Farewell Toilets: Heading Out to the Host Communities

The day we left the Darkhan Hotel for our host communities, it was raining and cold. Dragging our massive suitcases, sleeping bags, water distillers, first-aid kits, and water bottles in the rain to the seven awaiting minibuses only added to our anxiety of being spilt-up among our host communities. The day before, when they had announced our host community locations (Bayangol, Dulaankhaan, and Sukhbaatar) and host families, we had compared notes ooohh-ing and awww-ing at those who had houses with an indoor toilet, vegetable garden, and/or two-story house. The actual reality was an amusing revelation. For those who had the indoor toilets (quite the luxury here in Mongolia), they did not have a shower of any kind and were forced to wash their hair in colorful tubs provided by the Peace Corps (PC). For those who had the pit toilets (aka: outhouses), there was an accompanying outdoor shower. Such quick, drastic changes makes one appreciate the little things in life such as a toilet seat and the feeling of double-ply quitted toilet paper.

Arrival into Mongolia

Sain uu!

I arrived in Ulaanbaatar (UB; the capital, translated as: Red Hero), Mongolia via a 27 hour layover in Seoul, Korea on June 4. The first night, our group of 48 Americans stayed in a tourist ger camp. The next morning was unreal: I woke up to blue skies, rolling hills, hawks, the smell of horses, and finally, the excited feeling of being in Mongolia. Lunch that day was with the US Ambassador to Mongolia, Ambassador Milton. Then we headed four hours via bus north to Darkhan (the 3rd largest city in the providence or aimag of Selenge, population 73,400), where we resided for a week for introductions and vaccination shots (16 in total;ouch) at a nearby school (pictures of the welcoming ceremony at the school are below). Afterwards, we were divided into three groups and headed off for our host communities (all located north of UB) till mid-August when we take our final LPIs (Language Proficiency Interviews), swear-in, and officially become PC (Peace Corps) volunteers. My host community is in Sukhbaatar (30 km from the Russian border). My host family are wonderful; they treat me like one of their own. Training is intense with 4 hours/5 days per week of Mongolian language classes and the other four hours per day is devoted to technical training. My biggest fear at this point is falling into the pit toilets...which I conveyed to the interim Country Director and she assures me that this has only happened once – but not in Mongolia. However, the girl survived unscathed. How this was suppose to comfort me, I don’t know.

Pre Service Training in Darkhan

27 Hour Layover in Seoul, South Korea

I write to you in Incheon, Korea – in route to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Staging introductions were made downtown Atlanta, GA for the past two days…a 27 hour layover in South Korea, two nights in a ger camp in Ulaanbaatar and a two hour van ride north later, I will arrive to the provincial center of Darkhan, where I will begin my 11 week
pre-service training.

My training group is a large group of 48: four set of married couples, two middle-age gentlemen, and 38 mid-twenties youngsters – all here for a variety of reasons. They are a great bunch and I'm excited about the prospect of getting to know them in the next two years.

I'm not in Mongolia yet but I miss you all already. Below are how I spent my layover time in Korea.

1. Korean barbecue, popular dish
2. Downtown Seoul, South Korea
3. Billiard advertisement in down Seoul
4. Gyeongbokgung, the main palace of the Joseon Dynasty; the Changing of the Guard
5. Buddhist temple, Seoul

When It Finally Hit Me

It started to hit me on the leg of my trip in Central America, three days before I had to fly back to Miami, five days before DC, 13 days before Atlanta and 16 days before Mongolia. The sadness hit hard like a smack in the face. There is no mix of emotions, no wave of a single feeling, just constant sadness; the kind that catches you off guard and overwhelms your senses and surroundings. This could not have come at a worse moment. In the middle of my island/tropics paradise, eating mangoes and dipping in natural hot springs - I have to deal with feelings of unexplained sadness.

"Are you excited?" "It hasn't hit me yet"

It will be five weeks come Monday till I arrive in the land of Genghis Khan. I am asked the same question when I inform others of my upcoming destination, “are you excited?” I give them the same answer I have been since I received my official country invitation to join the Peace Corps in Mongolia late February, “it hasn’t hit me yet.” And it still hasn’t. Not the increasing gap in time to departure, not when I was shopping at REI for winter sleeping bags, and not even when I knew I was saying “goodbye" for the next two and a half years to my love ones. I just hasn’t hit me yet.

Article: Peace Corps Director Visits Volunteers in Mongolia, April 9, 2007

Director Ron Tschetter Goes to Peace Corps Volunteers’ Sites and Meets with Mongolia’s President Nambaryn Enkhbayar During Visit.

ULAANBAATAR, MONGOLIA, April 9, 2007
http://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.media.press.view&news_id=1197