Going to congregation, on and off

July 23rd, 2008

For last 10 or more years I have been going to church. The first time I went there was when I slammed the door behind me and inadvertantly went to church. These days I sometimes go and sometimes not. I am not getting truth as I did before. My heart is slowly shrinking.

Praying for a team

June 21st, 2008

For UEFA winning team?

No. For my team. Like learning to build my website, I got to learn to build my team, I guess. Does somebody know how to do it fast?

Project ideas are big. But I am always behind schedule.

Direct experiment with kanji “blue, green”

May 13th, 2008

When I studied the kanji ‘blue’ I was surprised to see it also means ‘green’. I thought how crude this language is that there’s only one kanji for 2 different words. Grudgingly accepting this unlogical kanji made using it awkward and grudging. One morning when I went out to jog, I was standing near a high bushy tree with green leaves. The sky was blue, clear. Then suddenly a breeze made the branches and leaves wave before my eyes. At this moment green leaves waving to left and right with blue sky background created a mix of color which was neither pure blue or green. I could not tell it was blue or green. Perfectly 2 colors were at the same time at this angle. Just experiment it. So, this kanji has no problem of being wrong.

kanji “blue, green”kanji “blue, green”. Its components are:

life, growth, new shoot of plant springing up from ground kanji “life” (this was the bush with green leaves, in my case) and

moonkanji “moon” which is still in the sky in the morning in many cases. The fact that moon is visible means the sky is cloudless, clear.

The first milestone in Japanese language study.

May 9th, 2008

It seems like I made some progress in my study of Japanese. I have been studying Japanese for years often setback by the unyielding kanjis. Still I barely can utter one complete sentence.

But some deciphering has been helpful for scratching my way ahead. Here’s an example:

kanji “review, look back”

This is a kanji meaning, look back or review.

Its components are:

kanji “hire, employ” hire, employ, plus kanji2.gifhead or neck.

The way I learn this is: when somebody is hired, the boss has to look back at his work and review its quality. Nobody leaves a new, untrained recruit unattended. Employer’s head looking back to employee’s work. Thus the meaning ‘look back’ comes. Right or wrong, this is my way of tackling this. Hopefully I am not wrong. I looked at other authoritative sources where I could not agree with explanations.

While traveling on bumpy roads I was reading books and now a light at the end of the tunnel seems to glitter.

Creative customization of Mongol boots?

April 13th, 2008

Sometimes people ask strange things through our shop website. My brother worked on an email and here’s a Mongolian boots design he ended up arranging for a buyer. Mongolians don’t use black and red color combination in boots design. Or it must be rare that we have not seen it before. The result is this: simple 2 colors.

mongolboots_redblack.jpg

What happens to a tour operator in winter in Mongolia?

April 13th, 2008

Winter is a slow time for most tourism companies in Mongolia. Except Ice Festival held on Huvsgul lake and Camel Festival in Gobi, both organized right after the White Moon or Lunar New Year Celebration, not many tours take place. Dog sled travel is organized by a company. In general the activity is uncomparable to summer’s.

What we did was to use the potential of our online shop http://www.mogultravel.com/artscrafts. Certainly it helped pay the rent. Established big companies owning fleets of cars may not feel pressure during this harsh time. But we did better this year thanks to this diversification. Seems like a way to weather out the cold financial low time is up.

Annual Mongolia tourism expo

April 13th, 2008

Here is a somewhat belated post after months. Every year the Ministry of Touism organizes Tourism event at Misheel Expo Center in March or April. This is a time when tour camps, hotels, restaurants gather to show their offers. Folk performance bands show their plays, throat singing, contortion and mask dances. These bands, ensembles, and artists also benefit from the tourism season. Here are few pictures:

Horse headed fiddle play and throat singing.

Throat singers group performing on the stage while boys’ team donning yellow hats waits to play the horse headed fiddle.

Presentation of a ger camp

Presentation of a ger camp in Gobi.

Altai mountains

January 12th, 2008

After a long break I am posting a picture from the last trip to Altai mountains where Eagle festival was organised in October 2007. Our arranging of the tour may have been quite squeezed as a lot of time was spent on driving. Personally I enjoyed the tour very much. The following picture was taken near Mt Huiten (Mt Cold), the highest peak in Mongolia, the westernmost point on Mongolian border.

 Horse ride to Potanin glacier in Altai mountains

Just during our ride the sky became very clear and we even had to take off some of the jackets and coats. The previous day some adventure mountaineers could not reach the place as it snowed heavily. After us other people also did not reach the glacier. But all tourists met at the Eagle Festival at Sagsai soum and later at Olgii town, sharing our stories. I wondered how come that the most spoiled of all people, us, not the tough mountaineers, reached the best of the spot in Altai mountains. When we returned to UB, the weather became increasingly worse. Did we steal the best of the Altai show?