kilometers of families trying to eek out a living in this new system, despite the odds against them.
After 15 years of transition from authoritarian communism to the current ‘democratic’ free-market system, Mongolia is approaching a precipice, a point of no return. Corruption in the highest levels of government breeds corruption in the lower levels. A growing shadow economy, and widespread bribery indicate the financial interests that are developing and becoming entrenched. Perhaps the most frightening development has been the worsening of Mongolia’s elections. Once famous for its quick transition to internationally approved elections, suspicious events during the 2004 elections call such innocence into serious question. Such corruption only worsens existing problems of poverty, unemployment, insufficient infrastructure, growing crime and violence, and especially a pervasive air of lawlessness. While some manage to be optimistic about the future of governance, cynicism seems to be far more pervasive.
In order to secure their future, Mongolians must work through their disillusionment, come to terms with their past take ownership over the present and future of their country. They must take their democratic rights in hand, no matter how tenuous they may feel, and use them to catch the rapidly closing doors of political legitimacy. Only by building a viable civil society movement, with support from the public to keep a stern watchful eye on all aspects of government, does Mongolia stand a chance for a truly sustainable future. Without such a movement, politicians will continue to work for their own interests, and corruption will continue to flourish. The growing symbiotic relationship between government and business will become one of permanence.
PART VI. SURREALITY
The Mongolian cat still bares her humble teeth,
If only in campaign ads.
From her mouth peer politicians: slick suited,
Pockets fleeced with Copper and Gold.
They will reform, herald a new era;
Or so they say. Until then
The youth wander the streets, crackling
With insecurity and xenophobia.
Coal fills the winter air;
Pastures fade;
Lines form to overpay at ger district water pumps;
Drunks stumble across sidewalks, their bloodshot glassy eyes half-open;
Street children recede to the sewers, watching the world above pass them by.
Saturday, November 3rd, 2007
SO, I’ve updated the research page with my final ISP proposal, as well as one of the previous iterations. The last week has been completely INSANE, trying to finish up all our “regular” work on top of finalizing ISP topics and arranging all our travel plans/translators/budget/etc… So I finally have a wikiplan for the month.
I’ll be studying animal skin and meat changers (mongolian: chenjuud), they’re raw material traders who travel around buying stuff from herders or other changers, then selling to other changers or factories or whomever. My plans right now are to hang out in UB for the next few days, spending some time at these two huge raw materials markets on the East and West outskirts of the city (1hr drive with bad traffic); Emeelt is on the West, and is where all the traders from Western aimags come to do biznizz; vice-versa for Nalaikh on the east side, which trades with the Eastern aimags. I’m hoping to get some contacts with changers in UB that I can meet with and chat, get an idea how things work. Then I leave on Monday for Darkhan, the third largest city in Mongolia (not saying much, 76,000). I’ll spend a couple days there (staying with the uncle of one of our language teachers, along with another student and her translator) visiting a sheepskin coat factory, and hopefully talking to some changers while I’m there. Then back to UB, and onwards to Kharkhorin, the ancient capital of the Great Mongolian Empire (known in the West as Kharakhorum). In Kharkhorin I have a homestay with a changer! Which is gonna be awesome. So he’s super busy right now because all the farmers are slaughtering their animals, since there’s been predictions of a harsh winter coming up. So there’ll be plenty of activity for me to tag along and watch. I’ll spend a week or so there, then onwards to Tsetserleg where I’m staying with the family of one of our teacher’s wife. Their whole extended fam lives there, so they know pretty much everyone, and can hook me up with contacts and such. Then on the 18th its back to UB to write, and visit some factories here since I prolly won’t have time before I leave.
Phew. Well I gotta run since its 1am and I still have to walk home (or is it worth 50 cents for a taxi…). Anyways, sorry about not getting any recent photos up, but its super slow where I have wireless, and when I don’t its just too confusing putting photos on my flash drive, then only getting some uploaded, but not being sure which ones… blah blah. So y’all will have to wait until I get back to UB… or maybe the states. heh…
Hope all’s well. And by all means, send emails or drop comments here! And I’d be happy to respond to questions and stuff too…
Monday, October 29th, 2007
So Halloween fast approaches, and with it, our ISP period. AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH
I haven’t written much about the last few weeks, which I should, but I’m thinking I’ll probably just type up some of my journal entries, since they give a pretty good picture of some aspects of life here. We went on a whirlwind trip down to Khamrind Khiid (Monaster) in the Gobi, and saw the shambala (108 stupas, and a place to cleanse your karma), a museum dedicated to Danzanravja, the Gobi Saint (he was a lama who lived in the Gobi in the 19th c. and built Mongolia’s first theater, among other things), and some dinosaur bones and petrified wood. The train ride was wild, we spent more time traveling than we did in the Gobi!
Otherwise, I’ve been living with a family here in the city, in the 13th microdistrict (I’ll have to post a map of the city at some point as well, and some photos of the neighborhood are forthcoming). My father is an Evangelical Christian pastor, who has his own church; he also runs the Mongolian Bible society, which is responsible for maintaining a Mongolian language version of the Bible (its NRSV I believe, which is pretty progressive). He was actually one of the lecturers during our religion week, so we all knew who he was when I found out I was living with him. He’s not so extreme, but still, it was pretty insane at first. Anyways, I have 3 host bro’s 13, 11 and 20, and one who’s 25 or so and lives in a ger district by himself (he’s a starving artist, which is awesome). My mom works at the Bible society as a translator, and likes talking to me in English that is only barely better than my Mongolian, which is frustrating. Our apartment is actually pretty nice, it’s on the ground floor of one of the 80’s stalinist apartment buildings, and has 3 bedrooms, a bathroom, kitchen and living room (where I stay). They have a TV, a pretty nice computer (and digital camera etc…) and lots of German stuff, since both my parents studied in East Germany. My host father was actually studying to become a vet at first, but he decided to switch to theology. I’ll write more about church later, maybe. I’ve been twice, once to the adult morning service, and once to the youth (teenager) service, both led by my host dad. The youth service was much more interesting because my eldest brother, Sotou, helped us follow along in an English language bible, as well as translating some of the most important words so we could at least follow the main ideas of the service. I had a friend, Kevin, who came too, so I guess it was due to our accumulating a critical mass, but a few times my father paused to give a quick English synopsis of what he’d been talking about. It was a little unnerving to be the focus of attention, but it was worth having a clue what was happening. My mongolian isn’t bad, but it’s not quite sermon-level…
On another note, we had our final language exam today, which went amazingly well. I’m not sure what “level” I’m at officially, but I can hold a pretty decent conversation about anything not requiring special vocab. The key is that my grammar has gotten good enough that I can figure out at least an awkward way to say most things, and finding the vocab is easy since most people I talk to speak some English (yeah, kinda lame, but I think it’s actually helped me learn to some extent, since they can explain what we do wrong). Sooo, ISP…
I went through about 4 different topics in the 36 hours leading up to our proposals being due (thursday), and met with three different people, all of whom have agreed to advice me on different topics… O_o I settled on studying regional development, with a focus on the far western aimags (provinces), specifically Hovd. I plan to travel out west for two weeks or so to chat with the aimag governer, as well as some of the soum governers (smaller division than a province), and regular people. The lady I will hopefully be bringing to translate (my Mongolian isn’t nearly good enough to conduct an academic interview… but I’ll be able to follow along decently) is actually from Hovd herself, and used to be a language teacher at SIT. I’m meeting her this afternoon, so we’ll see how that goes. But overall, I’m still pretty mixed about my topic, since it feels a bit like a compromise. But at this point I really need to move on and just get started researching. I’m hoping that especially once I’m out west, I’ll be able to find some neat angles from which to look at things to make the project more interesting and engaging. I hope.
UB is getting colder, much colder. It’s pretty much below freezing all the time, though midday can be a bit warmer. Also, the smog that hovers permanently over the city in the colder months is rapidly accumulating, turning once lush views of surrounding mountains and hills into a hazy, sulfurous blur, even at night. The air doesn’t feel too bad yet, but we’ve been told during the coldest months you can taste coal in your mouth by the time you get to school (20-30 minutes), provided you’re walking outside. The cause of the pollution is mostly the scores of gers that blanket the land surrounding the city center for kilometers in all directions (except the areas with cleaner air, where the rich people build their mansions and keep their many landcruisers). Since there’s no wood left, people burn mostly coal in small metal stoves, that aren’t very efficient, and are running constantly to keep the frigid Mongolian winter at bay.
Gotta run, time to meet my new translator… more later
Sunday, August 26th, 2007
So I’m alive. And in Mongolia.
Yeah, I’m in Mongolia… still hasn’t quite hit home. I mean, I’m getting used to the idea, but walking down the street and looking around feels more like a vivid dream than reality.
The group I’m here with consists of five other students, 5 guys (including me) and one girl. All are complete losers. Just kidding. By far the most positive aspect of the trip so far has been the incredible group dynamic. As Kevin said the other day, he feels like we’re all old friends from school (after only a week), a sentiment I can echo wholeheartedly. We’ll see if things are still so rosy after a few months of close contact… but I have high hopes. A quick run-through of the group: Kevin is the red-head, and one of two from Carleton. He’s a religion major, has a girl waiting for him at home, and is completely obsessed with frisbee. Oh, and he’s from Salt Lake City, so we look to him when we need tips on fending off raucous mormons (just kidding). The other Carletonite is Adam, a chemistry major, also with girlfriend, who hails from the bourbon-soaked land of Kentucky. Andrew is a Swarthmore linguistics major who will hopefully provide us with his throat-singing debut during the ISP presentations at the end of the semester. He is also the resident hilarious-quote-generator. More of those to come later (if you’re lucky). Ethan is the quietest of the group, but when he speaks his dry sense of humor usually sets the rest of us into hysterics. He, also, has a girlfriend. (3/6?! Yikes). Last, but most important is Allison, the lady of the group, a biology major from UC Boulder. She keeps the rest of us from misbehaving too badly, and tolerates our juvenile humor.
We arrived on the first leg of the plane trip to Beijing, at around 5 am on the 21st. We decided we’d try to get into the city itself since we had 12 hours to kill until our flight to Mongol-land. I’m running short on time so I’ll make this short… and add more in later posts. Basically we scurried around the airport trying to find Kevin’s laptop, which he left while filling out a customs form. I tried to dredge some Chinese from the dregs of my memory, with a small degree of success, but our efforts at computer-finding were fruitless. Then we had to figure out a) where to go in the city, b) how to get there, and c) how much it would cost (so we could change some money). After meeting some random people who helped us find the right bus, we made our way into Beijing. First stop was the mighty Tianamen Square, which was cool. Not mind-boggling, but definitely worth the effort we put in to get there. We walked around and enjoyed a 50cent 1L Tsing-Tao at 10:30am. Which was fun. Then we went on a quest for food, as I was about to eat my arm. I managed to ask a security guard where we could find restaurants, and he directed us into the heart of a smaller neighborhood. Tianamen Square lies on a busy 4 pseudo-highway, which is sort of odd for somewhere that the bus calls “city center”. I was imagining a densely packed, bustling network of streets and shops and life. Instead it was open, expansive and completely lacking in food (at least along the street). Which at the time was high on my list of concerns. Once on the back streets we passed more than a few restaurants, and ended up deciding on one with nice lions and latticework outside. The ordering of food is a story in itself, one that I’ll save for another time, but once the food came, it was amazing. We had a whole roast Peking duck, a cold beef dish, some “cakes made with fish” (tasty, but we have no idea what they were), and some other stuff I don’t quite recall. After eating we walked back to the bus-stop and caught the airport shuttle back to… yep, the airport. We checked the lost and found one more time, then headed to our gate. Five hours later we were in Mongolia!
Mongolia has been pretty cool so far. Administratively, I’ve been less than pleased with certain parts of the program, namely the language classes. I was hoping that taking two weeks of lessons, for two hours a day (and $25/hour) would allow me to get a head start on things, and hit the ground running. Instead it seems either a) they don’t have a clue what they’re doing, and have no ability to assess what I already know (even though I took a placement test), or b) I learned much less than I thought, and wasted lots of money on lessons. Neither option is heartening. But we’ll see what happens, I’ll have faith in… oh, who are we kidding… I’ll continue to sing doom and gloom and hope events prove me wrong.
Otherwise we’ve spent most our time getting aquainted with the city, and preparing for our first homestay in Delgerkhaan, out on the steppe. We’ve been to Narantuul Market, a dance and music performance, several dinners, and had a tour of the city from our language teachers, a group of young students from the area. I’ll be sure to add more about UB and related happenings when I have more time.
And I’m posting the latest 100 or so photos to my flickr, so head here to admire them!
