Routine, Routine, Routine (Scott)

Those of you out there who avidly read this blog are probably wondering why we haven't made any recent updates -- I mean don't you enjoy living vicariously through our wild and crazy Mongolian exploits? Well, to be honest, there is not really anything exciting going on. Ashlee and I are both trying to keep busy as we settle into our professional lives here in Olgii. We are working hard to establish routines to give our lives some structure and, if you haven't been able to tell from our previous posts, Mongolia is not exactly crazy about structure.

Now that we are in our third week here, I think that we have effectively divided the household chores. Ashlee is in charge of all food (including planning and preparation), all shopping (grocery and otherwise), and using every single pot, pan, and cooking utensil we own when making meals. I am in charge of getting water from the well (we have a 10-gallon or so jug that makes me stronger each time I carry it across the yard), chopping coal and keeping our firewood box stocked, and cleaning every pot, pan, and cooking utensil we own after the Messy Chef cooks our meals.

Every weekday we wake up at 6:30am. Actually, scratch that -- Ashlee wakes up at 6:30am after which she immediately checks to see if the power is on before switching on our electric kettle and powering up the computer for our morning e-mail and facebook checking session. Around 6:45am she has to forcibly drag me out of bed. My excuse for staying in bed later than her is to give her first dibs on the outhouse -- hey, we've only got the one outhouse for the 9 people living in our hashaa! For breakfast, we alternate between bread with butter and jam, suutei boda (white rice with milk, sugar, and cinnamon), kash (sort of like cream of wheat), and oatmeal along with tea for Ashlee and coffee for myself. I absolutely love the French press that I brought with us, but I am running out of coffee. If anyone who is reading this wants to send a care package, coffee is at the top of the wish list! While we eat, we usually hang out with our best "friends" -- Monica, Chandler, Joey, Ross, Rachel, and Phoebe.

Surprisingly, the weather has been relatively warm during this past week. Actually, let me clarify that for all our Californian friends and family: when I say "warm," I mean sunny and mid-60s during the day and not having to make a fire to keep our house warm at night. With that said, word on the street is that this weekend will be bringing some gorgeous 20 degree weather our way! Woo hoo!

Generally we both start work around 9am. While this is already the third week of school, I still do not have a schedule, although one has been promised to me. Basically I must track down a different English teacher every day and invite myself to her lessons the following day with the hope that she will meet with me that afternoon to make a lesson plan. Fortunately things have worked out so far and all the teachers ("counterparts" in Peace Corps lingo) are excited to work with me. So far I have co-taught around 30 classes and solo-taught 5 classes. The classes themselves are 40-minutes long and I have found that the secret to a successful lesson is to have a solid lesson plan. The students -- grades 4-11 -- love to play games and so long as I act like I know what I'm doing, they seem to respond well to me. Just the other day I taught a 4th grade class and the kids were so adorable as I taught them Simon Says with English commands (Sit down! Stand up! Be quiet!) and the Hokey Pokey. They all also seem to love tongue twisters and I generally start each lesson by writing one on the board -- anything from "Freshly fried fresh fish" to the classic "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers." The older students write them in their notebooks and I can hear them practicing them in the halls.

The kids here, really the entire country, absolutely loves songs and music. I mean not a day goes by that I am not asked to "sing a song from my home." Now anyone who has not been to Mongolia might not understand this, but Mongolians have a song for everything and perhaps their favorite past-time is sitting in a circle taking turns singing songs while a vodka bottle is passed around. Such times are incredible to witness -- everyone here seems to have excellent voices. They are not "pitchey" at all! Anytime I am part of one of these circles I always dread the awkwardness of the moment when my turn comes and I try to stutter through the chorus of whatever American pop songs comes into my head. Usually the only thing that comes to mind are my versions of Christmas carols, the Happy Birthday song, and Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. I know, I'm lame. One of these days I'll actually sit down and learn a song that I can sing on command. For now, however, I will rest on my hazy rendition of "Yellow Submarine."

Back to our daily schedule -- Ashlee and I have been fortunate so far to be able to meet at home for lunch every day at noon. We generally eat leftovers from the night before, but if Ashlee wants to butter me up for something she'll make grilled cheese sandwiches with sliced tomato. We usually get to hang out a bit -- maybe watch some "Friends" -- before getting back to work around 2pm. My afternoons are usually reserved for lesson-planning with my counterparts for the next day's lesson. Each lesson plan takes about 40 minutes and I'm generally home by 3pm. Although this past week I did help teach an extra afternoon English lesson for those graduating students who want to prepare for the mandatory English language aptitude test they must pass before enrolling in university. I think the lesson is something that I will begin to teach regularly...however, I am usually the last to know.

Ashlee usually gets home around 4pm and from then on we just kill time until dinner. We have found that the one thing that we can look forward to regularly here in our Mongolian lives is (surprisingly) good food. With the aid of our three American meals at Laura's house every week, our handy Peace Corps cook book, and Ashlee's willingness to try any recipe that sounds good, we have definitely been eating well. Just last night Laura made cheeseburgers, fries, and chocolate cake. Looking forward to such meals -- and the immediate gratification they provide -- is what gets us through the day. It sounds pathetic, I know.

So yeah, when we are not at work, eating delicious food, or showering on Wednesdays and Saturdays, we can generally be found nice and snug in our little house obsessing over Facebook, watching Friends, watching movies, or playing Scrabble. Yep, wild and crazy, we know!