Mongolia Mission Week 74 - Market snapshots, meaningful interactions, and multinational Conference!

 Mongolia Mission Week 74

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 week we want to share with you what some of our typical markets look like. In these markets, we get a good idea of what imports are currently accessible for Mongolian shop owners. We see lots of Russian and German chocolate, Vietnamese chips, and Korean kimchi. Sometimes something like baking powder or cheese will disappear for weeks until supplies make it to this landlocked country. 

Generally speaking, market shelves are packed as tightly as possible.

Clothing markets don't often have dressing areas.

There's often an eclectic selection of products.
It's not uncommon to see women's bras for sale
in the same store as hardware.

You can enter a doorway off the street and find a whole maze of shops owned by different people, usually sitting on stools behind counters full of merchandise. Sometimes it's hard to tell where one person's goods end and another's begins. Cash boxes are often cardboard and kept somewhere under the counter. Sometimes shopkeepers will pull out the box, set it on their counter, and run to the next vendor to get your change (They generally need close to exact change.). It's a refreshingly trusting society. 

There are little indoor food markets on every street, sometimes multiple food shops on one street. Walking into one is very much like walking into another one, although some may specialize more in produce or try to stock international foods like cream cheese when they can. Each has at least one freezer section. You can buy frozen chicken or dumplings by the piece from an open bag. Or in closed bags. There are many different ice cream bars available.

 This is an interesting ice cream cone treat kids like,
flat-topped and only covered with a blue piece of plastic. 

Choco pies come in a variety of flavors and are very popular. They are
like cookie sandwiches with flavored cream filling, covered in chocolate. 

Dried meat dates back to the times of Chinggis Khan. People soften it in soups or gnaw on it.

Little food markets usually have a big selection of alcohol,
especially Russian and Mongolian vodka.

Most little markets have a dizzying supply of snacks, candy, and chips. Chips come in a
variety of flavors (usually not plain), from barbeque to squid to onion and sour cream.

Most markets have a large supply of Ramen-type soups,
from Japanese to Korean to American, sometimes
with hot water to prepare it on the spot and eat at tables.

Each market also has shelves and coolers of juice and soda. 

Secondary schools don't always have school lunch programs, but they often have breaks where kids leave the school and go grab snacks. Now the weather is warming up, we see lots of ice cream bars being eaten on the streets. 

It's hard to completely portray these markets that are a very interesting piece of our experience here and offer us plenty of chances to meet friendly shopkeepers and let them know they can get free English classes.

Now for our amazing week in Sainshand!

On Thursday we had an open house at our church. Several folks came from Ulaanbaatar to conduct the open house, bringing their posters, pictures, snacks, and experience. The open house, from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm, had nice attendance. We experienced several miracles in the people who attended. Following the open house, all of us involved (our guests from UB, our English teachers, and several local members) all donned "Helping Hands" vests and went to clean up a park and war monument that overlooks the city. 

Our team, along with our pile of collected trash.

Two deacons who contributed a lot that day.

The open house featured displays about several church programs and the initiatives of our related charity, "Deseret International Charities." Attendees learned about humanitarian projects, self reliance and addiction recovery programs, family history, and of course, English teaching programs.

Odmaa talked about English programs offered through the church.

Mandy helped participants sign up for Family Search,
the world's largest genealogical database.

Pujee showcased humanitarian projects happening all over Mongolia.

Chukka talked about our group and exhibited church magazines for different ages.

One of our church members who served as an usher.

It was an event where leaders and members of our community learned more about us. There was a wonderful feeling as Mongolians expressed to other Mongolians things near and dear to their hearts. People in this city (and in our little church group) caught a glimpse of the worldwide impact of our church and its members. "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them" (Matthew 7:20, Holy Bible, King James version)

Then on Saturday and Sunday, our congregation watched General Conference. It's when the President of our church, the 12 apostles, and several other church leaders speak. This time was extra special because it was the first Conference following the death of President Russell M. Nelson, so the first meeting included a "solemn assembly" where each group of members, worldwide, stand and sustain the new prophet and his counselors. Even in Sainshand, Mongolia, where these new members raised their hands to show their faith and support. 

 

Because of the variety of ages in our group, we set up tables and provided coloring pages, conference Bingo, and other activities - and food - for people while they watched.

We can't find root beer, but multiple flavors of Fanta are everywhere.

Between sessions, we went for a walk and had to investigate a potential car behind our church - we need a new car when we get home!

Weekend multitasking included making cabbage salad, 

banana bread, caramel corn, and macaroni salad.

We were also watching the return of the Artemis II spaceship from the moon.
And fitting in video cleaning checks of young English teacher apartments.

Altogether, it was just another not-so quiet week for the Roses while the schools were still on break between terms. But it was amazing with with the open house and General Conference weekend. The love of the Savior was very evident. So was the fact that, by the Spirit, we can get answers to our sincere questions. The messages and spiritual uplift were wonderful. We are so blessed to be led by a prophet, apostles, and other leaders. We know that Jesus Christ leads His church through those called to lead and receive revelation and that this church blesses people's lives in many ways. 

Mongolia Mission Week 73 - Easter in Mongolia

 Mongolia Mission Week 73

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). 

It was transfer week! We bade farewell to Elder Anand, who left to serve in Ulaanbaatar.

Our little group seeing the elders off at the train.

Friday morning, Elder Temka arrived. He's replacing Elder Anand and waiting for a visa to go on a mission to South Africa. We know there's a reason he's here. And speaking of divine design, we were excited to welcome Sister Fifita back to Sainshand! She was in Sainshand before for 6 weeks and now will spend the last 6 weeks of her service here as well. Then we will share a long flight home to Utah with her and several others on May 16.

She brought Sister Hayman, who barely arrived in Mongolia on Thursday morning and about 11 hours later was on the 12 hour overnight train ride. We can't even imagine having that train ride immediately after 20+ hour of air travel. We appreciate her cheerful attitude, even when jetlagged!

We enjoyed a welcome dinner together.

With the rest of the Christian world, we celebrated the Savior's atonement and resurrection with a special service on Easter. Each day of the week leading up to Easter, we posted a Holy Week spiritual thought in our church message group. We did our best to celebrate and make it meaningful for our congregation because it is so important for everyone to understand Christ and to know of His love for us all. He lives! Because of Him we can live again! And because of Him, we can choose to be cleansed of our sins. We can be worthy to return to live with Him and our Heavenly Father together with our families forever.

Elders Temka and Odbayar with Sisters Fifita, Heyman, Keogh,
and Grover practicing "I Stand All Amazed" for the Easter service.

Later, the sisters came to our house and helped
us make deviled eggs for Easter dinner.

 Baagii and her sons joined us for Easter dinner. With the elders
and sisters, 12 of us were cozy together in our little apartment.

We served camel tacos, fresh guacamole, chips and salsa, deviled eggs, cheesecake, and chocolate cream pie. Maybe all of that doesn't scream Easter dinner, but we did the best we could. The chocolate pie was a double failure, however. The crust did not look good and the pudding didn't set up. But it made a delicious chocolate soup for dessert. 

Only the crust looked bad at this point. Then we cut into it..

After dinner, we played games, including UNO and
Taco, Cat, Goat, Cheese, Pizza, and ...

Shagai - the traditional Mongolian ankle bone game.

Our youth activity this week was helping the youth learn how to teach a lesson. Kathy did some instruction and modeling; several of our youth taught us something they were interested in. Lessons included how to play volleyball, how to play the piano, how to sweep a floor, and how to dance (with everyone participating). It was a fun and valuable lesson. It's so important for youth (and all of us) to learn basic teaching techniques, since in this church we all participate in teaching and learning from each other.

Luckily, we have a 12-year-old boy who translated what she said.

Such a busy food week! Our dear friend Alice and her daughter, Michelle, came to dinner so we could celebrate Alice's birthday. She teaches English at our school and helps coordinate things for us. Our young English teachers joined us. Some of them teach in her classroom at the 3rd School. 

Michelle aways says something hilarious and keeps
us all very entertained. We all love interacting with her.

We baked Alice a banana cake for her birthday - 
rectangular, because that's the shape of the pans we have.

Sadly, we taught our last class at the medical school this week. When these students finish their schooling they will go work in the rural areas around here as surgeons, dentists, pharmacists, etc. These are busy, smart, talented students. They're so busy that we pretty much had different students each week. But it was fun to have the opportunity to help in some small way with their English skills. 

All of a sudden, the walls of our apartment stairways and halls got painted. All 6 stories. A small crew puttied all the walls in the morning, then painted the orange part in about 6 hours starting at 6 pm. The next day they came back to tape off and paint the gray trim. They were so fast!! 

Freshly puttied. Orange is a common color in homes
and on apartment exteriors here. 

One of our church youth told us orange is a color
used traditionally and represents caring for your family.

Winter laughed at us one day when we had a sudden snow squall.

What?! We thought it was spring!

But it was pretty dry and sunny the next day. 

We often see workers along the edges of streets, manually sweeping gutters and shoveling desert sand out of the way. We noticed a curb this week that shows us how important this is. 

The sand fills up the gutter!

This is unusual. We are very impressed with how hard people work to keep things looking nice in a windswept land. Paint makes things cheerful, and hand brooms and shovels keep things sharp. But most of all, the people here impress us with their ability to live in a harsh environment. God's Mongolian children are adaptable and resourceful. We're glad we've had a chance to be inspired by them.

As an example: this guy needed to work on the undercarriage of his car.
So he parked it over a depression in the ground.

Mongolia Mission Week 72 - Babies and Connections

 Mongolia Mission Week 72

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). 

We had many highlights this week; one was our P-day visit to the countryside to see the babies! Baagii, from our church congregation, has a brother who lives not far from here. When we heard the camels had babies, we all wanted to go see them. There were 10! And they are so cute and fluffy!

In each case, mom or baby was tethered so they wouldn't
both wander away into the desert.

We also saw a pen full of baby goats and sheep
whose moms were out grazing.

This kid happily holding a kid born earlier that day.

Imagine this view out your front door! (The motorcycle is a valuable herding tool.)

However, getting there was a challenge. It's not like a ger out in the countryside has an address. We had a pin to it on our digital map, but knowing where it was and actually getting to it with few to no roads took some navigation skills. 

We started down a nice, new asphalt road (which is quite a rarity) but soon realized we were on the wrong side of the railroad tracks. So we took some dirt roads to get closer to the tracks, hoping to find a way to the other side. Luckily, there was a creek bed running under the tracks with a space tall enough for a car and with other car tracks running through there. So, it must be okay, right?

Then we did some adventure driving across the Gobi. We found the place, just where our digital pin said it would be, although before we went home we found ourselves needing to change a tire. Some of the brush attacked it.

Could have been worse! It was a nice day, and we had
elders and sisters willing to help.

Earlier in the day we had visited the energy center, monastery, and caves not far from the baby animals. We get there every few months when we have new young people serving here. It's an opportunity to visit a local place of historic, cultural, and religious significance. And this time, we even had great weather!

Us, Sisters Keough and Grover, and Elders Anand and Odbayar 

This is how you receive energy.

There was a silent but watchful overseer soaking up the sun.

The easy to explore "caves" are more like rock cavities, some
with manmade access.

This one is called the birth canal, symbolizing a birth into a
new life free from sin. Sister Grover came out breech.

These caves were historically used for meditation
or hiding from communist persecution. Now people 
leave offerings of  food, money, birdseed, etc.
They also burn incense in some.

After P-day, it was back to work, but our school has one week of "independent study" and a two week break before testing season begins, so our class load is lighter. But we were invited to judge the English speaking at another area-wide English competition. We're getting to the point where we see a lot of familiar faces both in schools and in town.

The speech contest judges.

Some of the speech contestants.

We have fun in our assignments and projects!

In other news, on one of our walks, we found a teeter totter. Turns out that after all these years, we still know how to operate one of these.

At the medical school we participated in an earthquake drill at 4:00 pm in the middle of our class. Protocol means we first have to climb under our desks until signaled that we needed to go outside with a book or backpack over our heads to protect from falling debris. You'll be happy to know that we all survived!

You can see new construction, which will mean more classrooms 
for the medical school. There's a new dorm being built as well.

The youth at our church had separate activities this week. The young women went to our local senior center to serve some of the older residents of our city. 

This is a game we spontaneously created last time we were there.
We put a bunch of tables together and pulled chairs and
wheelchairs around them. Residents love batting the ball around,
and everyone can participate even if they're blind or mostly deaf. 

For the young men's activity, they worked on social and intellectual skills by playing Catan, Monopoly, or chess. 

And celebrated Ulzii's 12th birthday!

John won, even though it was Spongebob Monopoly!

We're continually awed at how interpersonal connections seem divinely orchestrated. A few months ago, we ran into a young woman with really good English who works at a local convenience store. We and the sisters became friends with her. But then we lost her. This week we found her working in another store of the same brand. She had gotten a promotion. We were delighted to run into her again and got contact info. We are hoping she'll come to our English classes at the church. Whether she does or not, we know there is divine design in connections and impressions we make, if we are in tune.

A sweet connection we have is with a student who occasionally comes to English class at the church. We found out she had just participated in an art Olympiad and is an aspiring artist. When we asked her to show us a picture of one of her art pieces, we were blown away with what this 14-year old produced. We loved it!

She showed us a video of an old Mongolian tale about a mother camel that rejected her baby - until a man played a song for them on a horsehead fiddle. Her picture depicts this story. It's wonderful. (Especially on a week when we just saw baby camels.)

And we had lunch with Molly, a dear friend headed back to a master's degree program in Taiwan. She's the one who persuaded us to participate in a dance class last year! Molly's done a lot towards helping us understand Mongolian culture and traditions. We won't see her again before we leave Mongolia. More and more, we have to plan and juggle how we will get to have our last interactions with people we have come to know and love here.

Elder Neal A. Maxwell, of the quorum of 12 apostles, said something interesting about connections at a speech at BYU in 1996. We've heard his words quoted by several different people through the years because they ring so true: 

"It should not surprise us, brothers and sisters, that Heavenly Father brings about these intersectings and intertwinings of our lives. So often (after something is over) we will say, 'little did I realize' or 'I had no way of knowing' in referring to these intersectings. But why should we be surprised? Each of us has circles of friendships, and within those lie the portion of the human family whom God has given us to love, to serve, and to learn from . . . None of us ever fully utilizes the people-opportunities allocated to us within our circles of friendship. You and I may call these intersectings 'coincidence.' This word is understandable for mortals to use, but coincidence is not an appropriate word to describe the workings of an omniscient God. He does not do things by 'coincidence' but instead by 'divine design.'

This describes so many of our experiences here. We meet God's children in the countryside, the shops, the schools, even in dance classes. Our lives are enriched by them. Before we came, we prayed that we would end up in a place where we could do some good. We will never know all the results of our interactions, but we trust that our sain ban uus (hellos) at least brighten someone's day. Theirs brighten ours!