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Random kindness of strangers #18736266

One thing that has been reiterated to me on this trip is that no matter how many cultural and language barriers there are, some things just always translate.

Like this morning when I was walking down the street and a delivery guy was coming toward me with a bouquet of flowers. I caught his eye and gestured toward the flowers as if to say: “For me, you shouldn’t have.” He cracked up laughing and pulled out a tiny flower from the bunch and handed it to me. I hope the real recipient didn’t notice!

Today I spent the morning hanging out with Sharon the daughter of some of Tanya Vok’s old work colleagues. She’s from Goa originally but has spent the last few years studying in the Philippines. Coincidentally she is working on compiling a book about micro finance which features Ospan’s brother-in-law Narbek.

She was kind enough to show me around Sukhbaatar Square and a few of the other sites in UB. Apparently today was some kind of auspicious day because it seemed every Tom, Dick and Harry was getting married. We just happened to walk past the only place in UB where you can get the formal part of a wedding conducted. It was like a drive through wedding chapel in Vegas. Hummers as far as the eye can see with people dolled up to the nines sleeping in the front seat waiting for their slot. I couldn’t think of anything worse than having hundreds of random strangers milling around in the background of my wedding photos but I guess the date was a symbolic one.

I was chatting to Sharon about the sanctity of marriage in Mongolia and she commented that she found it strange they went so all out on their wedding days when most of them were already having affairs anyway.

We also called in on a guy called Eric from the US who has set up a coffee shop called UBean Coffee. It’s a not for profit enterprise where they teach unemployed Mongolians how to be baristas. Larry and Krista had given me his contact details.

They were also kind enough to give me the number for a guy called Danny. I know I have been raving on about the kindness of strangers constantly but I have to mention my latest escapades for accommodation.

I had to leave chris’ today for two reasons. He has pneumonia and because he’s leaving for Thailand on holiday tomorrow. That left me homeless until about 3pm today when I got in touch with Danny, a US guy, who has kindly agreed to let me stay on his couch for a couple of nights.

I could have gone to stay in a hotel for my last couple of nights here in UB but what I’ve really been craving is someone local to show me around. Chris wasn’t very forthcoming in that regard but Danny has gone out of his way to make me feel welcome. He has two French girls staying on his “couch” too and he was kind enough to invite us all out to dinner with come of his Peace Corp friends.

Today is the first day I’ve genuinely been happy in Mongolia despite the extraordinary experience I have had….

Drive-Thru weddings: