Ger Camp

Did you know that there are 3 million people living in Mongolia, 1 million people live in Ulanbataar and that 60% of those people living in the capital live in Ger tents. Bet you didn't, that's why I told you.

What is a Ger? I hear you cry well my dear friends, it is a round tent that looks like a small round circus tent except for the fact that it's white. There is no electricity in the Ger, or running water...or underfloor heating. There is only a stove in the middle where a fire burns to heat the Ger. Julia and I were going to go and live...in a Ger.

Outside our Ger Hanna inside our beautiful Ger

We were thoroughly sick of our group by this point, so can you imagine the dances of joy we did when we found out that there were 15 other people at the Ger camp. As soon as we got there we ditched Mooreen, Badonk and Snorelax installed ourselves in Ger number 6 and made new friends. Our guide Gerlee had many things planned for us to do, we found out through doing these activities that Gerlee is a master at extortion. She would be really enthusiastic about making us do things then after we'd done them she would stretch out a small but commanding hand and say"That costs 1,000 tug." which would be followed by us having to pay up...we had been hoodwinked. The activities Gerlee used to extort us were varying but abundant, all the same she managed to trick us every time.

Extortionist Trick no.1 : Archery

Archery looks simple when the native nomadic mongolian man shoots off an arrow at 100km/h which hits a target 50m away first time. But when Julia and I tried this technique out, the outcome was different. Firstly we found it impossible to pull the string back due to our flimsy arm muscles and secondly aiming was rather difficult when blinded by snow and sun. Therefore the outcome was pathetic, the arrows just kind of flopped down...and so did we because it was exhausting.
Extortionist Trick no.2: Horseriding

In Mongolia people ride small but stout horses around on the snowy tundra. I pictured images of Julia and I in Mongolian warrior clothing galloping at full pelt screaming out warrior cries. Instead Julia and I got the broken horses, you know the ones that however much you coax them, kick them and click at them they just keep plodding really slowly whilst everyone else got the warrior horses and raced off into the distance. We did learn one thing though towards the end of our horseride; Mongolian horses don't respond to the same commands as western horses do, to make them go forward you have to scream "CHOOGAAAAH!!" information given to us slightly too late in my opinion seeing as the ride was over.


Extortionist Trick no.3: The Dinner and Lunch Menu

Some idiot (Snorelax) had told Gerlee that all we wanted to eat whilst at Gercamp was traditional Mongolian food. Traditional Mongolian food consists of water, fat onion and some kind of bone thrown in for good measure. Gerlee somehow made this sound delicious and we all ended up having two three course meals of the stuff. It was pretty much inedible and I still feel sick when I think of it, we survived on two bars of chocolate that had gone off 6months earlier for the two days we were there.


Extortionist Trick no.4: Mongolian Nomadic Family

Gerlee told us it would be a great idea to visit a real Mongolian nomadic family so that we could see how people really lived in Mongolia. So off we zoomed in our camper van bus to the Nomads house. In the bus Gerlee says "Oh yeah by the way as a gift I thought we could all pay them money, as thanks for letting us visit" It was too late for us to back out now, I mean Gerlee was knocking on the door of the Nomads house. The first thing we saw when we entered her house was a T.V and a fridge (so much for traditional nomads). Inside we were offered curd that looked like cigarette butts and a special Mongolian tea. Mongolian tea is special because it is made from fermented cow's or sheep's milk, salt, water and lumps of meat. It is rude not to accept food you are offered in Mongolia. We had to drink their meat tea....Deeeeelicious. Other than that the nomadic family was really interesting to learn about, and we could ask them questions about their everyday lives. It was only at the very end after we'd given her our gifts of money the woman tells us that she doesn't even live in the little hut we'd visited she lives in the city. We had visited, and paid, a phoney nomadic woman!!!

Nomadic city woman and an ashtray of stale curd

Nomadic boy and a bowl of sheep's milk

Nomadic boy living dangerously

Activities that were not included in the extortion plan were things such as trying on traditional dress...

...and playing an awesome game called anklebone, that Julia was great at but I sucked at. You threw the anklebones taken from sheep on a table, afterward Gerlee would scream out animal names such as "CAMEL!", "HORSE!", "SHEEP!" and "GOAT!" she would then point at the people who were out, or force you to give her your ankle bones, sometimes she would just snatch all the anklebones off the table and laugh that she won. This game went on for 40 minutes....the things you do to amuse yourself in a Mongolian ger.


We also visited Turtle Rock... a rock shaped like a turtle


And Julia entertained with a chair dance...