Finally we arrive in Mongolia!

We made it!

After two days of traveling/waiting it was wonderful to finally arrive! 

Korean Air was a surprisingly wonderful experience. Tawny and I caught up on all the latest newly released movies and ate some yummy Korean food. The flight attendants were so lovely and kind,  but we were pretty exhausted and ready for some good sleep. 14 hours is too long to sit in an airplane! 

One of the first things you notice in Mongolia is the unique smell. It smells of animals, probably sheep, and wood and coal fires. It took a little bit to get used to that. I really appreciate the fresh clean air of Wildwood a bit more than I used to. 

 My parents, sister Tara who had travel delays also, and new friend Oyun, a missionary companion to Tawny 13 years ago, were waiting to greet us. It was a happy reunion. We hadn't seen our parents for about a year. They looked great. They both looked thinner, which was likely the pneumonia, and happy and excited to see us. Tired as we were, but stayed up until 2 or 3 in the morning catching up with each other.

Here is one of our first experiences with Mongolian traffic. I could write A LOT about driving/crossing streets/taking taxis in Mongolia, but not tonight. This picture does not accurately portray the reality of Mongolian traffic. It lacks about 100 cars that could easily fit into that space behind us. I hadn't yet learned that I should be very afraid standing this close to the curb. Well, maybe it isn't that bad, but pedestrians definitely do not have the right-of-way in Mongolia. Dad's blog describes it well-

 "Crosswalks don't mean a thing. However, we and most drivers and pedestrians honor red lights. We look in all directions on a green light. So another skill we are learning is how to walk across a busy street one lane at a time while the cars next to us are whizzing by.  If one lane stops or is almost stopped, you make eye contact with the driver or motion that you want to walk in front of his or her vehicle. Then you navigate the next lane the same way to the middle. Or when one side of the road doesn’t have any traffic, you go directly to the middle of the road. The trick is to get to the center of the road and wait for a break in the oncoming traffic in order to get across the rest of the street. If you wait until both sides are clear, it will be a long wait. It is a piece of cake when traffic on both sides of the road has come to a standstill. If there is any opportunity for a car to gather speed, then cars rule. Don’t even think about it! Darlene swears that one car saw us and deliberately sped up as we ran across the street . I believe it was to frighten us and he succeeded. Just as the drivers have a keen sense of awareness of playing chicken with each other until the right of way is ceded, drivers and pedestrians have worked out their own code for coexistence."
 
 

 Here we are eating a yummy meal with Mom and Dad's sponsor. (They teach English at his company)  His wife is an excellent cook, and her borscht was amazing. I didn't know I liked borscht so well. She and Mom were able to communicate in Russian and Mongolian! Mom is doing great with a very difficult language. And Dad isn't so bad either. Keep up the hard work, you two! One cannot help but notice the joy it brings to the Mongolians to hear a senior couple using their language. Most seniors missionaries don't try too hard, but since Mom and Dad don't have regular translators, they do what they need to do to communicate with the people.