Two Sabbaths a month or so we try to visit the different churches here in the city. This past week we were privileged to visit, for the first time, the “ger church”, or Amazing Grace as it is called. The church is located in the ger community. It has a wooden fence all around the property, and inside there are 2 gers and a regular cinder block building. One ger is where the “caretaker” lives, the children had Sabbath School in the regular building, and church is held in the second ger. Inside the ger church there was a coal stove in the middle for warmth, a few pictures hung on the sides of the building, a small stage located in the front, and the rest filled with folding chairs.
The service was all in Mongolian of course, but we enjoyed our time there and met many new people whom we hope to get to know better as time goes on!
Did you know there are a lot of similarities between Mongolians and Native Americans? We first heard about this possibility through a friend here who visited a Navajo Pow-Wow in the US several years ago. He said their languages were very similar - - words, style of speech, etc. He said he even understood many of the things they said!
While at camp meeting, we met many different Mongolians from various parts of the country. I was amazed at the variety of people there are here! Some had the typical Mongolian look, with high foreheads and cheek bones, darker skin with rosy cheeks, and straight black hair. Others were very fair skinned and had a more Russian look about them. Then there were those that looked exactly like a Native American! Several young men attending camp meeting even had long black hair, and in my mind’s eye I could easily see them dressed in Indian garb, riding bareback ponies across the plains. It wasn’t much of a stretch of the imagination to see the similarities!
Then there’s another amazing connection that we just found. Recently, we were looking at a book on the history of gers (the round, felt homes of the nomadic people) and the first picture drawing they had of a Mongolian home looked exactly like a tee-pee! I couldn’t believe it.
Mongolians are nomadic people by nature; they herd animals, and are excellent horsemen.
With all the varieties of people we have been privileged to see and meet during our time in China and now Mongolia, we have seen striking similarities between these people groups and other Indian nations such as American Indians, Eskimos, and even Peruvian Indians! How amazing it is to “see”, after all these generations, how similar we really are, all around the world.
People had always warned us about pickpockets, but up until this past week we hadn’t given it much thought nor had any trouble. However, the other day as Dean was crossing the street with a crowd of people, he realized that someone was trying to dig in his pocket! Fortunately, they were rummaging in the wrong place so they didn’t get anything.
Yesterday in the outdoor market I was being pushed around by a lot of people. I started pushing back, trying to get out into open air, but I was very tightly boxed in. I was beginning to wonder what in the world was going on when suddenly I realized someone was digging in one of my coat pockets! At the instant it dawned on me what was going on, I heard something clatter on the ground. I looked around and saw my calculator laying next to me and a guy quickly leaving in the opposite direction. I guess he wasn’t impressed with just a cheap calculator! I quickly picked up the calculator, now broken, and sped off to find my family.
I was fortunate in that I had had money in that very pocket earlier in the day, but our shopping was now done and we were on our way home. All the change from our purchases were in other pockets, safe and sound. God continues to watch over us!
We’ve learned that pickpockets tend to work in groups of 3 or 4, using whistles or signals to gather everyone around the target. Then they use the “squash ‘em” method so the victim is so caught up in being bumped around that they don’t notice someone quickly getting into a pocket. We’re learning to keep our eyes and ears open when in a well populated area!
We woke up last Sabbath morning to our first snow here in Mongolia! It wasn’t even an inch deep, but of course everyone was very excited. I even got to wear my hiking boots to church instead of my tennis shoes! (My Sabbath shoes were one of the things that didn’t survive our packing experience.) It stayed cold and overcast all day, then Sunday it was sunny and warmer. It was sad to see the snow disappear. Ironically, the day before the snow fell the heat went off. But it was on, then off, and hasn’t been too hot since. I wonder if this heat thing will become a trend….
Recently I wrote and told you that they turned on the heat September 15. Well, last weekend the heat and hot water were both turned off for a day. When they turned it back on, the heat was on full force! Now our apartment is so hot we can hardly stand it. We wear short sleeved shirts and shorts most of the time, and even then it’s too hot. The windows are fully open and it barely makes a difference. We’re all waiting impatiently for when the weather really gets cold!
Of course the weather turned warm about two weeks after the heat was turned on so that hasn’t helped. This week we’ve been wearing just short-sleeved shirts outside! It’s a little cool but still comfortable. We walk everywhere, so the temperature seems just right for us! It’s just the house we bake in. I wonder when winter will set in?
Ever since we’ve been here we’ve been boiling our drinking water. Eventually, we were suspicious that boiling the water was not working very well, even though we had a gadget specifically for boiling water. Our water bottles smelled of minerals and even though we brought with us one of those pitchers with filters for extra filtering, we just weren’t happy with the quality of the drinking water. (This may have contributed to my cough…)
So, one of the major things we did last week was get a water filter for the kitchen faucet. Of course nothing is easy around here. The filter nozzle didn’t fit our faucet! Rather than try to hunt for a part that would connect the two, (there’s no such thing as Home Depot, of course!) Dean suggested that we buy a new faucet all together. I think he came up with that idea after visiting the “plumbing” section of town and seeing a whole lot more faucets than parts for sale!
Last Friday we walked to “construction mart”, as we have named that area of town, and there we found a faucet that would work. Naturally, the hoses we had didn’t fit well with the new faucet and so the hot water dripped if you turned it off at the faucet. Our solution at the moment is to turn off the hot water at the pipe and then turn it on when we need hot water in the sink. I’m hoping this is only temporary!
As for the drinking water, it has greatly improved the situation and I think this has helped a lot. It’s been only 2 days and already my cough is almost completely gone - - even in the mornings!