Tuesday, July 25 Mongol Fresh
We woke up before 8am, in the Mongol yurt, from the sound of heavy rain loudly pouring over the top of the yurt. The yurt started leaking, with water dripping on the carpet and on the bed. I was under a heavy blanket. What a great sleep! — all the grass bugs, moths, toads — all worries disappeared in the great night sleep with the Milky Way above us, with fresh air blowing through the steppes. Apparently, a single mosquito ruins a night, but a hundred grass bugs will sleep around friendly the guests. I was laying under the blanket, watching the water dripping on it, enjoying a little more of the calm moment before the blanket gets wet inside.
Then, in the rain, we ran from the yurt to the host’s house with a bathroom. Toiletries done, we sat for breakfast. Mongolian unsalted cheeses, good coffee were for breakfast, but no milk tea — turned out Stoop’s dad brewed the tea, but he left for errands that morning, and Stoop didn’t know how to brew Mongolian tea.
We drove to Hulunbuir after breakfast; we got the idea to visit a sauna. The sauna was large, taking space over 4 or 5 floors. One floor for lockers, another for massage rooms, another for pools and saunas, game rooms, tea rooms; something like that. Mass scale and affordable. A large water palace to serve the workers. All that space was quite empty on the Tuesday morning.
The lady at the lockers complained about B’s and GQ’s two pieces swimming suits — apparently, one-piece closed-type swimming suit is the standard here for women. But I felt rather overdressed — in my American style long swimming shorts, all Chinese guys looked freeer in their ultra short swim briefs.
The sauna turned out to be Korean style — so no that hot at all; with lots of pools of varied temperatures scattered around walkways. It was pleasant to soak in the warm pool after getting wet in the chill rain in the morning.
We couldn’t decide if I should take the full body scrubbing session.
– Asian men don’t have much body hair. — B was saying, — They will scrub your body really hard. They will pull your hair. It will hurt.
I was getting worried what the heck was this bloody scrubbing service. Finally, I decided to try it. Since I had to separate to the men’s section, we agreed on what exactly they do, and where we meet after. There were many massage tables in the room, and three middle-aged men sitting in the corner. One man was squatting on the chair — he preferred to squat even though he had the fine chair to seat. He held a cigarette to the side of his mouth, so slowly burning the smoke didn’t hit his eyes, while he was typing something on the phone with his hands busied. Another man prepared the massage table, showed me to take off my swimming suit and lay down. So I did, I closed my eyes, and this man washed my body very well. Of course, my body hair was not as easy to pull, as B thought — that was just fine. Then they gave me a single use underwear, wide shorts and a top, and walked me to the game room.
Go, and some other board games that I had not see before, and various 1980s style arcades — that was the game room, which was totally empty. I was fresh; there I waited for B and GQ to finish their body scrub.
Fresh and hungry we went to a local dry hot pot kind of food called Tie guo dun which means Iron Pot. What makes it special is the buns that are cooked together with everything on a side of the pot. GQ said she tried it in Shanghai too. Turned out, it took 40 minutes to cook the pot; usually, people call in advance and arrive when the food is almost ready. So we sat around the table, fresh and hungry, and looked at the pot until it was cooked. GQ said in Shanghai the flow of people is high and they always have a few pots prepared, but in here we had to call in advance.
We stayed at a friend’s house for the next few days. We cooked home made Buryat buuz, and drank hoppy fresh local beer in the evenings — the customs were that one had to drink together with someone, not sipping beer alone whenever one wanted; just raising it and saying something good, and then — chugging the whole medium size mug, and refilling from own bottle. Whenever I tried to sip my beer, someone would join in, say something, and I had to gesture and finish my glass. In two days I got used to it so much that I couldn’t drink beer another way anymore, like sipping by myself.
(written in January)
