Mongolia Mission Weeks 39 & 40 - BOGO - And a true Mongolian barbeque!

 Mongolia Mission Weeks 39 & 40

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). 

This time you get two weeks for the price of one! (It was the only way to catch up.)

Well, there wasn't a lot to report one week - just a quick trip to the city for meetings about our online class for missionaries, which leads them directly to Pathways, which is a program with online introductory classes for BYU-Idaho. We came home with Yax, a different RAV 4, because we couldn't replace our damaged tire in Sainshand (which is a long story we won't bore you with). 

On our way to Ulambaataar, we saw these horses
had wandered into a decorative landmark outside
the city. 

Yax, a tribute to being in Yak country.(And to the 
license plate, which, in Mongolian, is NOT
pronounced anything close to "Yak.")

It was week 39, which means we have reached the halfway mark of our mission. We expect this half to be better than the first half. Why? Because it actually took a while (with a lot of the Lord's help) to find our way around, figure out what to do with our teaching in various groups, decide what we can contribute to our church group, and get comfortable with not understanding so much of the language. We still don't, but at least we've gotten used to it. So we're excited to see what this half brings.

Our second week was power packed with so much going on, with many blessings and miracles!

For one thing, we had a great group Family Home Evening on Thursday. The spiritual thought was about the Savior - we conducted a tour of all the artwork in the church, which depict aspects of the Savior's life and are a real draw when we have visitors in the building. We played some active games and ate chocolate eclair dessert, (using British digestives since graham crackers are unavailable here). We had to cut it into pretty small pieces because we had many more people show up than we expected - a wonderful problem to have! So we supplemented with cheese balls we had acquired in the city for such emergency situations. Everyone seemed to love everything.

Catch the chopsticks game

Eclair dessert and cheese balls - what a combo!

Then there was the party of the century. Several weeks ago in our church council it was suggested we have a party in August. Chuka suggested we have khorkhog (kind of pronounced "horehook"). That's what a traditional Mongolian barbeque is; the kind of Mongolian barbeque that is popular in the States was actually invented in Taiwan and does not exist here. 

John has been eager to participate in khorkhog ever since we arrived, so that's all the suggesting he needed. This traditional meal is meat, along with potatoes, onions, cabbage, and carrots cooked with some water in what looks like a milk can. The meat is layered with the vegetables and extremely hot (clean) rocks, like round "river rocks" of fist size. The can is then sealed and placed on hot coals - heat from within and without and cooked under pressure. 

This is the largest pressure cooker we've ever seen.

So party planning got underway. A location was found, which was a challenge. There aren't really city parks suitable for this purpose, and many of our folks don't drive, so it needed to be close to town.  Chuka found a resort/campground just outside of town, about 10 minutes from our church. The plan was for people to meet at the church at 2:30 and carpool and/or shuttle to the campground. Meanwhile, the cooking crew would start things going about noon.

The resort has gers you can rent for overnight stays.
We rented a large one for day use for shade.

Oh, wait. We needed a goat. Or two. We've been told that goat is mostly for special occasions because most meat consumed here is mutton. We arranged to buy a couple of goats from a herder, Chuka's brother-in-law. John and Chuka went out a day before the party to pick up the meat - or so John thought - about an hour's drive south of our city. When they arrived there was some discussion, in Mongolian, then Chuka said, "let's go help him get the goats." So off they went to round up the goats into an enclosure where they grabbed the two that were to be dinner.  

Yep, two of those were to be our dinner! Herders
often use motorcycles; John and Chuka just 
clapped their hands.

The town closest to the herder where we bought the goat is Zuun-bayan, a small, rural place full of Soviet-era buildings in various stages of disrepair. Turns out, it is home to the first swimming pool built in Mongolia. The pool and John are the same age - both from 1957!

  

After acquiring and butchering the goats, they cut each into several pieces for transporting, then left it all in the fridge at the church to be cut up more before the party. 

*We didn't take many pictures of the butchering, but we do provide some interesting butchering details at the end of the blog if you are interested in such things. 

Once we arrived at the resort, a campfire was built and the rocks placed in the fire for an hour. When they are layered in the pot with the meat and vegetables, they are added one by one, with the lid clapped closed between each addition to keep the sizzling heat in. 

Left to right: Lkhagvasuren, Chuka's friend who
cooked the meal, Baagii, Chukka's wife, and Chuka.

When the rocks come out of the pot after the cooking, some are given to spectators to pass back and forth between their two hands - a form of hot potato - but this is also a tradition of some significance. Since goats eat the grass of the land, when the rocks cook the goat they absorb the goodness of the land from the goat. Handling the rocks gives people the blessings of nature and some healing properties. And nice soft hands from the grease.

Rocks and meat after the cooking

With the shuttling, cooking, visiting, games and lots of food, we had quite the party! About 40 attended; most were non-members, including the cook. A special blessing was having some visitors from out of the area: our mission president, President Kunz, our friend Enkhjiguur (the mission secretary), and the APs (Assistants to the President). They are Elder Cook and Elder Bateman, who was one of the original English teachers in Sainshand about 18 months ago - right after English teachers started here. 

President Kunz, Jay, and the APs joined the games.

Colton plays guitar, which is a hit with
these boys who are also interested
in guitar.

And more food than we could eat! The buffet included commercial bottles of pickled carrot, onion, and bell pepper salad, which is a favorite, as well as cucumber pickles. We had various breads, too. Baagii made homemade buns. Grace Gainer and Daisy Hess made banana bread, which everyone loved. Everything was set out on multiple paper plates for serving - no scooping into bottles or bags for this nice meal! Good thing we borrowed long tables from the church.

A tray full of meat chunks!

Thoroughly enjoyed

At the end of the party, our cook gave John an award for our church, because the missionaries and volunteers helped him with a marathon earlier in the year and because the community values our English teaching. His daughter, who is 8, is taking gospel lessons. He made nice comments about what he sees the gospel doing for his family. And they all showed up for church the next day.

John with our cook and Jay, our translator extraordinaire.

 

The party ended about 8 pm. The are many more photos and videos, including the loading of the cooking pot, the juggling of hot rocks, etc. See more here.  

While John was chasing goats around in his white shirt, Kathy went with our youth to a service project at a senior citizen center. This is the second time the youth have been there since we've been in Sainshand, and it is a rich experience for all involved. These kids obviously respect elderly people. They didn't act like awkward teenagers at all - they initiated conversations , spoke loudly when people couldn't hear them, played games, and in one case, massaged feet and shins. It was a tender and beautiful activity.

Later that day is when Pres. Kunz and the others from Ulaanbaatar arrived. He spoke in a devotional for us. He is such a wonderful teacher, leader and example. And the week ended with a church service with President Kunz speaking again to a room full of worshippers. We were so blessed with such spiritual meetings and many people attending!

That's it for this week(s). Thanks for following our adventures in Mongolia! Living here has its challenges at times, but we feel like we're the most blessed couple on earth to be having these experiences! Any of you retired or nearly retired people - do it! You might think you are giving back by serving, but not really. We are receiving so much more than we are giving - we've had the privilege of getting to know another culture, make some precious friends, develop a deeper appreciation for the Savior, notice more miracles, and learn some things about ourselves as well.

Cutting the meat just before the cooking,
 in a white shirt and tie, of course!

* Butchering details: The process of butchering a goat was a learning experience even for John, who has butchered beef, pigs, chickens, and rabbits. First, Mongolians bleed the animal internally to preserve and use the blood, which is a valuable food source. Traditionally, they believe the blood shouldn't touch the ground because the ground is sacred. They also keep and use the internal organs. We passed on those. 

So the goat is stunned, and then the herder creates a slit big enough for his hand to reach up into the animal, evidently disconnecting the aorta. After a few minutes' wait, the animal is opened up and the organs removed, taking special care to place the liver and blood in a separate bowl. 

Then, instead of skinning, the hair is burned off, then scraped with a knife, then burned, scraped, etc. until all hair is completely removed. After that, fat is placed on the skin and melted over the hide. Then that is burned off. This process removes the hair and softens the hide. Finally, the skin is scrubbed with water and steel wool to clean and remove any residue of the burning, etc. That's because the skin is left on the meat when it's cooked.

The goat is then cut into several large pieces for transport and to be cooled in the refrigerator. (It does tend to make the car smell like burnt hair, even after it is removed.) Later, it will be cut into smaller pieces and cooled (in our case, in the church refrigerator!), and finally still smaller pieces, which is where John got involved with the hacksaw, just before cooking. 

Individual pieces for cooking, complete with skin.