Our first few days settled in

Hello all,

This morning, we started out day off by walking to the "poster store" with Tsene where we bought a map so that we could find our way around the city on our own. Due to the heat and exhaustion from the hospital, we needed to find water for the day. So we went to this underground store where we bought water for less than 40 cents. Then we walked to the maternity hospital where we started our first full day.

Kelly, the other volunteer who we mentioned yesterday (and who is actually 23) brought us to the natural delivery room where we three women were in labour. In the first hour, two of them gave birth however one of them had a "backwards labour" meaning that the baby's body was facing the mother's back rather than the front which doesn't allow the cervix to be stimulated enough to dilate. She was in severe pain and by the end of the first two hours, we were seriously considering adoption as the only possible way to have a child. It was scary. The babies were blue. The first baby had the umbilical cord around it's neck. Also, for some reason, once the baby comes out, they tend to just leave on a table and check back a few hours later. Jess was going to cry she wanted to cuddle it so badly.

The third woman in labour had to be taken for an emergency c-section and because only one of us is allowed in the room at a time, Jess went in and watched. Meanwhile, Mathilda was assisting one of the nurses, the crazy lady. This woman is known as the hospital crazy lady as she never uses gloves or sterilizes any of the equipment she uses, which as you can imagine, would be an issue as she is the one who gives injections to the women. In addition, she very much enjoys telling us that everything we are doing is wrong and proceeding to show us the "proper method" which is either the same as what we are doing or different from what she had previously shown us.

After this, we had lunch, aka our second unfortunate encounter with mutton. Jess did not eat.

We assisted the nurse for the rest of the afternoon until there was another c-section which Mathilda watched. While this was happening, Jess obviously snuck into the neonatal ward to look at cute babies. Then she was hanging out with Kelly who was supposed to be teaching an English class, though none of her students showed up, so we were hanging out with the hot tech guy. Apparently, Mongolians don't like the Chinese but like the Russians. Also, there is this site where you can look at Ulaanbaatar like google street view (in case any of you were wondering what it looked like). The site is www.360mongolia.com/map .

Then we went to the State Department Store which we discovered is like 8 stories high. They have everything from a supermarket to camping gear to fashionable cashmere and leather jackets. We are planning to make many more visits there!

When we got home, we had an experience that rivals the c-section for the best part of the day. We asked Ali to show us how to get to the Grand Khan (yes.. it is the Grand Khan not the Great Khan as mistakenly mentioned yesterday.. it is a better name too as when it is said in British, it rhymes). As she was showing us, "Bad Romance" started playing and she said "that's your favorite song". We took this as a question and said "yes!", she however said "I knew, because I read your blog!" We all couldn't stop laughing for about 10 minutes. She really enjoyed the commentary on her and her family. She loved that we called Ingu a "social butterfly" and that her sister gets her laundry from my balcony and that we said we would get back to you guys with more info. She also informed us that the man was her father, aka Ingu's grandfather. So check that off the list of missing puzzle pieces! She apparently was looking for a site she had been on yesterday and was checking the computer history and tried our site and saw her name. She thought our description of her was amazing, but that it should be noted that she doesn't just sit around at our house and eat... she doesn't eat that much (she is very skinny).

That night, we went with Ali, Ingu and about 20 other volunteers to the Grand Khan. We watched the Brazil vs. Netherlands soccer game. Even though we are both (as you all very well know) big sports fans, it was really fun. There were about 300 people there and one of the volunteers (Kjeel) is Dutch and was really excited. He got up during the anthem and was so happy when they won. Also, the songs "Waving Flag" and "This time for Africa" by Shakira are both played over and over again and everybody dances along to the Shakira one, it is really fun. That night, we met two volunteers from Toronto who are currently at McGill!!!

The next morning was Saturday, so we didn't have work. We woke up at 12:00 and met Patrick and Amy (our British friends) for lunch at Cafe Amsterdam, which was as good as any place at home (aka amazing by UB standards as far as western food goes). We hung out there for a while and swapped funny stories. At one point Patrick was telling us about how he was sitting at a table with three little girls (host family members) and Amy blurts out "there are three!! I thought there was only one!" One of their family member's name is either Icky or Inky, they have yet to figure it out. Also, they told us that whenever they watch movies at their apartment on TV they put English subtitles on English movies, but the subtitles say completely different things then what is actually said. We shopped around a bit that afternoon. We discovered that in the State Department Store there is this amazing floor that is filled with traditional items. We want everything there! We were meeting up with the PA group at 5:00 for a fun filled night, so we had a beer (Chingis beer) while waiting. While at the pub there was this kid who kept trying to sell us Mentos and face wipes. These kids are everywhere and they all sell the same stuff. This kid was so persistent and we felt bad so we bought stuff and he still wouldn't leave because he wanted us to buy more.

Eight new volunteers had arrived that day and when we met up with everyone we totaled about 40 people. We had dinner at a really amazing Korean dinner where we got to know a lot of the new volunteers, including a psychologist from Vancouver and a girl from Ottawa. There are about 15 Canadian, 4 Americans, 4 Australian, 3 from Asia and over 25 from the UK and Ireland. Then we went to Karaoke, which was slightly awkward as it was not a Karaoke bar, but a room with a bunch of TVs and Karaoke machines, tables and couches. Jess sang Dream On with our friend Lawrence (there is also a Florence... confusing) and Like a Virgin with Matt. (BTW there is a karaoke place on every street corner... more than Starbucks in the US)

After Karaoke we went the Grand Khan again for the Argentina vs. Germany game which we were sad that Argentina lost. Lots of little funny things happened that are a little hazy now. However, we are going to take this opportunity to discuss Artemis... She is from London (but if asked will make it clear she is from 'Central London') and was best described by Amy as "posh". She is really stuck up and does not make an effort to speak to anyone. She dresses like she is going to the office and smokes her cigarettes as if she is in an Audrey Hepburn movie. See picture below.

This morning (Sunday) we intended to be more productive and set our alarms for 9:00, however, we ended up just going to Michele's French Bakery for breakfast. We met up with about 15 PA people at 12:00 (at the horse statue in Sukhbaatar Square) and went to the "Black Market" which consists of about 60 000 people and is one of the biggest markets in Asia. We had to take an incredibly crowded bus to get there which was rather unpleasant! At the market, there is a serious pickpocketing problem and we were all on high alert. At one point, a woman unzipped both of our bags at once, but we were watching carefully so she just hurried off. Around 2:00, we, Patrick, Amy were all getting hungry and exhausted from the heat (it must have been +35), so we took a taxi to an Italian restaurant, it was good but quite expensive (for UB standards).

We then met up with Matt (from NYC) and Jessica (from Shanghai/Toronto) because we are going on a trip to the Gobi desert with them and we needed to plan it. We went to a really insanely expensive tour company first. Then we went to this other one (after accidentally walking really far past it in the 40*C heat) that was recommended by some other volunteers who had been on a trip already. It was way cheaper and includes way more. We are going for 8 days, 7 nights, and we will be on horses, camels, see singing sand dunes, waterfalls and awesome monasteries!!! We might be going with more people.

Tonight we are staying in, having a h0me cooked meal and doing our laundry. Sorry if it takes us long to post, we are really really busy and sometimes the internet doesn't work. We will get back to you with more info as soon as possible!