Richard writes:
So back in surburbia with four days to entertain ourselves before our train ride to Ulan-Ude in Russia, we set about exhausting Ulaanbaatar's attractions and exhibits. We barely saw Ulaanbaatar in the two days before our trip to the Mongolian wilderness due to the snow and rain, so it was a relief to wake up to sunshine and blue skies on the first morning after our return, It was actually quite warm too (though Casey would dispute the use of the adjective warm, and replace it with chilly! Australians are so soft!).
Whilst walking around Ulaanbaatar, it immediately became apparent that the city had completely transformed from the small sleepy capital I had visited eight years previously. The traffic in Ulaanbaatar makes London's roads look free flowing and there are more high rise buildings under construction than in New York in the 1920s. There is no better illustration of this metamorphis from village to metropolis than the city's (and country's) only theme park. Eight years ago, myself and two friends from University, Ian and Oli, visited Ulaanbaatar's theme park which housed some of the most dilapidated rides you could wish to see. This theme park still exists with some of the rides we rode on eight years ago.
The old rollercoaster
However . . . new rides have been installed and have turned the park into something approaching modern, including a massive vomit inducing track of twisted wires. When it comes to rides of such ilk, I tend to be quite cautious, considering the human need to have my body violently transported from one direction to the next. However, after Casey exerted significant peer pressure I relented and rode the Mongolian, steroid fuelled rollercoaster. Within seconds of it starting, I was uttering 'I don't like it', and mid loop the loop I was screaming every expletive under the sun. By the time it had come to a close, I nervously stumbled off and had a bit of quiet time to recover my composure and to consider whether my Mongolian BBQ lunch tasted better the first or second time.
The new rollercoaster
Other than the city's rapid expansion, my other main observation is that the taking of photographs of the city's exhibits is not encouraged. I would love to fill this blog with photos of the treasures we have seen over the past few days in the many museums we have visited . . . but I can't, as we don't have any. This is not to say that you are not allowed to take photos, but the charge to do so in museums is astonishing. The most striking example of this was at the immense Winter Palace of the Bogd Khaan, the last Mongolian King, who's reign ended in the early 20th century. The "Palace" almost looks like a ruin and is situated an hour's walk from the city centre. The sorry state of the building gave us no clue for the wonderful exhibits housed within. It seems Bogd Khaan was an avid collector of taxidermy. He had more animals than Kruger national park (albeit stuffed): there were penguins, hawks, armadillos, a tiger, a lion, a seal and almost anything else you could care to think of. One of the armadillos was particularly spectacular, it was enormous (the size of a large wombat). We were desperate to take photos of this amazing exhibit, however the charge for taking photos was 50,000 Togrog (about AU$30). Now considering this represents half our daily budget for food, booze and sightseeing, this seemed a bit excessive, especially as entry to the museum was only 10% of this. Normally with such ridiculous pricing strategies, I would take a few sneaky pics using my body to shield the camera from museum workers' prying eyes. Unfortunately the museum's management had decided to spend the last ten years' building maintenance budget on CCTV; there were cameras everywhere, the bloody irony! All I wanted was a few photos, but I couldn't because every move we made, was being filmed and no doubt scrutinised by security guards eagerly waiting to produce the exorbitant bill on the first sight of a camera lens.
The next item we saw at the palace was a beautifully carved wooden bed that we were both in awe of. Not only was it a fantastic exhibit, but it stimulated ideas for the furnishings of our home when we eventually arrive in London. We are under no illusions about our financial competitiveness when it comes to property in London, most likely, all we will be able to afford is a poxy studio. The bed at the museum would be perfect for a small living area: it was like a four poster bed with walls as well as a small entry area housing drawers and shelves. Perfect for a studio and very stylish! I immediately said to Casey, if we can just take a few pics, and send them to my Dad (who is a dab hand with a bit of wood and a saw), he can knock this up by the time we arrive in Blighty. Foiled again. I tried every angle to avoid the gaze of the cameras, but absolutely every angle was covered. After yet another disappointment we sauntered around the rest of the museum and its temples muttering about the unfairness of the CCTV.
The Bogd Khaan Winter Palace
On returning to our hostel, we immediately did what we always do when we have been somewhere that is either hilariously crap or has some other unique feature (such as a charge to take photos ten times the admission cost): we went on Tripadvisor to see others' comments. It has occurred to me, that we have somehow missed the point with Tripadvisor, most people use it to help them decide where to go, we merely use it to confirm that other people think something is terrible as well. The Tripadvisor consensus on the Bogd Khaan Winter Palace seemed to concur with us; brilliant exhibits, the buildings need some work and expensive photos!
During our foray onto Tripadvisor we noticed that another museum we had visited was not even listed on the things to do in Ulaanbaatar. The museum was called the "Memorial Museum of Victims of Political Persecution". We had noticed it when we had got a little lost wandering around Ulaanbaatar looking for the theme park, and vowed to return. On arrival the old wooden building looked shut, and we almost dejectedly gave up on visiting. However, a middle aged gentleman, who looked considerably more life worn than the average person of his apparent age, appeared out the front door and beckoned us in. The museum had an array of rooms with photos and exhibits from the 1930s when apparently Mongolia was a dangerous place to live if you were out of political favour or had a few ideas of your own that were out of sync with Uncle Joe's ideas in Moscow. A few annotations were in English but the vast majority were in Mongolian. The museum director (the guy who beckoned us in) also proudly described every item in the museum, in Mongolian, even though we had politely explained that we were not well versed in the language. This did nothing to deter his explanations however. The final room was a collection of human skulls (akin to the Cambodian Killing Fields, but on a far smaller scale) recovered from a political massacre somewhere in Mongolia from the 1930s. A sobering end to a museum where we had learnt little, but are now committed to learning more of the seemingly gruesome political history of 20th century Mongolia.
The Memorial Museum of Victims of Political Persecution
As well as the museums mentioned, we also visited the National Museum of Mongolian History and The Zanabazar Museum of Fine Arts and we also attended a Mongolian cultural show featuring contortionists, dancing, music and throat singing (a bizarre skill that allows the "singer" to make two noises concurrently with their throat). All attractions were brilliant, but sadly no photos, apart from the exterior buildings!
Drinks in Ulaanbaatar
Our ten awesome days in Mongolia had drawn to a close, and yet again we were sad to leave a country, but excited about the month in Russia ahead of us. We boarded our 24 hour train from Ulaanbaatar to Ulan Ude (in Russia) with Nathan, an American guy who was staying at our hostel, who is doing a similar over land trip to us, but from Hong Kong to Tennessee. Coincidently Nathan was sharing our train cabin, along with a young Mongolian guy, who held an elongated eerie stare and didn't like answering his extremely loud ringing phone during the night. We shared food and chatted and admired the blizzard that greeted us almost as soon as we crossed the Russian border. Our entry to Siberia was a picture perfect scene of deep snow, exactly meeting all of our Siberian perceptions.
The snow from the train
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