PDM Trainings, Ballet, Art Galleries, WHO meeting, English Classes and Oral Hygiene Trainings

3/3/2014

           Friday, the 28^th, I left Arkhangai on the bus to UB for a training I applied for. The project was called PDM (Project Design and Management). Through out the past two months, I have conducted two surveys and a group focus group/interview with school doctors, health teachers, Health Department staff and hospital staff. All three assessments showed a serious lack of health education in schools and a large problem of drinking, smoking, weight gain and STIs in teens and young adults. Based off of this, my idea was to create a universal health curriculum which school doctors (each school has its own doctor here) and teachers would teach their students every year, ages 6-16 years old. Each grade would have its own tool kit and workbook which would be in English and Mongolian, so that future Peace Corps volunteers can work to help develop the curriculum and activities each year depending on what the needs of the children are that year. The health department put on a training for the school doctors last month, so I took this chance to sit down with them and my counterpart (who translated for me) to find out what they thought was a problem in their schools and what health subjects the students need to learn more about. The schools currently do not have a health class in schools, which is alarming because of the quickly urbanizing culture is becoming more and more infected with diseases that used to have no prevalence here, especially STIs. So many people are moving to the city, in close quarters and the western world is influencing Mongolia so much now. They listen to American music, watch American movies and look up to American celebrities, with this comes a culture of sexual freeness, which Mongolia has never experienced before. More and more young people are becoming pregnant, HIV although still not a problem here, is rising and thought to rise even more as more and more people move to the city and engage in more risky behaviors than they could living in a Ger with their families. We want to keep HIV a rarity by informing and encouraging students to use condoms and get blood tested. Also, I am pushing for a campaign which will promote the HPV vaccine, which Mongolia has just recently begun to offer their woman. Currently, there are many myths surrounding it in country, so woman are not taking advantage of the vaccine and many are dying from preventable cervical cancer. I want to partner up with World Vision, who is currently working on a feminine hygiene project and have them help me develop a curriculum for girls which I hope can be be taught by a local gynecologist or a World Vision staff member. My Peace Corps Health Sector Manager really loves the idea, so in the future I will ask her to help me translate some of the activities I design and see if she can help me find grants or a company (perhaps UNFPA) to sponsor lesson books which we can have made to give each school. PDM training will begin on Monday.

          This weekend was full of fun. Friday night I went out for Burgers at Joe's Burgers with 5 other volunteers that were in for the weekend. I got a delicious burger with egg and onions on it, french fries and a Sprite. I never ate burgers or drank soda back in the States, but when I get to UB, I crave all “American” foods, including ones I never liked before. After Joe's, we went back to our guest house to hang out for the night. We had all had long trips into the city and decided to watch a movie and then go to bed. Saturday morning we dedicated to culture. There are so many museums and arts centers in UB, that we decided to make a list of all of them and pick out the ones that seemed most interesting and visit them. So we all started the day off with brunch at our favorite, Naraa's. This is the one place that sells real machiattos, lattes and mochas. This time I opted for the Naraa Latte and a vegetable omelet. Both delicious and satisfying! Then Marilyn, Hannah, Hali and I began our culture day by walking to the Natural History Museum to see the dinosaurs (Mongolia is known for their Tyrannosaurus), but unfortunately it was closed due to unsafe conditions. The sign on the museum said it was closed until further notice for reconstruction and that the city had deemed it unsafe for visitors. Apparently, the ceiling had started to cave in (I hope they got out the dinosaur bones), so that one is still on the list and hopefully we will be able to visit it before we leave next year. Recently, Mongolia has been in the news about their dinosaurs, because a looter in Florida actually smuggled Tyrannosaurus bones from Mongolia to the US. Read the news article here: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-22491967. Next, on the list was the National Art History Museum. This place was full of artifacts from all over Mongolia. Each room was dedicated to a different time in history. Their were 10 different halls with the following themes.

1. Ancient history of Mongolia

This hall displays stone tools and instruments for religious ceremonies that were used by people who inhabited the area of modern-day Mongolia between around 800,000 BC up to the Iron and Bronze Ages.

2. History of ancient states

The archeological artifacts of this hall relate to the history and culture of the political entities that were established from the 3rd century BC onwards. The first powerful empire was established by the Hunnu (3rd century BC – 1st century AD), which was succeeded by the Turk, Uigur and later the Kidan empires (6th – 12th century AD).

3. Traditional clothing and jewelry

On display here are the costumes of Mongolia’s ethnic groups together with state ceremonial attire, seasonal dress, jewelry and accessories. Mongolia has more than 20 ethnic groups. The origins of many ethnic groups can be traced back to the 13th century.

4. The Mongolian Empire

This hall is divided into two periods: the earlier Mongolian State and the Mongolian Empire. The latter section displays objects relating to the time of Chinggis Khan and his successors, which include a state banner, military equipment and tools. The artifacts include those excavated from the ruins of Kharakhorum city.

5. Traditional culture of Mongolia

The many facets of traditional Mongolian culture are represented in this hall by artifacts associated with music, literature, traditional forms of entertainment, and religion.

6. Traditional life of Mongolia

Mongolians have been living as pastoral nomads for many centuries. This hall examines the particularities of the nomadic lifestyle through displays such as a fully-furnished ger, tools for livestock herding, and hunting and agriculture tools.

7. Mongolia under Manchu rule

For about 200 years, from the 17th century to the beginning of the 20th century, Mongolia was under Manchu rule. Seals, coins, instruments of torture, and other historical materials document this period.

8. The Bogd Khan State

The beginning of the 20th century saw Mongolia struggling for her independence from Manchu rule, which resulted in a declaration of independence in 1911. The consequent theocratic monarchy headed by the Bogd Khan lasted until the early 1920s. Exhibits in this hall describe the military and political struggle for Mongolia’s self-determination.

9. The Communist era

With the revolution of 1921, Mongolia became a country driven by communist ideology. The communist period lasted until 1989. During the period between 1921 and 1989 there were major changes in Mongolia’s political system, society, economy and culture. These changes, negative and positive, are explored through historical photography and exhibits.

10. Democratic Mongolia

In 1990, Mongolia’s peaceful revolution ushered in democratic reforms and transformed Mongolia into a democratic state with a constitution, a multiparty system and parliament. Since then Mongolians have enjoyed, once more, the right to private property. Foreign relations were expanded and Mongolia’s position in the international arena was strengthened. Since embracing democracy, pluralism has become firmly established and Mongolian traditional culture has been revived. This hall exhibits objects relating to the changes that have taken place over the past 20 years.

               My favorite room by far was the room that was full of traditional Mongolian clothing. Each ethnic group in Mongolia has their own take on the Mongolian Dell. Each one slightly different than the others. The dells were so colorful and full of texture and patterns. Many were deep greens and royal blues. The female ones were more detailed with intricate patterns and design woven into the fabric. In this room, there was also a display of old jewelery and shoes, which once again was dived by ethnic groups. In Mongolia there are over 20 different ethnic groups living across the country. You can see the clothing style and some interesting facts about each ethnic group here: http://www.discovermongolia.mn/country/mongolia_ethnic.html

The jewelery section was filled with snuff bottles, pipes, necklaces and earrings. The most interesting of the accessories were the 5 part chains that could be fasten to a belt. They are called Chatelaines (French word, not sure what they are called in Mongolian) Each chain is mounted with a useful household appendage such as scissors, thimble, needle, ear pick, perfume, etc. They were all made of silver and adorned with beautiful jewles. Next, we went to the Zanzabaar Art Gallery, which was amazing. Visiting art galleries is one of my favorite things to do. The minute I walk in, the calmness and silence of the room casts a peace over me. Staring at each picture is therapeutic in a way. You can just get lost in the image and forget the days stresses. The details and colors in some of them were so vivid and beautiful. My favorite was the painting of the White Tara. The White Tara is a buddhist “god” known for compassion, long life, healing and serenity. The painting was striking. Rich blues, reds, yellows, greens and gold detailed the background and she was pure white in the middle. The painting although bright in color was so calming to look at. I sat on the bench in front of it for a good ten minutes just taking it all in.

             After visiting those two museums, we went back to the guesthouse for a nap. Being in UB is really exhausting. I think it is a combination of the really poor air quality, cars and people everywhere (not used to worrying about crosswalks and running into people living) and having to walk everywhere we go. Its weird how much visual stimulation can exhaust you when you are not used to them. For the past 9 months, I have lived in a tiny village with barely any cars and a handful of people walking around at any given time. Then you go to the city and it is jam packed traffic and you are bumping into people left and right. It takes energy to just stay alive on the streets of UB. Also, breathing through a mask as you power walk around the city is not fun or easy. Sometimes I wish I was placed in UB because the volunteers there have so many options for food and so many resources at their fingertips, but then after a week of being there, I am so glad I was not placed there. The pollution is just awful and there is no way you could go running on the streets even if the air was clean. Outdoors activities are non-existent in the city if you are an Expat living there. Mongolians may be used to the air quality but for people who haven't lived there for their whole life it is really hard to breathe the smog. The air literally smells like coal. You walk outside for 5 minutes and your clothes reek of smoke and dirt. Hopefully, in the near future they will be able to come up a technology/new way of heating all the gers and building that does not involve giant piles of coal and mile high smoke stacks. Currently, there is research going on regarding that. The World Bank is helping lead research and take action on the current Ger stove problem: http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2012/04/25/curbing-air-pollution-in-mongolia-capital .

              Saturday night, we all went to a party at the head of The World Bank-Mongolia Branch. The World. The World Bank is one of the world’s largest sources of funding and knowledge to support governments of developing countries in their efforts to invest in schools and health centers, provide water and electricity, fight disease and protect the environment. This support is provided through project or policy-based loans and grants as well as technical assistance such as advice and studies. The goal of the World Bank is to reduce poverty and to improve the living standards of the people in low and middle-income countries. For more information about what The World Bank does in Mongolia visit http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mongolia . We took the elevator up to the top floor of the building and stepped off, we immediately could here blaring music and peoples voices. We knocked on his door and were greeted by this small Asian man (though from America), Twin, the head of The World Bank. He hugged us all and invited us in. Immediately, we were ushered to the bar where there was an assortment of real alcohol, no Mongolian vodka in sight. The apartment was gorgeous, compared to American standards. One of the nicest apartments I have ever been in actually. You walk in and it was this big open layout with gorgeous leather couches along one wall and cool modern paintings on the walls. On the side opposite of the couches was a giant TV mounted on the wall and the opposite wall behind the couches was floor to ceiling windows overlooking the city, which at night was gorgeous. His apartment was on the top floor of the building and had this giant balcony/deck that stretched from one end of his apartment to the other with big oversized wicker furniture and a bar. The kitchen and dining room area was beautiful as was the guest bathroom. He throws parties once a month for fellow US expats (US Embassy and Peace Corps Volunteers). The apartment was full of people, drinking, chatting and dancing. I actually felt as though I was back in America! I chatted with many officers from the Embassy, they were as interested in my job as I was in theirs. They were awesome people! I then ran into my friend Tom who had visited a couple months ago with the Ambassador. So for most of the night I hung out and talked with him and his friends. He was carrying around bottles of champagne and kept refilling our group's glasses the minute they were empty. It was so much fun and I just loved hanging out with the staff of the embassy. We had so much in common and it was so nice to be able to chat about America and American things (like how Tom toured with Green Day back in the day as part of the sound crew or how one of the women went to school at University of Rochester), it was such a great break from life in the countryside. It was by far the best night I have had in Mongolia. The police ended up coming and breaking up the party due to a couple noise complaints (don't worry mom and dad, no arrests were made and no citations were given out and no one got in trouble). It kind of felt like college all over again. We tried to play the we don't know Mongolian card, but being in UB, most people know English, so the cops than clearly told us that the music needed to be turned off and the party needed to end. So, we all hopped in cabs around 2am wishing the party didn't have to end and headed back to our guesthouses.

              Sunday, we all met up for lunch at the pizza. Of course it was delicious. I had pineapple on my personal pan. Then at 430pm, I walked over to the other guest house where other volunteers were staying to meet to go to the ballet. The girls were still finishing showering so I sat in of the bunks using the internet. About ten minutes after I arrived there, a Mongolian woman came in and started to talk to me. She asked if I was Polish, and I said, yes, how did you know? She said that I looked like some of the girls who she had worked with for four years when she lived in Poland and worked as a professor in one of the colleges. She then began speaking Polish to me! I told her I did not understand but I listed all the words I did know in Polish, that I had learned from my DziaDzi (Polish for grandfather). This is the third time since being in Mongolia that I have met someone who spoke Polish and I can't help but think that it is my DziaDzi looking over me and proving that he is always with me. What are the chances of meeting three people in 9 months who were either from Poland or lived in Poland for a number of years in Mongolia, of all places!?!? I loved hearing her stories about Poland and she told me that I must visit their on my way home to the States.

             Once everyone was ready, we (Marilyn, Hale, Hannah, Tucker and I) walked over to the Opera House where the ballet was being put on. We saw THE FOUNTAIN OF BAKHCHISARAI ballet by A.Asafyev, which was an interpretation of a Russian poem by Alexander Pushkin. The costumes were gorgeous and the dancing was pretty good, nothing like the NYC Ballet, but still very beautiful and entertaining. The orchestra was amazing! In one of the first scenes, there was a large fight among all the male dancers and it left everyone but one dead. The dancers jumped around with swords and knives, moving in unison and then in complete chaos as the fight broke out and then more and more small fights broke out across the stage until they were all dancing sharply and aggressively and killing one another. It was a very exciting scene, but my favorite part of the ballet is when all the women were dancing around the fountain in the courtyard. They had these bright colored costumes on that looked as if they were all Princess Jasmine in Aladdin. They were so detailed and sparkly! They then partnered off with men and danced a sassy dance. If you want to know more about the ballet, Wikipedia does a wonderful job summarizing it. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fountain_of_Bakhchisarai_%28ballet%29) After the ballet, we went to an Indian restaurant called Namaste. We ordered butter Naan and onion garlic naan with shahi paneer and palak paneer and Hariyali chicken. To drink we had different flavor lassis. All were absolutely delicious. It is so nice to have so many options for food and to have meals with spices and flavor!

3/6/2014

Monday-Wednesday was spent in the countryside outside of Ulaanbaatar in the PDM training. We worked with our counterparts and with other volunteers. The trainings we had were: Steps in Project Planning, Project Design, Action Planning, Monitoring and Evaluating (MRE), Budgeting, Proposal Writing and Outside Funding. The sessions were extremely helpful and informational. I now have some great skills to bring back to the Health Department and back to the US at a future job. We also had two sessions of Mongolian Language Training, which were very helpful. I learned some great new phrases and verb tenses that will help me when working on projects with my coworkers. As time goes on, the language classes and topics we learn in them begin to make more and more sense. Now that I have a solid foundation to build on, it is not as hard to learn new vocabulary and verb tenses like it was in the beginning.

3/10/2014

            Thursday four other health volunteers and I had a meeting with the Mongolian Branch of WHO (World Health Organization). The meeting was incredible. First, all the WHO staff introduced themselves and what they were responsible for. We then introduced ourselves and gave a brief summary of what were are each working on in our Providences. After that, the Mongolian WHO representative, Dr. Soe, introduced us to what WHO does in Mongolia and how Peace Corps can work with them to help meet the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDG). The eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – which range from halving extreme poverty rates to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 – form a blueprint agreed to by all the world’s countries and all the world’s leading development institutions. Dr. Soe, who was born and raised in Burma, was a UN volunteer when he was younger. UN volunteers are like more experienced Peace Corps Volunteers. In order to be a UN volunteer you must be at least 25 years old, hold a Master's Degree and have 5-10 years working experience in whatever field you will volunteer in. A unique thing about UN Volunteers is that 75% of them come from developing countries themselves and 30% volunteer within their own country. While a UN volunteer, Dr. Soe worked with Peace Corps volunteers in his host country (Sierra Leone) and build great working relationships with them. So now that he became WHO representative last year he wants to build a working relationship with the PCVs in Mongolia, which is very exciting! Once he introduced the main ideas, each staff member gave a power point presentation on their specialty and the goals for this year. I learned so much information about where Mongolia stands when it comes to the MDGs and overall health of its citizens. At then end of the presentations, we discussed projects and training ideas that we had that would aid in meeting WHO goals and what other problems we see in our communities. Due to time constraints, we set up another meeting next month to discuss in detail our new partnership and WHO is going to come to our MST (mid-service training), along with UNICEF (United Nation's Childrens Fund) and UNDP (United Nations Development Program) in August to set up specific projects in our aimags. This is so exciting because all three organizations are ones that I would really like to work at once I get my masters. It is so nice to have these contacts and will be especially great to have in the future!

            After the presentations, WHO took us out to lunch at a Korean Restaurant in the Blue Sky Building. I had a spicy fish soup which was really hot and spicy. I had such a great time chatting with Dr. Soe, about his life. He is such an interesting and intelligent man. He has two Masters Degrees, one in Public Health Administration and another in Political Science and also has a M.D. He told me that he recommends getting a dual MS in Public Health and Business/Political Science if we aspire to work for WHO, the UN or a large Health Department. I was excited to see when I looked up Masters Programs that it is possible at many schools to get a dual degree in Public Health and Business, so as of right now that is what it looks like I will be doing when I get back to the States. He also talked about his son and daughter who both go to Columbia and how he loves visiting them in NY. His son is on the swim team there and is majoring in Environmental Studies and his daughter is a Journalism major. He has even visited Saratoga during Track season! He told us stories about being a volunteer in Africa and of going to university in London. He was so down to earth, we all had such an amazing time getting to know him and getting advice from him.

          Thursday night I spent the night at Laura's apartment (another health volunteer from my group). We went to the Salsa Club that night, which was soooo much fun! They had lessons in the beginning that we joined and through out the night they taught little routines to different songs. Mongolians are great at Latin dancing and it was such a joy to watch them and join in. I can not wait to go back.

          Friday night, I met up with Jen and Marc. We went out for drinks at a wine bar (expensive, $65 bottle of mediocre white wine, which I am sure was not worth that much, but since expats hang out there they jack up the prices), but it's nice to treat yourself once and while when you are in the city. Not many luxurious things to spend your money on in the countryside. We then went to FACE nightclub for their Woman's Day celebration. UB is like a whole other world compared to the rest of the country. The night club was full of shirtless men with black masks on, whose job was to just walk around the club and look good. They were not allowed to dance or really talk to anyone. I know this because I both tried to talk and dance with them and they told me they were not allowed to. Haha. About and hour into the night performances began on the dance floor. First up, were these fabulous men in tiny leather shorts and stilettos dancing to Beyonce and other popular songs. The one danced right up to Jen and I and pretty much did not break eye contact with us until his performance was over. They had heavy eye liner on and dance way better than I ever could in 6 inch heels. The crowd went wild for them! Next, was a muscle competition. Basically the men in no shirts stood in a line flexing different muscles for the ladies. Not sure why, because they were not judged and no one won, but for a good ten minutes we watched them flex their biceps, abs, backs and quads. Haha. The last performance was a gymnast who did a beautiful routine on the pommel horse. He was doing all these crazy moves and contorting his body in ways I have never seen a male do. The whole night was so unlike traditional Mongolia and its views.

          Saturday morning I woke up early and ate breakfast at the guesthouse with some of the other travelers. In my bunk room, there was a guy my age from Portugal, an older man from Thailand and a father and daughter from Sweden. The two men were on vacation and the father was in Mongolia for the week visiting his daughter who is teaching English in the countryside for a year through an exchange program. One of my favorite parts about staying in the guesthouses, other than having a shower, is getting to meet so many different types of people from all around the world. Sitting their in the living room area everyday, you learn so much about different countries and the people that live there. It is so interesting to see all these people traveling to Mongolia. Before Peace Corps, I had no idea where Mongolia was, let alone plan a trip to visit it. I feel like other countries are a lot more culturally aware and well traveled compared to the US. Many of these people have gone to the coolest places that I had no idea existed and have these magnificent adventures to talk about. I am in awe every time I hear their stories. I just love it and I hope I get the chance to visit all the amazing places out there in the world while I am young and healthy. After breakfast, I decided to check out one more gallery before I had to go to the bus station to head back to Tsetserleg. I decided to go into the Theatre Gallery and Museum which housed old costumes, posters, pictures and props from historic plays, operas and ballets. It was a great way to spend my last couple hours in the city. My last stop before I went to catch the bus was to grab a salad and pizza from Round Table. It would be a couple months before I could have pizza again so I wanted to make sure I got some before I left. The bus trip was uneventful, thankfully and caught a cab home from the bus station and fell quickly to sleep.

             Sunday, Will and I went to Lorre's Ger to start packing it up. She was officially medically separated this week, which stinks. I am going to miss her! After work on Monday, we finished packing it all up. Her hasha dad and sister came into her Ger while we packed and helped and chatted with us. My counterpart was going to come pick up the suitcases and bring them to the bus station the next morning to send them to PC office in UB. While we waited for him to arrive, her family invited us in for tea and bread. They are so sweet and I hope they get a new volunteer this summer. They told us we were welcome anytime and to please come visit them often. Being with them makes me wish I lived in a Ger and had a family to hang out with, but I know that I am lucky to be in an apartment and living the Ger life isn't as easy and lovely as it seems. But it would be nice to have a family around.

3/11/2014

          Today I had my English class with the HD staff. I taught them the past tense and we played BINGO at the end with all the vocab we have learned so far. They really enjoyed it. I had bought snickers bars and coffee packets before the class to be prizes for the four games of BINGO we would play. They were so surprised and so excited about the Snickers bars. They told me I am the best teacher ever. As time goes on I am more and more comfortable teaching English, so now it is more fun. I try to keep the lessons light and enjoyable. Next week, I think I will trying cooking with them.

3/12/2014

            My English class threw me a pizza party to thank me for teaching them English. It was a surprise to me. One of the women came and got me from my office saying that she needed my help and when I walked into the training room, there were all my students with pizza,cake and hot chocolate. I almost cried. Its these little things that make me realize how lucky I am to be in Mongolia with these beautiful and caring people. We practiced speaking English and they taught me some new Mongolian words. The cake had fruit on top of it. Kiwi, pineapples and berries! So good! They then went around in a circle and each took turns complimenting me, which really brought tears to my eyes. It was in Mongolian, so I could only catch parts of it. But what I did know was that after they each complimented me they told me that they loved me. The defining moment was when I was leaving and they all thanked me one last time and instead of saying teacher, they called me sister, which is a big sign of respect here. It was such a great feeling to feel like I was finally accepted as one of them and that here I was with 6 new sisters and a brother. That is why I love this culture so much. Everyone is considered family and treated that way. I have learned so much about true kindness and compassion living here, I wish that everyone had the chance to live in Mongolia. Everyday they make me a better person.

           After the little party, I went back to work on some things and then had a meeting later in the afternoon with the director. My coworker who went to PDM with me and I showed her what we worked on at PDM and what our thoughts were on coming up with the Health Curriculum. She okayed it all and said to start working on writing grant proposals and that she would get me in contact with the dentist at the hospital. She also asked if I would come up with a Stress Management seminar for the end of this month, so that is what I will be working on for the rest of this month, along with my oral hygiene and smoking trainings. I love how I am being assigned things now like the rest of the staff! =)

3/16/2014

          Last Wednesday night, I took part in the Health Department Volleyball tournament. There were 5 teams of six staff members. I was on the white team with my director. It was so much fun. During one of the games I scored 7 points! While I was not playing, I played with my coworker's children. Ages 2-12 years old. I played soccer with the older ones and then played monster with the little ones, which involved running after each other making roaring sounds and trying to tag each other. At one point I lead an exercise class with the 2-5 year olds. We did jumping jacks, lunges, crab walk, monster walk and then one 5 year old suggested we do situps and pushups! Haha I nearly died when he showed me what he thought our next exercise should be. We also ran laps around the gym. All the staff were taking pictures, because here I was running around the gym with 7 babies running after me. It was so much fun! That is what I pictured Peace Corps would be like when I first applied. Me, running around with little children (although in my mind I thought they would be little African children) playing sports and teaching them a little about healthy habits. I am so excited for the summer, when all the kids will be out of school and I can run some day programs with them and just have fun outside in the sun!

               One thing that I also hope to change while I am here is my HD coworkers thoughts on people with mental disabilities. Here children who are mentally disabled do not go to school. They are kept in their homes, hidden away because it is seen as being cursed. Like the parents had done something wrong in a previous life so they were given a disabled child. It is horrible, but I am happy in that one of my coworker's has a son who is 25 years old and mentally disabled. But she takes him out in the community and he works out at the HD gym everyday. He also came to the volleyball tournament and cheered everyone on. I played basketball with him. When his mom introduced him to me she said in Mongolian that he has a bad brain and he is stupid, which made my heart break. She said this right in front of him and its not like he doesn't understand things. He does and he can speak. The saddest part, is that I think if he was born in America, he would just be in a life skills class, he is not severely disabled, but he was never allowed to go to school, so he lacks a lot of skills, which anyone would who never attended school. I talked to my counterpart about this and he said he will get me in contact with an NGO that is based in UB to discuss my thoughts and to see what we can do in our town. He is willing to help me and sees a need for it as well. So I think that will be one of my summer projects.

           On Thursday, I went to Ex Tamir soum to be part of a NCD day training. The NCD specialist, exercise therapist, HIV/AIDS doctor, my counterpart (he is the training manager and epidemiologist for the HD) and I taught lessons on smoking,drinking,nutrition, exercise, oral hygiene and HIV/AIDS (even though it is a communicable disease). When we first got there I helped set up the room for the training and then my counterpart, the HIV/AIDS doctor (also in charge of food preparation in schools) and I went to the local school to do an inspection of their two kitchens. While we were at the kitchens we were served lunch by the cook. It was a great surprise and was my favorite Mongolian dish, cyyte boda, which is milk soup, sugar and rice. After they passed inspection we walked around the schools and they introduced me to the students and teachers. I love visiting the schools because every single child wants to say hello and tell me their name. I feel like a celebrity every time. Ariuk (my counterpart) and I then went into a room that was filled with about 20 boys to talk about smoking, drinking and condom use. We only got through smoking and by we I mean Ariuk was the one talking to them I just stood their smiling and listening. They had a lot to say about smoking, so the whole hour was used to talk about it. I am glad that they were so interested in discussing it.

We went back in time to catch the exercise portion of the training. So we both jumped in and did the Tai Chi exercises and stretches with the doctors and social workers who were attending the training. 

            Next, was my turn. My session was on oral hygiene. Ariuk translated for me while I went through the power point and activities. First to get every ones energy back up we had them do the human knot game. It was Ariuk's idea and the trainees loved it. We had them split into two groups to make it a competition. They were shouting and laughing, it was great to watch. After that, they sat back down at the table and I gave my presentation on the importance of maintaining good oral hygiene. I did a brief power point going over oral disease and then handed out pictures I had cut out from magazines of good food and bad food for your teeth. I had drawn a big healthy tooth and than another that had cavities and decay. They had to go stand by the tooth that they thought their food/habit would cause. Each person than had to describe why they stood near each tooth. It was a great way for them to start a discussion about their own habits. When I asked who has ever had a cavity, every single Mongolian raised their hand. We then discussed how cavities form and how we can prevent them. I did a teeth brushing demonstration and had them each practice and then came the really fun part! Dental floss is not sold here in Mongolia, they just use toothpicks or their fingers. So, I handed out a piece of dental floss to each person and showed them how to use it. It was the first time for all of them, including my Health Department staff. It was hilarious to try to teach them how to use it and watch them try to do it. There fingers kept getting tangled up in their mouths. For the rest of the training, they all kept trying to floss their teeth. At that moment, I saw actually evidence that I taught them something knew and that they would be showing their family members and friends how to use it. I told them that since there is no dental floss here that they could use the small plastic threads that are sold at all the stores. It is basically the same thing, just not mint flavored. To close up my training, I played question and answer game where the first person to answer the question correctly (there were 3 questions) would win a new toothbrush. My counterpart and coworkers said my training was so much fun and they want me to help them improve their own trainings for next time.

“The most recent proof of this was yesterday, when we conducted a training about NCD in one of the soums. Four health department staff and I were going over the training schedule and our power points when my primary counterpart and one other staff member decided that they needed to do more hands on activities and add an icebreaker into the training in order to keep everyone's attention for the 8 hours. My counterpart wanted to do the Human Knot activity that we did at the PEPFAR training months before and it was a great choice because all 25 people at the training had a great time doing it. It really woke them up after 4 hours into the training. The other staff member decided to have the trainees put together an interactive poster instead of her doing it first and just reading off of it to them. She had them fit the pieces into the right spot and discuss it. Both of them said that they had learned these techniques through Peace Corps and through watching me conduct my trainings. I was so happy to see them improve their training techniques and develop high quality trainings that are informational and fun!” **

**I was asked by the PC Health Sector Director to briefly explain what I have been doing so that she could send it to the Health Minister and talk about the changes I am seeing in the staff I work with. This is one of the paragraphs that had to do with this training and the moment I started to see real change in my coworkers.

3/18/2014

           Today I had my English class again. We had it in the kitchen where I taught them kitchen/cooking vocabulary and the present continuous tense. I had them practice using their new vocabulary by reading recipes for apple, banana and cranberry bread which we then made. It was so much fun to watch them reading the recipes and finding the correct ingredients to add to their mixes. They were impressed that the bread mix was already made in the boxes and that all they had to do was add eggs, water and oil to it. They kept saying how quick it was and how they wish Mongolia had bread mixes like that. It was by far my best lesson and the breads came out delicious. I brought coffee to have with the bread and we then sat their eating and chatting in Mongolian for 30 minutes. It is so exciting to be able to understand what they are saying and be able to add to the conversation every now and then. It is a big contrast from my first couple months there where I would just sit silently in the room as they talked and tried to catch a word that I knew.

We also have two interns now at the Health Department. They are social workers from the local university who will be with us until the summer. On Thursday I am going with them and couple our staff members to do smoking and drinking trainings at the tech school. I am excited to work with them, because they know some English and are my age.

          Yesterday I helped a Kazakh man who is Mongolia working for the Health Inspection Department write an essay on Bird Flu to get into a study abroad program. If his essay wins he will win a scholarship to a US university for a semester (not sure which one). He had to pick a disease that is a problem in his country and basically write a proposal for a project that he would do to educate people about the prevention and treatment of the disease. He had to write three small essays: informational, persuasive and the actual proposal about bird flu. I hope he does well! It is required that the person be fluent in English, which he is not at all, but he was so excited and enthusiastic about the opportunity I helped him translate his essay into English.

Also, my sister, Ashley, has a fabulous blog that you should all read as well. We will both be talking about things that were in each other's blogs. writing to one another. http://letterstobrittnana.blogspot.com/

Music Choices, Flooded Laptop and Dental Hygiene

9/27/13

       Currently, I am sitting at work, happily singing along to the Justin Bieber Christmas Album that my coworker is playing. I'm almost positive they have no idea that the songs are Christmas songs, but I am really enjoying singing along to them. His renditions (which I kept spelling as ramditions, and getting mad that spell check didn't understand what word I wanted, good thing I'm not an English Teacher here) of popular Christmas songs and original songs are actually pretty great. My absolute favorite though, is when I walk into the Health Department and highly explicit rap songs are playing. That really makes my day. I keep going back and forth between telling them that the songs are sexually explicit and they may not want to blare them through out the HD, but then on the other hand, I really enjoy the songs and it gives me something to sing along to with them, even though they don't understand what they are singing along to. So I will probably just say nothing and enjoy some English music being played during the day. They are also huge fans of Enrique Iglesias and Pitbull. So it's even more hilarious when we all try to sing along in Spanish to their songs. One day I hope to video record the singing madness that happens in my office.

       Yesterday, my counterpart approached me and asked if I would help him to come up with brochures about dental hygiene that will be passed out to teachers and parents of children in the community. At first he told me posters, so I got straight to work designing posters and looking up ideas on Pinterest. But then about a half hour later he came down and said that he didn't mean posters, he had a little paragraph he wrote out in English describing what we were supposed to do. We needed to make brochures/pamphlets not posters. We had to look up facts and advice to put in the pamphlets and design them. What we decided to do was to have a cover with a catchy photo and slogan and then the pages following would be: 1) What is a cavity? 2) How can you keep your teeth healthy? 3) Advice for Teachers 4) Advice for Parents 5) Diagram showing how to properly brush teeth. We decided that I would make a brochure and he would make one. We are then going to combine our ideas and make one final brochure. So that is what I am currently working on. I gave him a rough draft of mine last night to see if I was on the same page as him and doing what he had envisioned. He said it was great and that when he is done with his he will show me. One thing about Mongolians in the medical field is that they love love love statistics, facts and dry information. He told me that since the brochure is for adults that we do not need any pictures. So I then explained to him that no one will read our pamphlets if its just paragraphs of stats and facts about dental hygiene. People are more likely to read things if they are aesthetically pleasing and interesting looking. So I am interested to see what his looks like. They do the same thing with power point presentations. The slides are just full of lines and lines of sentences that the presenter reads word for word. No interesting graphs or pictures, just straight words. Hence why everyone is having side conversations and talking on their phones during them. Once I establish myself more in the Health Department, I would like to do some kind of training on this and show them how to make their presentations more interesting an interactive. I would also love to do some trainings on practices of facilitation, using surveys to receive feedback after trainings, Behavior Change Communication and Edgar Dale's Cone of Learning. I think that these would increase their effectiveness tremendously. But those will have to wait until I have gained their respect and proven myself to be successful with these techniques in my own trainings with the community. For now I am enjoying conducting surveys around the community myself and helping out in little ways around the Health Department. Currently all the Halloween party planning is taking up a lot of my time.

        The beginning of the week consisted of me spilling hot water all over my laptop and sending me into an instant terrible mood and pity party. The minute I did it, my world fell apart and I left work to see if I could salvage the computer. All I wanted to do was call my parents, but it would have been their 3am. It did cross my mind to just call anyways but after thinking about it, that was not necessary, I am an adult and need to start handling things myself (although I did call the next morning to talk about it). A great revelation, right? Haha. Thankfully I was able to, but that was after having a mini hissy fit on top of a mountain I hiked/ran up in a fit of anger. I ended up twisting my ankle half way up it, but continued to run until I reached the top, where I got out all my anger and prayed. It actually turned out to be very therapeutic and by the time I came down the mountain, my head was clearer and I decided to make progressive steps and begin to ask around about the best way of buying a new laptop. Do I take the 8-12 hour bus ride to the capital to see if there are any good ones there? Do I order from China, pay the enormous tariff on it? Or Do I buy from America and hope it gets here in one piece and makes it through customs? I got a lot of advice and decided the best option was to go to UB and my counterpart said he would drive me and help if I needed to go. He is so great! Hahaha, I am such a mess in situations like these. I do not like when things happen that I have not planned for. I like to have control and structured environment. My sister always told me that I was too uptight, and I never fully recognized it until this situation. I can only hope that my up tightness will be non existent or at least drastically reduced at the end of these two years. Because really having to buy a lap top is not the end of the world (even if I did just buy a new one 4 months ago), there are much worst things that could have happened. Luckily, none of that was needed and my computer survived and is running like normal. I will never have a liquid near it again. Lesson learned.

       This weekend we are planning on visiting the hot springs (so excited to just relax in them), going camping and hiking. I am really looking forward to it! This will be my first time really camping out in the wilderness in a tent, unless you consider sleeping in tents in Emily P's yard as camping =). I always did. Haha.

Dried Yogurt Curd, Australians friends, and Halloween Parties Galore

9/15/13

              This morning, I hung out at Will's apartment, with him and Andrew (a PCV from a neighboring town). I brought over Gigi, which I will never be doing again, because I will have no skin left on my arms after walking the ten minute walk to his place with her in my arms. I wrapped her in a blanket and she still managed to claw my arms. But she enjoyed the change in scenery. Will taught me how to make homemade tortillas, which are super easy to make. Who knew. So far I have learned how to make french toast, fried rice and tortillas. I hope to be a good cook by the time I get out of the PC, so my future family doesn't have to live on omelets and vegetable stir fry (currently the only things I can make successfully). We then walked around town and went to the market, where I found chocolate arraul. Arraul is dried yogurt curd, it is an acquired taste, which I have to come to enjoy, and with cocoa added, it is even better. I bought a big bag of it, since it really never goes bad (it is already fermented and sour). It is a great snack. I ran to the bank as soon as I saw it, so I could buy a big bag of it. The market lady laughed when I asked her if it was really chocolate arraul and that I would be right back to buy some.

9/16/13

           Sunday evening, we went to the Australian families house for dinner and dessert. The family runs a guesthouse and cafe in town. They have been in Tsetserleg for a little over three years as Christian missionaries. They are wonderful people! They have 4 children, who are hysterical and so interesting to talk to! They go to school at Mongolian Schools for half the day and then the second half, their mom home schools them, to make sure they are keeping up with Australian standards. The eldest boy is planning on going to university in Australia next year, so he has been only home schooled for the past year to make sure he meets the requirements of the colleges he is applying to. We had homemade pizza for dinner and apple crisp and custard for dessert! So delicious. We then talked about skiing and sledding, both of which are possible here! I can not wait for the snow! I absolutely love the family and can not wait to get to know them better over these next two years. They plan on living here for another 5 years I think. Every 9 months they go back to Australia for three months so see family and friends. Their restaurant and guesthouse is a favorite of tourists, it is always full and they employ local Mongolians to run them, which is great. They also rent out mountain bikes and camping gear, which we are renting this weekend! There are great mountain bike trails and a plethora of places to camp. I can not wait.

9/17/13

           The past couple days have been so busy! This past weekend, Andrew, a PCV who lives a couple hours away from Tsetserleg came to visit. We went out to the dance club on Saturday night. The Mongolians love when we go there. Everyone wants to talk to us and dance. We met some pretty good English speakers who work as computer engineers in town and the club's manager who speaks awesome English. Jen and I have to set up a meeting with him to see if we can rent out the club for our Halloween Party we are planning for the high school students of the town. He owns a hotel here too and worked with one of the previous volunteers here on planning events for the town at his nightclub. Right now Jen and I are on the Halloween Party committee for the Special Olympics. We had to come up with the theme and decoration ideas. We came up with two great ideas and the rest of the committee is going to vote on which one they want on Friday.

            Our two themes are, Hallowscream Masquerade Ball or Zombie Apocalypse. These were our ideas for the two themes:

Suggested Ideas:

1) THE HALLOWSCREAM MASQUERADE BALL

BROOM PARKING: Which could be a coat check that we could potentially charge money for.

CUTE LITTLE SPOOKS: We could have pictures of the Down SYndrome of Mongolia events and perhaps pictures of the children if that is allowed. This could be their promotion area within the party.

CAUGHT IN A WEB OF FRIENDS: This would be the backdrop for pictures. We could use toilet paper as a spiders web. Cut outs of the moon, glow in the dark starts (Brittany has) and we could do cutouts of black cats, and spiders. We could also utilize a prop table where we could have broomsticks, hats, masks, another other tidbits that people may have lying around. We could also potentially charge for printouts of pictures.

MONSTER MASKS: We could have a table where people could create their own masks out of paper plates and string.  Markers, scraps of paper, shiny paper...glue...Pretty much anything we have or can find CHEAP which is the name of the game.

We were also thinking that if there was a way to get sponsorship from companies around the area...even having them invest 5000 or 10000 t, We would be able to easily get the materials we need and we could make signs with their names to promote their company around the room...

We can also decorate with recycled jars and cans. We can place candles in them...do halloween cutouts with the cans that go over the jars for decorations. We can hand black and orange balloons, and decorate doors with cutouts of monsters like frankenstein witches, mummies.

2) Name: ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

ARM CHECK: Coat Check, same idea

WALKING DEAD: We could make a section with this heading for pictures. The backdrop could be fake trees, the prop table, chains, torn clothing with "blood" stains, if allowed, hammers, shovels, things zombies would carry. Gravestones. Also, we could have paper machee heads.

DEAD YOURSELF: We could have a ZOMBIE face-painting and hair-styling area.  

CUTE LITTLE SPOOKS: Same idea as we described in the other email we wrote!

DECORATIONS: I have wood that we could make gravestones with. We could hang pants upside down stuffed with newspapers. We could also hang gloves. Pretty much any article of clothing that looks like it's been cut off from the body. We can also ask some kiddos here to show us how to make paper machee heads:-)

          On Friday they will vote between the two. Not only are we planning this party, we are also planning parties for K-4 grades. 5-8 grades and high school students. For these parties, the two younger groups will have parties at the school, where we will have games, music and a costume parade, the high school students will have a Halloween Dance at the Nightclub. Jen and I have been meeting with teachers and community members to plan the parties. We have so many ideas and everyone seems very enthusiastic about the parties!

        Another project we have been working on, is starting up an English Club in School 1, where we would teach English, help with homework and watch American movies. One of the English teacher's at the school expressed the need for beginner English books and to start an English library at the school. So we are going to look for companies and grants to get books sent to the school for the students to use. Currently, the only books they have in the school, are the books teachers buy with their own money and lend out to the students to practice with. I also set up a pen pal program with a teacher in Philadelphia at the Science Leadership Academy through the Coverdall World Wise School Correspondence program, so we are going to incorporate this into on English Club. Also, I plan on doing a similar program with Corinth Elementary School. The Mongolian students and teachers are really excited to speak with American students! We are going to start our English Club in October.

          After meeting with the school doctor, social worker and Dorm teacher at a local school, I have seen the need for Health Classes in schools and in the dorms. So I am going to come up with a health curriculum for the schools. Currently, there are no health classes going on in school and with all the young teenage pregnancies in Mongolia, I think that it is very important to have Sex Education in the schools, as well as nutrition, body image, fitness ad hygiene classes. Today, I went to the World Visions Headquarters in Tsetserleg and spoke with the Health Education Training Manager and she said that she would love to work with me. She wants to come up with ideas and trainings for the schools and community, so she will be a great help when I start planning my trainings for the schools! I also me with the Director of their Child Sponsorship Program. She asked if I would help her translate the letters from the Mongolian children to their sponsor families. I ended up helping her with four of them today. The sponsorship program is where orphaned and poor children are matched up with Korean families, who send the children money and gifts. Every month the child and Korean family send letters to each other, so her job is to translate the letters from the families into Mongolian, so the child can read them and then translate the child's letter from Mongolian into English, so they can be sent to the Korean families. It's a wonderful program and I am so excited to be helping out with it.

           Starting next week, I will be tutoring a local business man in English. He speaks well, but wants someone to practice conversations with, so I told him I could help him, if he helps me with my Mongolian. We are going to start meeting at my work on Tuesdays and Thursdays to practice. I am also tutoring an 11^th grader, who came up to me while I was touring one of the school and asked if I could help her with her English speaking skill. Her mom works as a statistician for the Health Department. I'm looking forward to helping them and really looking forward to improving my own Mongolian skills.

         Tomorrow, Jen and I plan on visiting the remaining three schools on our list and the local University, to talk about our Halloween party and starting to teach health and life skills courses at the schools. Jen is my site mate, who is a social worker and works with one of the school social workers in town, so a lot of our projects are going to be done together, which is awesome. We both have the same ideas as to what we want to do in the community and work well together. Thursday, we are visiting the Education Center, the Governor's office and revisiting FLOM. Finally making moves!

Vodka at 11am ,Blonde Hair and Writing Letters to Korean Organizations

9/13/13

        This week as been pretty low key. I've been doing a lot of translating reports still and looking for organizations to partner with and possible places to get grants from to start some of the projects I have in mind. At work on Wednesday we had a luncheon. We had potato salad and“ham” which is really just processed meat that is the consistency of bologna with fat chunks throughout it in a big sausage like shape. There were also apples, candies and cakes for dessert. To drink, we started out with my favorite Milk-Tea and then proceeded to have vodka and wine. Mind you this is 11am. Luckily, we just passed out the shot of vodka 3 times and everyone just had to sip it, not take the whole shot. Then with our dessert we passed around glasses of wine and did the same thing. Somewhere between taking the shots of vodka and wine, they realized that my face did not scrunch up in disgust after taking the sip of wine. They interpreted this as I must really love wine and insisted I drink a tall glass of it. For the rest of the luncheon I sat there sipping on my wine, by the time I left there was still more than half of the glass left full of wine. During the luncheon, I hear my name a couple times and they kept staring over at me during their conversations, but unless someone is directly speaking at me in a semi-slow pace, I can't understand a word that is being said. So I just sat there smiling and trying to make little comments to the people sitting next to me. All I remember saying was when asked my drink preference, that I don't like beer, I like vodka a little bit and I like wine. Also, they asked if my hair color was real and if it was okay that I had yellow hair. I said yes I was born with “yellow” hair and that a lot of people in the US have my color hair and its okay. Not sure where they were going when they asked if it was okay to have blonde hair. Haha

       Last night, I played volleyball again with the teachers at School 4, more like watched them play. This weekend they have student sports day so they were all practicing for it and took it very seriously. Ten minutes into the game I was benched because I couldn't set the ball properly for the volleyball coach to spike. I didn't see why he should always spike it every time, so I would hit it over the net every now and then to ease my boredom, well soon after I was benched for the rest of the game. Luckily, my health department doesn't take our games so seriously and lets me play the whole game whether I set well or not.

      After volleyball Lori and I planned on doing our 5^th day of Insanity, but I got a desperate call from my counterpart Aruika asking if I could meet with him at 8pm he needed help writing and translating a proposal that was do in the morning. Gotta love Mongolians time management skills. I fully tend to have a training with my company on the importance of time management this month. Anyways, he came to my apartment at 9pm, not 8pm. Mongolian time is different then real life time, 8pm really means 9/930pm, another training I'd like to do : The Importance of being on time or just being truthful about what time things will actually be taking place. So here I was at 9pm reading through emails the health department has received from the Korean government and various other Central Asia Region Countries' health departments. The task: write a letter to the Korean NGO MediPeace thanking them for our invitation and the opportunity to travel to Korea for this conference in which our Health Department Director will be representing all of Mongolia's Health Departments. A Pretty Big Deal, yet we still wait till the last hour to send this email in which all the other countries had sent a week ago. The format of the letter was supposed to be this (according to the examples I read from the other countries involved in the conference): 1) Thank MediPeace for the invitation and opportunity 2) tell them about the history of your health department and about the Public Health sector in your country 3) How you think you can benefit from the conference and what you hope to gain 4) How this will help you in the future and how you will implement your new country relationships. Seems like an easy task, but my counterpart did not understand what to do, since the email was in English and he has had 1 beer to drink. 1 beer. So I try to break it down into smaller sentences of bullet points to show him what he needs to write. He still doesn't know, so I start to ask him questions in Monglish (a mix of english and mongolian words) about the Public Health sector in Mongolia (What are its goals? What are the major concerns? What are some projects in place to combat these concerns?); I soon realize that I will be the one writing this formal letter to Korea, me, who has been here for less than a month, will be writing the letter to the Korean Government about a conference I know nothing about. Luckily, he has brought the conference agenda and schedule so I look over some main points and come up with what I thought was a pretty great letter explaining how thankful we are and how this opportunity to discuss challenges that we face as a country with other Central Asian Countries will help us overcome the challenges we face as third world countries. The opportunity to gain knowledge and practices from countries like Korea is invaluable and we hope to form lasting strong relationships with the other countries involved..etc... Ariuka does help out in the statistics area and provides me with some numbers about morbidity and mortality of infectious and non infectious diseases in the country.

         At about 10pm the letter was done and Lori and I finally got to do our workout and then had dinner at 11pm. We made sure the dinner was only protein, so that our bodies would still use it during sleep and now store it like it would if we had eaten carbs. Our dinner consisted of eggs and milk. This had been the first time I had drank straight milk, not almond or soy milk, in years! It was whole goats milk and I still took my precautionary Lactaid Pill before drinking it, but it was surprisingly delicious. Since it was so late and it is dangerous to walk at night (Ariuka made sure to point this out when he left and to tell Lori about the story of how he saw me walking at midnight with a man alone, the man was Will, my other site mate, and we were walking back from dropping Lori off at her Ger, and then he was walking me home; but Ariuka didn't understand that the man was walking me home so I wouldn't be walking home alone, he still thinks that “the man” walking me home was up to something haha), Lori stayed the night and we watched the first episode of the first season of “Friends”, it was hilarious and they were all so young.