Waiting to Leave.

That is a terrible feeling- but that is what it comes down to on the last few days. Thursday a huge truck came and took all the stuff away. Friday friends volunteered to help, so I put them to work cleaning the house. Now it is clean and we are living in two rooms, the living room and the kitchen. I’m sitting on the four mats we have for sleeping on the floor. All the other rooms are empty except a few things in our bedroom. Those are the dregs that are left to be packed- do I really want that thing? Need this thing?

Last night we were taken out to a nice meal at the best restaurant in town by Enkee and her sisters Munkjargal and Oiunaa. They gave us great gifts, woolen slippers for the kids and leather gloves for us.

Today we head out to Nomt, a ger camp down the road to have our final picnic and Mongolian bbq. This is not really a bbq, but a pressure cooker. They get water, meat and root vegetables and put them in a huge metal milk canister with a lid. On the most special occasions they bring a live sheep, kill it, butcher it and then cook it. They find and clean lots of large stones. They start and enormous fire and put the stones in it. They put the milk container on top of the coals. They put the heated rocks inside the canister and put the lid on tight. Then they put a wet cloth all around the lid, making it a homemade pressure cooker. They let it cook for a long time and then they remove the top and take out the stones. They pass the heated stones around and people heat their hands and rub the meat fat into your hands like lotion! J I love that fat part. There is nothing like range mutton fragrance for your hand lotion! Then we all eat the food inside.

Tonight we are going to BaatarJows house. He was Peter’s language teacher. Last spring his mother’s house burned and we were able to help them rebuild by giving all the building supplies we had. So tonight we go there for dinner.

Tomorrow we go to church in the morning, Aruinaa and Tsogoo’s for lunch, and Terri and George’s for dinner. Then at 8pm we’ll walk across the street to catch our train to UB and that will finally be it. We’ll drive away and have a “train bed party” with the kids. J We got four coupes in one compartment that has four beds. The kids will sleep great. I’ll be on the top bunk trying not to fall down and not to wake up at every stop along the way.

To illustrate the full Siberian Rail experience I’ll tell a story: My mom took the night train in 2007 when she was here. Sierra was six months old at that point and I was completely sleep deprived. So I passed out and she cared for Sierra most of the night. When I woke up around 6 am, my mom was awake and had obviously been awake all night. Her eyes were glazed over and she looked up and calmly said, “I don’t know how you slept, I think this train stopped at every sheep we saw along the way.” I laughed so hard. It is the best quote because the train does seem to stop at every one cow town along the way. And we are NOT talking Amtrak. We are talking and OLD train with outdated breaks. That means that each car does not have breaks and that it stops by slamming into the car in front. So everytime the train stops, it sounds like BANG, BANG,BANG,BANG,BANG…..about 20 times. Then when it starts again, it pulls each car each time BANGING the tow hitch back into position and then it bangs again 20 times. The train is only traveling about 150 miles, and it stops about thirty times. It takes 10 hours. When it not stopping or starting, it winds throughout the Mongolian countryside and each time it turns there is an ear piercing screech as the wheels catch the rails and keep us rolling down the track. I’ve not traveled on trains in other countries, so I have nothing to compare it to, but I have a feeling it is the most meager of train travel. However, I am thankful. It is nice to have your own compartment and a door that closes. There is a bathroom on board, hot water (that is made by lighting a wood fire beneath the kettle) and snacks to buy when you first leave. There are clean sheets to rent, and miraculously, we all sleep quite well and we’re able to be somewhat rested on arrival in UB at 7 am.

On Monday morning, we’ll head over to a friend’s house and stay there for the day and hopefully get a good night’s sleep. The next day we’ll take our eight bags to the airport. Our friend is driving us his minivan.

It is the first time we’ve flown on China Air. In Shanghai, we change to United and fly over the ocean. Pray we can check our bags all the way through to LA? Pray we leave on time and that we can make all of our flights as we traverse through China to LAX? We only have 2 hours layovers and timeliness is not the highest priority here. Thanks- you all are great!