Marrying monks

The tables turned once again and I did not end up performing the Latin American dance I learned. They cut me because I missed a practice that they informed me about it once it was happening. I was really bummed out about it at first but I let it go soon after. It can be frustrating to be stood up many a times for planned events but then be expected to drop whatever I'm doing to go somewhere because teachers text me when something is happening without any warning. I often get texts like "Where are you? We are _____now. Come now." At first I would freak out and search my memory for something that was planned only to assert that nothing was indeed planned at that time. I'm slowly but surely getting past this cultural difference. Anyways, I ended up performing the Mongolian solo dance I learned in training. The teachers' concert was definitely a good time. The different departments each performed one act for the different categories: singing, dancing, acting, and poetry reading. There was everything from traditional Mongolian dances to hip hop dances to cross-dressed duets. It was a lot of fun. For every act a panel of judges held up little cardboard panels with numbers on them. I must brag that I got a perfect score. I'm sure it's because I'm the goofy American doing the Mongolian dance but I'm going to brag about it anyways! The foreign language department ended up taking second place and 25,000 tugriks. To celebrate and spend our prize we all went out to Mongod Mod, Silver Tree, which is the hoppin bar/club in town. So we ate a good meal, drank a couple of beers and danced away. I love it because Mongolian men are not afraid to dance here. It's quite a sight to see herders in their traditional dels get down to some good ol' trance music. I thought to myself....this is the beginning of a joke..."So three herders walk into a bar...." yet it is really happening. lol.

So a couple of weeks ago two teachers and I went to Erdene Zuu, the local monastery. As I was leaving, one of the Buddhist monks called for me in English. We got to talking and he ended up asking me if I could help him with his English. His English is actually really good, though he wants to practice more. So last night, Byamba the monk, called me to set up a lesson time. He ended up coming over to my ger with another monk though the two monks, my counterpart Handaa and I ended up just talking. The other monk, Dashka, looks like a tall, chubby five year old boy dressed in goldenrod satin. He sat quietly while the rest of us chatted. He'd alternate between tapping his cup and resting his hand in the opening of his robe or reaching for his cell phone. Anyways, after an hour or so they asked Handaa and I if we wanted to drink airag, the fermented mare's milk, later. We agreed. They left and returned with airag and dressed in everyday clothes as opposed to their monk robes. We drank airag, ate chocolate chip cookies that I made, and listened to some Justin Timberlake. ha. Good times. Soon, I will hopefully hold English class for a couple of hours on Saturdays for the monks and tutor Byamba on the side. Handaa, my counterpart, has an understandable crush on Byamba so I'm going to try to work my magic for them. ha. I definitely wasn't aware that monks could even get married! I definitely was ignorant when it came to monk life. I naively thought that maybe monks weren't even allowed to talk, yet here they were- talking to me in amazing English. They were much more modern than I expected. I asked Byamba to teach me about his religion too. I'm excited to learn more about Buddhism and the monk way of life.