i'm leaving on the trans-siberian agin in 2 hours and have been desperate to get on the internet and do my final blog before leaving but guess what - a little kid was on the bloody thing playing Warcraft and i didn't have the heart to chuck him off. the ironies of life ... !
so, back to the archery. the Mongolians were all kitted up in traditional gear and my god they could shoot an arrow. it was phenomenal. the women were as good as the men - in archery as horseracing. the only sport the women couldn't compete in was the wrestling even though some years ago a woman had entered in disguise and won - only to be discovered at the final moment when she had to take her top off in the traditional way of acknowledging victory. seems a bit of a shame to me. the men were wearing little skimpy satin shorts that wouldn't have looked out of place on a Mardi Gras float i can tell you. after the wrestling and the archery i wandered into a big hall where there was a very intense atmosphere of men playing a game of what looked like dice but played with sheep ankle bones that they had to hit with a flick of their fingers using another piece of bone from about 2 metres away - it was quite something. the ankle bone flicking is quite a national sport - they even had a TV show with it playing the other day. believe me it wasn't that exciting on TV. by this point i was pretty knackered and the rain was still coming down but we decided (Margaret, the American woman) & myself to head over to a nearby temple where they were having a 'throat singing' display. when i went to Xinjiang many years ago (where the riots are now happening) we went out one night and saw some similar singing where the singers made incredible sounds, like birds, and i thought this might be similar. it was nothing like it. the singers were big burly men who sang from the pit of their stomach and made a noise that went straight to the heart and tingled the spine. it quite literally brought tears to my eyes. so that was it for the day & i went home and slept like a log.
the next day it was up early for horseracing. i avoided another omelette and instead fell asleep on the crowded tourist bus taking us the 37km out of town. it wasn't too bad getting there and the weather was actually quite nice. the racing was taking place over a huge grassy valley with darkened blue hills lying close to the horizon in the background. it was a very festive atmosphere with kite-flying going on everywhere, gers litterering the hillside and horseriders galloping by in traditional costume. there were about 300 riders all classed into different horsey age-groups. the one we watched was the 4 year olds: first they had to ride 25km up the track and then gallop the same 25km back. it wasn't that interesting until one of the horses collapsed and the poor kid riding him was trying to peform CPR which really wasn't going to work. you can bounce off the chest all you like but you do need the air being pumped in mouth-to-mouth. it was a sad sight but the day before 8 horses had died in a similar way. apparently they hadn't been trained in the correct way due to the late summer. what can you say?
the day was nearly over so we spent it wandering in and out of the gers before having an goddam-awful BBQ (potato covered in mutton-fat which i vommed up) and then getting stuck in a traffic jam on the way back as the Mongolians couldn't figure out that when a train goes by you nreally do have to leave some free lanes on either side or else gridlock will result. we were stuck for 1 hr 40 mins.
and now its off again, leaving on the trans-sib. i'm sad to go but also ready to depart. i haven't seen the best of Mongolia but also know that being a veggie it'd be difficult for me to travel a wide area unless i'm more prepared. maybe next time ...
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