mother tongues and mother nature...

well, saturday morning AB and I met up with our three Canadian friends (Roxy, Eugene and Roger)...we were then joined by these two Germans (Johannes and Berta) and headed off to the countryside! Terelj National Park is only about an hour outside of the city...but the traffic and terrible roads make it a bit longer...AB and i were so excited to spend the weekend with his hilarious people...Roger is such a goober...i'm including a picture of him...he took pictures the entire way there, all the while wearing his Dior sunglasses...oh man...good times...

so we got to the park finally around 11...it was beautiful! you are completely surrounded by mountains...but honestly, my pictures don't do it justice...it truly is breathtaking...and i wish i could tell you how wonderful it felt to get out of the polluted city of ulaanbaatar...it seriously is a blessing to be able to take a deep breath, and not be worried about inhaling toxins...we just kinda hiked around for a while before lunch...found some great views and just took in the scenery...we also made a new friend who you will see in some pictures...we named him Pongo...don't worry mom, i've been vaccinated...and he wasn't rabid...Roger kept us laughing the whole time though...he kept making comments like "i'd roll around too, if i didn't mind getting my fur dirty" and "i'd love to be a dog...but only if i had shoes for my hands"...now keep in mind that Roger is the Canadian originally from China...so, his accent is chinese...and it's incredible...more stories later...

at lunchtime, AB and i were so excited to be served our favorite mongolian meal...cucumbers and sausage (note the sarcasm)...but we got to sit next to our German friends! they definily think americans are crazy now...but, i think they liked us...they are travelling all over the world for four months and even going to the Olympics...really awesome couple...i'm so glad we got to meet them...after lunch we all went to Turtle Rock...it was about 5 miles away from out ger camp...oh, and i forgot to mention how nice our ger was...it was seriously nicer than my first host family...no lie...anyway, at turtle rock we just climbed and took pictures...these two little boys kind of adopted me for a while...they just kinda dragged me places...it was really cool...they took me down this little hole to see some great views...they just kept saying "come on, come on"...and so i went...then they showed me their horses...they just pointed and said "my horse, my horse"...i asked them what the horses names were and one boy said "horse"...ha, i laughed...anyway, we walked back to camp and managed to make it back to camp despite the severe wind storms...the dust comes from every angle...you can't escape it...the dust combined with the wind and sun sort of rips away a layer of your face...lotion is my new best friend...i need to include another Roger story right here...on the way to Turtle Rock, we passed by a tepee...Roger asked what we call those...we told him, and moved on...on the way back, Roger all of a sudden asks "hey, have we passed the tipsies yet?" as i'm writing this, i realize it's not that funny...but his accent just cracks me up...maybe i was just delirious from the sun or something, but we just could not control ourselves...and we made fun of Roger for the rest of the trip...and probably will until the end of time.

at dinner we swapped stories with our German friends and then went back to our ger to play some cards...and then we made the biggest mistake of our lives...we lit the furnace in the ger...i've never been so hot...it's shocking how well insulated those tents are...i mean, wow...we had to open the door and let the fire go out...but ofcourse, that invited in some unwanted guests that kept landing on us all night...but it's not like we slept anyway, because once the fire went out, so did all of the heat on planet earth...it was freezing!i don't know how these nomads do it...so after a not so restful sleep, we got up, ate breakfast, and then went on another hike...it was even clearer today and we got to wonderful pictures...then there was a brief hail storm...random...but after lunch it cleared up and we went horseback riding...Roxy, Eugene and Roger had never been on a horse before so, we took it slow...the horse guy thought we were idiots...but, he let me gallop for a while which was incredible...then sadly we had to leave...

ulaanbaatar is really nasty today...there is so much dust in the air you can't even see the moutains surrounding the city...and now AB and i are about to hit the sack! we are so tired...but, we still can not stop laughing about all the hilarious things that happened this week...i wish ya'll could have been there for it...it was so great...well, AB and i have some more reminiscing to do...goodnight!