UB -> Choibalsan

The city of Choibalsan is in northeast Mongolia. It is quite close to the Russian, and Chinese borders. Something about the place gets you when you're there for a while. I don't know if it's the fresh air, the landscape, or the chill people but it has been a long-time favorite place for missionaries to serve. It is a two hour flight, or a 14 hour car drive. The road is paved for about 1/3 of the travel time. It is quite cheap to fly there if you're a Mongolian (about $85) but around $200 to fly as a foreigner (The Mongolian way of business). I decided I would take a mini-bus out and fly back. I may have paid a lot less for that minibus, but it was a LOT more memorable.

By my count the mini-bus had seats for about 27 people. About 11 two-person benches, and a back row with 5 seats. There was no undercarriage luggage storage so everyone fit as much as they could in a small overhead rack. The rest of the luggage, including my backpack, was just piled in the middle of the aisle. That wouldn't have been so bad if there hadn't been, by my best count, 41 people on board. So naturally there were two little kids sitting on my backpack the entire 14 hours. No problem with that. One kid even decided it was nice and soft so he started to jump up and down on it like a trampoline. No problem with that either since I didn't have anything breakable in the bag, except a CD I bought at the St. Besil cathedral in Moscow. I went to check and see if my CD was ok at one of our famous roadside bathroom breaks, and it was fine. However, I noticed a lot of my clothes were a little damp. Either some kid decided to wee-wee on my CD, or the alternative: little kid bum sweat.

About 2 hours into the trip, after we had already taken one bathroom break, a guy from the back row started shouting at the driver. "Hey driver! Can you stop?" No response. (Louder) "Hey Driver!! Can't you stop?!" This continued intermittently for about 5 minutes. "Hey driver!!! I have to go!" He kept shouting at the driver and started to annoy people. Someone yelled back at him to shut-up. "Don't tell me to shut up, I'm just a guy with a body like everyone else, and it has to go!" Then someone yelled back, "What are you, a kid?" "If I was a kid, you'd stop the bus! Kids have to go, adults have to go, we all have to go! Can't you think about someone else and just stop the bus?" At this point he was either gaining some sympathy or just completely annoying everyone because one lady yelled to the bus driver to stop and let this guy go. So he did.

The real hit of trip were the two girls in front of me who kept looking into this cookie tin. I noticed it had a bunch of wholes punched in it. All the little kids gathered around and I saw that they had two turtles. It really freaked out one of the guys in front of them so for a little while, every couple of minutes they poked him, or were putting one of the turtles in his face.

There was a little grubby kid, about a year old, whose older brother had given him some chewing gum. It was really funny to watch this kid play with this gum. Then he dropped it. I realized later that night that my backpack had been the lucky landing spot for this gum.

Oh man, there are plenty of other stories I could tell you about this single, trip. The angry lady who accused the driver of losing her bag. The wheel seat where I sat with my knees to my throat. The way you help a little kid go potty in the wilderness. The 9 hour dirt road. Wild horses. Good stuff.