30days30years

Naming the baby

Tonight was a very emotional night. Rosa and I were invited to a celebration with Ospan’s family. His brother’s wife gave birth to their fourth child a month ago and today was the day they gave her a name.

We were both hanging for a shower (my hair looks that ratty I can’t take off my hat) and were then planning to attend a cultural concert in town as part of the festival. I was really excited to go because I wanted to hear some throat singing which my friend Erika said is a “must do” in Mongolia.

As we headed for the washhouse Ospan asked if we would mind taking a quick detour to his brother’s house to see the baby. We, of course, obliged. When we arrived we found about a dozen adults and children crammed into a single room with a mass of food spread over the food. I was invited to sit between Mr Aralbai, the man who will be teaching me to train an eagle, and Ospan’s father. It didn’t take me long to realise I sat it the worse possible spot, not because of the company but because they had easy access to refill my shot glass with vodka! It is Kazakh custom that you must drink when offered a shot and the more you refuse they more the seem to ply you with it. I’m not much of a fan of shots at the best of times so I did my best to take slips at regular intervals just to be polite.

When the chai started to be passed around I grabbed for mine quickly, hoping that if I had that in my hand they would be less inclined to offer me vodka. Stupidly though I reached out for the cup with my left hand, a big no, no in Mongolian culture. As soon as I did it my heart sake. The woman passing around the tea just starred at me but I’d already taken it into my hand so it was too late to even try to cup it with two hands. I felt so bad and sat on my left hand for the rest of the evening.

These people were so incredibly hospitable to us, and sat back as they forced food onto our plates. I was like “you eat too!” but they were like “no, no”. I felt incredibly bad. When we arrived we’d asked Narbek – Ospan’s brother-in-law who is a businessman and speaks very good English – whether it was normal for a baby to go without a name for such a long time and he told us they had delayed the celebration because they didn’t have enough money to put it on. Usually a baby is named within a week or so. It broke my heart. This should have been a celebration for them all to enjoy, not me. I certainly didn’t need eight shots of vodka and have enough “spare tyres” around my waistline to last a month or two lost in the desert at least. I was pleased when they did finally begin to pick at things.

Narbek explained that the baby’s name needed to be accepted by the entire family before it could be bestowed upon the child. They then did the most heartwarming thing and asked Rosa and myself if we would say the child’s name three times, thus christening her with it for the first time. Rosa was closest so she got up and did it. The child’s name (which I have regretfully forgotten how to pronounce) means lovely sunshine. It was a truly loving thing to be asked to do.

Speeches started quickly afterwards with each adult taking their turn to give a toast to the newborn and her family, starting with the oldest member of the congregation. Mr Aralbai tucked 10,000 Tughrik into the baby’s blanket after he gave his speech. Through Narbek he told us he used to give a sheep or a goat when a baby was born.

Rosa and I were asked to make speeches as well and strangely both of us got really emotional. Maybe it’s just because we are both so exhausted but the experience was just really touching. I managed to keep my tears at bay but Rosa broke down, I guess because she has witnessed over the disintegration of many cultures through her camera lense during the last 20 years. She just kept repeating over and over again ‘Please don’t lose your culture”.

Afterwards we got treated to some singing from a couple of the kids:

By the time we rolled out of the party, we’d missed the cultural concert and the washhouse was closed but Rosa and I both agreed it was well worth another day of smelling bad.

Oddly, I finished off the day doing the homework of Ospan’s daughter, who is 15 and goes to the local Turkish school. The Turkish school is considered the best in Olgii because it teaches most of its lessons in English. I also tried to help her younger brother with his homework, which I have to say was bloody hard in the context of a young Mongolian boy trying to learn it.

The task was to teach him the concept of “who” ie who likes this type of food and who likes that type of food. The paragraph he had to read was talking about an Italian girl liking lasagne, and a British boy liking a curry and someone else being a vegetarian. I thought it was a bit rich to expect the kid to answer “Who doesn’t like meat?” when he have no idea what a curry is or what is in a lasagne. All people here eat are variation of four things –  meat, fat, potatoes and noodles. As for understanding what a vegetarian is, that’s about as foreign as a three-eyed alien from Mars for this kid.