People ask me, “Why did you go to Mongolia?” I find this a strange question. My first impulse is to reply, “Because I had never been there before.”
My second impulse is to say, “I had four reasons. The first is a quip from a British sitcom about riding yaks in Mongolia. The second is a newspaper article about the summer sports festival in Mongolia, the nadan. The third is I met a friend of a friend, who was from Mongolia. The fourth is that a colleague from work went to there on his honeymoon.”
For several years, Mongolia was on my long list of places to visit. I finally made it there in 2011. I am so glad I went, and definitely want to return.
Why? I have three reasons. The first is the Mongolian people, especially the nomads. They seem to live simply, with deep respect for each other and for the land, but they do have to work very hard. The second reason is the so-called black markets. In the West where I come from, black market refers to selling stolen goods. The black markets in Mongolia originated that way, with goods stolen from the Russian invaders. The Russians are long gone, but a dual economy remains. The black markets still exist, selling inexpensive goods under make-shift conditions, as an alternative to the more expensive goods sold in regular stores. My third reason for wanting to return is the landscape. I only visited the grasslands and mountains in central Mongolia on this trip, although I rode through the Gobi Dessert on the train from Beijing to Ulaan Bataar. The central highlands are what in America would be called “Big sky country.” It is so vast. The horizon stretches far, far into the distance. It is quiet. The air is fresh and clean. The word “beautiful” doesn’t begin to describe this land.
This series is about the first two of these reasons, the nomads and the black markets. It is the people themselves who tell the story.