Dorm Rooms

The dorm rooms here in Arvikheer, where students live for 9 months out of the year, are pretty nice by Mongolian standards. I only qualify that because if they were compared to the USA or some other country, they might not fare as well.

I recall my first look at a school dorm here. . . It was almost one year ago! When my group of PCV's arrived in Mongolia, it was night time and dark. We then took a very interesting bus ride to a neighboring town where we were to be housed in the school dormitory for our initial orientation period. (It was also my first experience with the pimped out buses here....)

The ride was scary because the roads were bumpy and rutty so the bus went very slowly and there were no lights anywhere. The occasional large dog was seen running along side the road, and there were odd sights, like little police booths where the bus had to stop, and arched entryways on the road with weird writing I couldn't read. It was like being in a foreign land... Oh yea, it was.... not so much anymore!

The dorm building appeared to be very plain and stark. There were no curtains on any windows. This I realized can be quite annoying and disorienting, especially when the sun rose at around 5 a.m. and I was severely jet lagged! The beds were tiny bunks, very hard and not a pillow to be found anywhere. There were many helpful local volunteers there to assist us with carrying all our luggage (100 lbs. of check in baggage, plus carry on....) to our assigned rooms.

The dormitory here in Arvikheer houses 100 students, ranging in age from 6 to 17. They come from neighboring soums and often spend the majority of the school year in this environment. The rooms are pretty nice, with curtains and decent beds, bedding and most even have lockers of sorts. The students take good care of them and many times have posters, bulletin boards and awards hanging on the walls.

My bright idea was to have my friend Andrew take photos of me with each group of students in their dorm room. Then I was going to surprise them with a copy of the photo at a party I am planning to celebrate the end of the school year...this is still the plan...but...

Tune in next week for a recap of the big party...these kids are amazing and deserve the best I can give them!

Much to my chagrin, by the time I got around to arranging this, I discovered that the students in grades 1-5 had already finished school and were going home for the summer, if they had not already left!

So most of the pictures are now with the older kids! And that means they will not be here for the big bash I have planned for Sunday! We are making pizza, watching a slide show, movie and popcorn and many, many games! The students still here are now grades 7-11 so that changes the original idea, but it will all work out in the end.

KharKhorin, ancient capital of Mongolia

This past weekend I visited KharKhorin with several of my site mates. The oldest monastery in the country, Erdene Zuu is located here, as well as the infamous phallic rock (both old and new ones) and our wonderful PCV friend Marisa. Many reasons to visit this lovely little town only a three and a half hour meeker ride from Arvikheer. The ride is always an adventure! Allison and I were the only non Mongolians on our way there. The paved road to UB is where we started, and followed it for at least an hour before turning off onto the rutted, dirt path that is the road for the next two hours. The half way point stop is an ovoo where many of us walked around clockwise three times, tossing a stone with each turn; and this is primarily a toilet stop. Our friend Babs (who speaks the best Mongolian among us) found and arranged the meeker for us. It cost us 8,000T each (around $6.) Babs and Joyce ended up on this same meeker the next day and it was the one we all rode back home together on Sunday.

We got to experience the lams chanting at the monastery and it was thrilling, peaceful, spiritual, and uplifting. It is a beautiful and serene place I would like to see again, even though dear Marisa will be back in the USA this summer, having finished her PC stint.

My photos cannot do justice to the serene view from the monastery grounds and the panorama of sky, mountains and intricate buildings. I found this place, just like my response to most monastery's, calming.

It blows my mind to think that the ancient capital of this magnificent country was once here, in the time of Chinngis Khan! The more I learn about the history of this beautiful land and it's warm and welcoming people the closer to my heart it becomes.

Sh*&!!

Where is my sh%$! What the what?! Manure, dung, doo doo, excrement, kaka, whatever else you want to call it, it's still sh#*! As part of my gardening adventure here in Arvikheer, my good intentions (and enjoyable, though somewhat time consuming and perhaps even a little hard work) were blown away by someone else's good intentions...

Let me start at the beginning. One of the exciting projects that both my school director and I were in agreement about was gardening. She envisions a greenhouse on the school grounds, growing vegetables. These vegetables would supplement the diet of the children living in the school dormitory, plus some would be sold to the public, with the profits benefiting the school as she sees fit.

My vision is to teach some children and adults about the wonders of gardening, the magic of vegetables and to introduce more variety as well as vitamins to the dorm students diet. I also have a serious gardening addiction that needs to be fed by just such activities!

Since I came to town in late August last year, one of my first outdoor gardening endeavors thus far has been to get the directors' ok to plant salad fixins' in the two large urns outside the school. It has been almost a week since I did that. After amending the dirt with potting soil, horse dung and some sawdust, I planted seeds with the help of a dorm student. I have been diligently checking and watering the urns daily, garnering some strange looks from the school workers and much curiosity from the children. I am anxiously awaiting the emergence of some green any day now! (provided all the seeds have not been pecked out and eaten by the birds I have witness feasting there...)

The compost bins, thrown together with the assistance of some of the Eco club members are another project that some folks seem to be interested in. While adding my own compost scraps to the pile yesterday, I noticed that one of the other bins is now being filled with veggie peelings, mostly from potato's. These I am pretty sure can only be from the school cooks..yea! What excitement to know that some Mongolians are willing to try this weird idea of mine out!

My enthusiasm really jacked up my mood yesterday. The pleasant weather also helped me feel fine and I spent several hours and many trips hauling bags of dung I had found from at the stream bed to the fenced in garden bed areas in front of the dormitory. There I dumped this dung, not bothering to scatter it, or to get my shovel from home and bury it.

As a farm girl, I understand the usefulness of manure as a fertilizer. Farmers worldwide know how beneficial animal dung can be! In some countries, such as China, the use of "night soil" is employed to boost crop growth . Here in Mongolia, animal dung is most frequently used as fuel for ger stoves; especially in areas where wood is not readily available, i.e. a majority of the country. Some of this dung I found even appeared to be from a stall with partially decomposed straw combined with it. The perfect combination for helping this rocky, sandy dirt produce better crops! I erroneously thought others would see this dung as exciting and beneficial as me!

What a rude awakening I had today on my way past the dorm to the monastery where I assist with the Saturday afternoon English class, when I saw all my dung was gone!! Who would ever think in a country where garbage, broken glass, discarded clothing and all sorts of trash are frequently found lying around that some animal dung thrown into a dirt bed would be offensive. Outraged, confused and pissed off, I went to class, vented to my monk friend and called Oyun.

After class I met with her and one of the dorm teachers. Apparently as part of the great weather spring clean up the school director told all the foreign language teachers to clean all the sh*% out of the beds in front of the dorm building. Ugh....there is not a heavy sigh heavy enough to convey my anger at myself for not burying that crap!

There appeared to be confusion as to why I might need the dung when we are attempting to make compost. I explained that the compost won't be ready for months and the only way we can get this dirt to grow stuff is through enriching it with dung! Ah, ha... that's all I needed to do was explain this basic fact. I did notice today that there is a little less trash around the school building; trash cans are still on my radar!

Next time I go hunting for dung, I intend to train students, (look out Eco club) exactly what to collect and perhaps we will have a dung collecting field trip! Live and learn.

Random Thoughts on a Typical Week

week ago Sunday I spent the entire afternoon at the cinema. No, not watching movies; it's what the "old theater" is referred to. I was watching the kids from the 5 local secondary schools Eco clubs compete. The two weeks prior was an active time for the Eco clubs, with the presentation competition at my school, then a big club competition at the local Aimag Children's Center.

The Sunday event was specifically for the Ecology/Green clubs, and included skits about taking care of mother earth, talent competitions,and a knowledge quiz portion etc. I really admire the stamina of the students, patiently waiting their turn for each event. My own patience has expanded by leaps and bounds in the past 11 months here; as well as my ability to sit in hard chairs for hours at a time. Though I couldn't understand the language, I could mostly follow along and the students from my school were very creative in their presentations. They won first place, with a big trophy; it was very exciting!

During the week I had my usual weekly activities, two English classes at the dorm, an Eco club meeting ( where we made compost bins from wire, which I actually got the school to pay for, though I ended up having to purchase my own shovel), Life Skills club, movie night, and arts and crafts time and assisting with English class on Saturday afternoon at the local monastery.

Thursday after English I was astounded to see a volleyball net erected, as well as a banner, balloons and real nets on the basketball hoops! I knew something was going on and suspected an important visitor was coming. However, turns out the 11th graders (what we would call high school seniors) were having a sporting competition that afternoon. Fortunately I took some photos because the nets, banner etc were all down the next day. I made many new little friends from the school that afternoon, as they all clambered for me to take their photos!

Friday evening at the dorm I had a karaoke competition for the students. They were so cute, and it was mostly younger kids, as many of the older students were busy, with 5th, 9th and 11th grade graduation celebrations planned for all the next day. I need to get over feeling that an event is not successful if it's not well attended. The idea is to give special attention to the dorm students and if nothing else, they certainly get that from me, and I in turn get so much back from them.

I don't really understand the grade system here, though I believe that there are separate Kindergarten schools, then grades 1-5 are all considered elementary. Oddly enough, there is no such thing as 6th grade, so 7, 8, 9 are what we would call middle school or junior high, and 10 and 11 are high school.

Graduation from 5th grade means you are advancing to middle school and from 9th to high school, then from 11th you are on your way to university! I did not attend any of the celebrations though I have been invited to go on a class trip with my friend and counterpart Oyun's 10th grade class early in June.

Saturday evening some friends and I had soup at my house then hung out at the town square (very close to my apartment) for an open air concert; sort of like a Mongolian Idol type of competition. It was a little chilly for being out too long but rather fun for the hour or so we lasted! We ran into several Mongolian friends, and some of my dorm students as well!

Yesterday (Sunday) the weather was beautiful; sunny, rather mild and not too windy. I ventured out hiking around town attempting to collect manure for gardening. My hour and a half was enjoyable, though only garnered a bag of dried manure. It was enough however for the two big blue urns out in front of my school that the director ok'd my planting salad fixins in!

I went by the dorm and found two willing young boys as helpers as well as a young girl. The boys graciously hauled my two big plastic bins full of mostly composted veggie scraps that have been sealed up in my kitchen. Booya carried the heaviest one as well as dug holes in the "soon to be new vegetable garden" patch in front of the dorm. He then buried the stinky compost, along with some sawdust in the holes for me! What an enourmous help he was! Nyearma, my quiet little friend, hung out with me and helped me dig the manure into the planters as well as some sawdust and potting soil we went to the market to buy. After preparing and water the planters she helped me plant the seeds then water again.

Nyearma and I enjoyed some ice cream after and I am very interested to see her reaction as the salad garden grows! Now if only I can get her and some of the other children to want to try lettuce, spinach and radishes! We did plant carrots and that is one of the most commonly grown and used veggies here, so that's a start!

Eco Club

The Eco (or Green) Club as it is known, is an extracurricular activity at The First Twelve Year Secondary School of Arvaikheer. Though I have started and am involved with various activities specifically at the dormitory, this is the only club at my school that I have worked with this year.

Officially, there are 32 club members, all hand picked by teachers in the school. I take issue with this process, as it appears that students are not given free choice to follow their interests; they are told what club to join, etc. Good for those who have high grades in science and are referred, but what about those interested and may not excel in that academic area? Seems to me this is a leftover viewpoint from the days of communism (whispered)... To further fuel the fire in me on this notion, one of the school social workers told me the governor will come and speak to the graduates, telling them what potential job growth there will be in our city; essentially telling them what to study at university, then to return to Arvaikheer to work. huh....

Back to the eco club...the students and I have floundered through recent months with me preparing power point presentations in both English and Mongolian. This has been fairly effective, but not exactly the enthusiasm I was expecting. I need that dose of reality once in awhile, as I am getting spoiled by what M20 PCV Wally G. calls "celebrity status" accorded to us here in Mongolia.

With the onset of Spring (at least some recent days... just like in my home state of Ohio), the students interest in the Eco Club seems to been peaked. Just in time for a "composting" lesson again. My big plan was for each club member to receive free of charge a medium sized plastic trash can with lid which they would use for composting their household scraps. Viola ! I thought by now we'd have gallons of compost for the gardening projects I have been envisioning.

Our club applied for financial sponsorship through World Vision; a great organization which provides monies to children's' organizations. By the time we got our papers submitted (2 months of missed meetings and lack of translation of my ideas/proposal) it's been over 6 months and now we are actually expecting our requested materials! Too bad I didn't ask for the equipment to build composting bins! I thought just like at home I could find some old cast away materials; boards, wire fencing, etc. Not happening....

In honor of Earth Day, the Eco Club has two weeks of green activities focusing on ecology. Last week our school hosted the annual meeting of all the area Eco Clubs; two of the four other secondary/high schools attended. There was a competition for the high school students (10th and 11th graders) for presentations given on the importance of taking care of the Earth.

In addition, I got to present my PP on the importance of composting, including step by step directions on how to build a compost pile, materials, to use, etc. My club students had been interested in it (they saw it earlier in the week) as were the others in attendance. The instructor form the tech school invited me to their school to give this presentation, and another teacher from my school urged me to present this to all the teachers at our school!

Whether or not this will transpire is another story, however, their enthusiasm encourages me!

Next week at our Eco Club meeting, we will be building compost piles near our school. Prior to that I have much work to be done, finding "free" or "nearly free" materials to build it with, gathering some tools and getting the school director to agree to let us build it in my chosen location.

play ball!!!

This is the story of me being a persistent trouble maker and some deflated balls....... Since I first came to my school dorm to work, there have been several large cardboard boxes underneath the computer tables. Early on I tried to find out what was in them... big mystery.....

Turns out these were boxes full of great donated items (which I believe my PC predecessor acquired for the dorm students). After a couple months, one of the teachers reluctantly allowed some of the items to be taken out for use by the kids. These included books, some games, etc. The boxes were then taped back up and returned to their lair....

At one point during the cold winter months, I took out many jump ropes for the little kids to play with. After a few days they disappeared. I am not sure but I believe staff put them away.

I recalled many brand new balls in those boxes.... basketballs, volleyballs and soccer balls. When I asked several times about getting them out, I was informed we don't have a pump.

Now that spring appears to have arrived, I started a quest for a pump. You would think it wouldn't be that difficult to find a little hand pump, but for me it certainly was. Two weeks ago while visiting my friend Sharaya in a neighboring town (5 hour bus ride) we saw in the market hand pumps!!! I was so excited that I bought 2; each costing the equivalent of $2. I decided one for me (and my bike that I need to be riding) and one for the dorm kids and those balls!

Earlier this week after the English class I told my counterpart Altai I bought a hand pump for the balls and would bring that evening when I returned for our life skills class.

And that's just what I did.... I brought the pump and started getting balls out of the boxes. Sometimes I just do stuff instead of really thoroughly thinking it through. Occasionally I need to check my attitude and motivation .... However this time I think what I did was ok. I applied the philosophical questions of "if not me, then who?" and "if not now, then when?" and concluded the balls might sit there and rot before the children they were intended for, derived the pleasure they should, from them!

The young teens in the life skills class were so excited at the new balls...and quickly pumped them up and began tossing them around. During a break in the life skills lesson the kids chattered excitedly about the balls, putting them under their shirts, etc.

Later, Altai told the kids they must leave the balls in the big room and I was both angered and dismayed, though reluctantly agreed. Knowing that Altai has worked with these students way longer than me, and figuring she had some pearl of wisdom about the situation, I told the kids and Altai I would stop by tomorrow..... (even though I did not have anything scheduled at the dorm Tuesday, I told the kids that I would get the balls out ...)

I did return Tuesday afternoon and went to the big room...where both dorm teachers were locked inside discussing the "ball situation". They did let me in and when I asked about taking the balls outside, they reluctantly said ok. I took 2 basketballs, 2 soccer balls and a volley ball out and gave them to the dorm students who were out on the playground.

Feeling somewhat devious and smug about it, I left... The next day Hajid explained to me that they would keep the balls in the teachers office (good idea) and kids would have to ask and come get one to play with. She said they are concerned students will ignore their lessons/homework if allowed to have open access to the balls. Imagine my excitement to find that I totally agree with her, and my pleasure at seeing the dorm students have some new equipment to play with !

English-the Global Language?

Non verbal communication comprises a large percentage of inter- personal communication. Since my Mongolian language abilities remain pitifully limited, even after 10 months in this amazing country, I'm grateful and dependent on non verbal communication!

Fortunately for me, many folks here speak some English and most others are interested and motivated to learn what is referred to as the global language.

Since talking with others is something I really excel at (lol....yea, I talk a lot...) my participation in English classes, events, competitions are a fun way for me to share with others!

Our local PCV's have a weekly "Monglish" night, where we assist others in learning English and it's intended to help us with our Mongolian language as well. Truthfully, we mostly speak English and our group ranges from as few as 5 to 20 some weeks.

At the dormitory I conduct twice weekly English lessons. These lessons are based on games and fun activities, which I find very effective! The kids are exposed to English through many games including bingo, one of their favorites, partly because I use candies for markers. Once there is a bingo, the winner gets candy as a prize. We have been playing animal bingo for weeks now and I just finished making a clothing bingo which will debut next week after the kids return from spring break.

Just last week I began assisting with the weekly English class held at the local Buddhist temple. My monk friend Bataar teaches along with a Mongolian woman and I assist by writing on the board, answering questions, talking, and pronunciation practice.

My friend Uugnaa teaches at the local technical university, and recently asked us PCV's to judge an English speaking competition. Five of us went and heard informative speeches which were accompanied by Power Point presentations given by 15 students. We scored each participant, then averaged the scores to determine the winners, who received English -Mongolian dictionaries from the university.

English Olympics are an annual competition held all over Mongolia and our local event was earlier this week. The test is for 9th and 11th grade students and my school hosted 23 students in each grade (from various area schools) for the test. The 11th grade exam itself was very confusing to students and as proctors we were not allowed to explain or clarify instructions. The two hour time limit was utilized by all participants and the highest score was less than 50%.

English teachers had their own exam and my friend and counterpart Oyunchimeg won this event; outscoring the competition by 20+ points! None of the 1st school students placed in the top 3 ; however PCV Joyce teaches (at Merged school) the first place 9th grade winner (who is my counterpart Chewka's daughter) and 2nd place 11th grader(who is a regular at Monglish night) - wooooo who!!!

Lucky for me that I speak the global language and that I'm somewhat animated when I speak, otherwise I might have much greater difficulty communicating!