Mongolia Mission Week 38 - One spectacular event after another!

 Mongolia Mission Week 38

Our hope with this blog is to share highlights with our family and friends about our exciting opportunities and awesome responsibilities in Mongolia. It's an impossible task, though, because it's hard to condense everything into a few words and pictures. So ask us individually if you'd like to know more about anything! You can contact us by email (jrose219@gmail.com or krose213@gmail.com), Facebook messenger, or you can text Kathy's phone (515-537-3273). 

What an amazing week for us! So much happened! This was the week when the Dornogobi province celebrated Naadam (that's our area of the Gobi). For the rest of Mongolia it was a couple of weeks ago. But let's just say Dornogobi puts on quite a party. Three days of celebration with horse races, archery, wrestling, ankle bone shooting, concerts, awards, and the equivalent of a carnival with games, rides, prizes and food.

We arrived at the stadium early to get good seats
for the opening ceremony.

The opening ceremonies were impressive. Hundreds
of kids danced on turf especially brought in to the stadium.

We had friends join us and made some new ones.

Officials from various areas set up hospitality gers,
so we got to see our friend Amgaa again.

There was a women's archery competition. Archers 
aim for (and hit) small pots against the white backdrop.
Red pots in the middle of each stack are the bullseyes.

Ankle bone shooters become expert at flicking a 
tile at a stack of ankle bones.

We hadn't seen ankle bone shooting
before. Younger kids get to crouch closer
to the target bones.

It was fun going to a regional festival. We still didn't see the horse racing in person, but they showed it on a huge screen on the main stage. We have plenty of other pictures and videos of Naadam. If you want to see more, they are HERE. 

This was also the week of Mongolia's first girls camp in about 15 years. Usually 12-18 year old Young Women (YW) in our church go to a church-sponsored camp each year. We understand there has not been one here since the church population became big enough to form a stake. Mongolia is divided into three geographic church units - the East Stake, the West Stake, and the Darkhan District. The two stakes both held YW camp the same week (July 31 - August 2) at separate locations. We are pretty far away from everything and are not part of any of those areas but were invited to participate with the East Stake.

6 girls from Sainshand registered to attend; 3 of them are members of the Church. We both went as leaders. For our group, this meant an overnight train at 7:30pm Wednesday night, a bus to the mission home/church center in Ulaanbaatar at 7:30am Thursday morning, and then a 2+ hour bus to camp over semi-questionable roads. 96 teenage girls and a passel of adult leaders arrived at the  "Gobi Deluxe Resort" camp at about noon. 

It was a rough and slightly wild ride.

We passed yak country getting to camp.

Once we got settled and played some ice breaker games, it was time for crafts. No girls camp is complete without crafts. Several elaborate stations were set up for girls to paint, make dream catchers, make bracelets, etc. 

Later that day, we led some active games.

For accommodations, some girls were in gers, some in cabins, and some in hotel rooms. (The resort capacity was advertised as 70.) We had 97 girls and probably 20 leaders staying, so it was packed!

This was a ger accommodation.

These were cabins. And ever present cows.

We were assigned to be the leaders of a group of 10 girls - 14 and 15 years old and from various congregations - none of them from our own. We became close with these sweet girls after 3 days, in spite of the difficulty in conducting daily scripture study and imparting camp information in a combination of English, Mongolian, and charades. 

"Our girls" for the week.

These 2 girls fell asleep and missed the group picture!

Friday morning we all hiked into a meadow where the girls made breakfast and learned survival skills like how to purify water and how to build a fire. Most of these girls had never used a match, let alone built a fire. They are mostly apartment dwellers. Such cheers went up when a fire started!

They made sandwiches for breakfast.

The food and the girls were very interesting to the local inhabitants.

Girls learned the hard way that they should
not share food with the locals - the cows kept 
coming back for more!

The girls made mutton stew using cook stoves like those used inside of gers. It turned out delicious, even in the rain!

Cutting up the meat for the stew.

New Harmony girls may be interested to
know that John is still cooking at camp!

The girls had sessions on education, making friends, getting answers to prayers, mental health, and all sorts of things. They also experienced a faith walk that included a station where Kathy taught about prayer and how to recognize answers to prayer. 

The faith walk finished with a message of "Look Unto Christ" and pictures of each girl within a frame of a temple. We expected and experienced miracles at this camp. First of all, when you plan something this big, it's a miracle when things really do come together, and we mean that seriously. And it's a miracle when you look in girls' eyes and see them feeling the Spirit, knowing that what you are testifying about is true, even if your words are inadequate. 

Other miracles included rain stopping just in time for the faith walk, the perfect translator showing up exactly when Kathy needed him, and the music for the final station that we just "happened" to download and bring with us without knowing exactly why. (Not to mention minor miracles like having rain gear and flashlights available when we needed them - the Lord's hand was very evident in the details.) The faith walk experience had a great impact on a lot of girls who later bore testimony about the spirit they enjoyed and love they felt from their Savior. And there were so many small miracles in this camp of girls being good examples of living and loving the gospel. Good examples to our girls who are so new in the church and who needed to see that other girls are committed to Christ and to doing what they need to do to stay close to Him.

Each girl's picture was within the frame
of the temple.

Camp also included a bonfire, fireworks, a talent show, a fashion show, and a service project. And so much good food and snack breaks throughout the day. Pretty good for these leaders' first attempt at putting on a girls camp! The leaders worked their hearts out and the girls seemed to love it all!

We've noticed that talent shows in Mongolia are very
animated and include lots of numbers. These are our
Sainshand girls singing a hymn (minus one who was sick).

Our large service crew - nearly 100 girls plus leaders

When we headed home, the buses had to unload all the girls to walk up one hill. The fear was that the buses would tip over on the uneven, rutted road, so they didn't want the girls in them. Just in case.

Back in the city, we waited 5 hours for the train, then enjoyed (?) the overnight ride home. This is where we all get to sleep with 60 of our closest friends. A "soft sleeper" is set up with bunk beds in open cabins. 4 beds (2 sets of bunks) are separated from similar compartments by a wall. Outside the 4 beds is an aisle, with 2 more bunks across the aisle perpendicular to the 4 bunks. That's hard to visualize, but you are always within view (and sound) of someone. Our previous train rides have been in private compartments.

Here are the 8 of us headed home. We crowded into
one compartment for the picture.

After arriving in Sainshand at 7:30am on Sunday, 5 of the 6 girls made it to church, even after a busy week at camp - which always means little sleep - and spending the night on the train. Their sweet testimonies that day confirmed that they had each had a special experience.

Sanchirmaa had been baptized on Monday before camp and now was confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. John confirmed her with Elder Jonon providing translation. When John baptized her on Monday, he did that ordinance in Mongolian!

Sanchirmaa has already proven to be a special member
of our congregation.

You can't pack much more into a single week than we did this week (okay, okay, we hear you saying "But we're sure you'll try!" Maybe give us a couple of weeks first!) But what a privilege it was to have such experiences and blessings. Naadam was so much fun! Then we threw ourselves into the Young Women's camp without completely understanding (most!) everything but knowing and seeing that the Lord directs His leaders and takes care of His children. Finally, there is no greater joy than seeing the light in someone who embraces the blessings of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and chooses to follow Him. 

God wants his children (us!) to have joy in this life. But He knows that our greatest joy will come when we follow the Savior, who has redeemed us and will guide us back to our Father in Heaven. 

Mongolia Mission Week 37 - How Green is the Gobi!

 Mongolia Mission Week 37

Our hope with this blog is to share highlights with our family and friends about our exciting opportunities and awesome responsibilities in Mongolia. It's an impossible task, though, because it's hard to condense everything into a few words and pictures. So ask us individually if you'd like to know more about anything! You can contact us by email (jrose219@gmail.com or krose213@gmail.com), Facebook messenger, or you can text Kathy's phone (515-537-3273). 

Temps have been hovering in the 90s these days. People carry umbrellas (not in the rain, but when it's sunny), and we've seen some creative ways of keeping motorcycle seats cool in the sun.

Flannel bling covering with cartoon characters

One motorcycle we saw was even covered in crocheted granny squares! Then there's this one with brightly colored fringes:

A ride like this just has fringe for fun.

We mentioned enough about the cold last winter to convince you all that we live in a frozen wasteland. But it's time to share some things we are learning about the Gobi (it's not called "Gobi Desert" because the word Gobi already incorporates desert into its name). You probably already know that it is the one of the largest deserts in the world - 500,000 square miles or about twice the size of Texas - but did you know it's green? During the summer? 

The Gobi seems to go on forever. And we only see
a small portion of it.

We were amazed recently when we noticed from
town how green the desert was becoming.

The Gobi where we are is not really a sand dune type desert. It's more just gritty dirt. (Fun to keep off the church floors!) When we arrived in late November it was barren and brown with very little precipitation, but in the hottest months of the year we actually get some rain, maybe once a week. And the desert weeds and grasses respond. 

When it does rain, you can see it does a decent job of
filling the low spots.

Around the apartments, we are beginning to see what emerged from the seeds people planted a few weeks ago. We have rows of grass. We also have tire planters with hardy plants like hollyhocks, cosmos, and marigolds. It's inspiring how much people work to beautify the area, even for only a few months.

We are also lacking in mosquitos here. (That's not a bad thing!) We hear tales of swarms of mosquitos of terrific size in wetter parts of Mongolia. Once again, we are grateful to be assigned to Sainshand. 

This week on our preparation day (p-day), the six of us assigned to Sainshand went for a picnic. We heard there was a lake near "the 13th windmill." Our group wants to have a cookout there (more on that in a couple of weeks!) We wanted to check out the location. But finding a way to the windmill was an off-roading adventure all on its own. First we tried one road/trail. It was pretty sketchy. We almost got stuck in the sand. And it was across the fence (there was a fence!! we don't see those often) and the railroad tracks from the windmills. We tried again. Found a road that goes past a huge solar farm along with windmills and government warning signs not to use it. But there were several other dirt car trails, so we chose one of those and went searching for windmill #13. 

We found goats and sheep along the way. They were complaining about the heat and using any shade they could find for relief.

We saw a nomadic family with their horses.
Maybe it was their goats and sheep we saw.

Finally, we found windmill number 13.
But no lake in sight!

So we set up our picnic, got baked in the sun, played Frisbee until we roasted, then packed up and drove back to the air-conditioned church to play a Chinese dominoes game until nearly 6 pm. That's when p-day ends and we get back to work. It was a great day of exploration and fun. 

The two of us won the dominos game,
which surprised the young people.

We are impressed by the amount of sustainable energy that is generated here. There is quite the solar farm just outside the city right next to the row of windmills. We don't know how far they extend. But it's nice to see that much of our energy here comes from these sources instead of burning coal. Most gers have a solar panel outside for electricity, too.

Even more fun is seeing the traditional nomad 
family gers in the view just beyond solar panels -
truly the old and the new.

We said goodbye this week to our fun Elder Bilegsaikhan. This was an unusual transfer; he's the only one who left us. He's only been here six weeks. This time the two that have been here 12 weeks both stayed. It's a reminder to us that God is in charge and has a plan not only for His work here, but for each of us. We know that He knows what is best for us. We may not always have the experiences in life we want to have, but we have the ones that will help us grow and become who we need to become. But we have to be meek enough to realize that He is in charge, and we have to follow His promptings and commandments. Otherwise, we often create self-inflicted challenges and hardships.

Goodbye dinner

And now we are welcoming Elder Colton Johnson, who has been in the country for six weeks. He's adjusting and learning the language so well. We are excited to get to serve with him and get to know him. Little does he know what hanging out with the likes of us will really be like!

Hello dinner

One of our exciting events from this week was a care package from John's niece and her husband. They sent such a variety of fun things.

One final fun fact. Rice Krispy treats are not known here, but in our quest to introduce people to all the best cuisine America has to offer, when we found some chocolate crispy rice cereal, we made Rice Krispy treats for a youth activity. We usually can't find that kind cereal at all. The other day the deacons asked for marshmallow cake for their activity. It took a while, but we figured it out. It does look like a cake before you cut it into squares.

Next week is going to be amazing here! We hope yours is too!