November in UB

The opening night of an art exhibition.

The artwork focused on calligraphy of the traditional Mongolian written script.

The opening night of the French-German Film Festival.
The film was called 'The Two Horses of Genghis Khan'

Felting workshop

My Assignment

I officially began my Australian Youth Ambassador for Development (AYAD) assignment this week by starting full-time work at the Mongolian Government’s Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) Agency.

The SME Agency is a government agency that was established by the Mongolian Parliament in 2008. It aims to promote the sustainable growth and development of Mongolian SMEs through policy and regulation.

The Agency consists of four divisions with 25 employees, as well as five SME centres from which SMEs can gain business information and advice. I have a supervisor, Suvdaa, who speaks really good English, as well as four counterparts, half of whom speak English really well also. They have been really friendly and welcoming, taking me out to lunch every day since I began. There is also a lovely Japanese man of around 65 who’s here as an advisor on a two year contract. So I’m pretty lucky that I can speak English, Japanese and Mongolian (although very little of the latter) in the office!

My AYAD role at the Agency will be as a Business Projects Officer. When I applied there was a list of desired outcomes for the assignment, although it seems that these are going to change as priorities for the Agency and for the Government continually change. I don’t mind at all about that, I’m happy to be working on such a good cause with great people, who are passionate about improving the prospects for SMEs in Mongolia. This ultimately ties in to the Millennium Development Goal #1, which is to help reduce poverty.

In general, I will be assisting in project planning, particularly for upcoming events such as the Made in Mongolia exhibition that is held annually in January before the Lunar New Year. These events are opportunities for small businesses in Mongolia, such as those in handicrafts, to showcase their products. Skills in this area are supposedly lacking because of the abovementioned reason: priorities alter, which means work tasks frequently change also, and therefore it is difficult to plan for something that may not even happen.

It also sounds like I will be involved in policy development through research, from which I will assist in writing and submitting papers and reports. Some main issues that the Agency wants to deal with are:

• Advising SMEs about networking avenues through which they can then sell their product (markets, fairs, shops, etc.)
• Advising SMEs about the loan system and what sorts of loans are available to them depending on their structure, number of employees, etc.

Since I began last week (half days as I had language lessons in the mornings) it has been quiet in the office as a lot of the staff has been involved in rural trips for the monitoring and evaluation process of low-interest loans that the Agency provided to SMEs across the country. It has been good for me as I’ve been concentrating on learning about the Agency and its work, as well as the SME sector and rural and industrial development in Mongolia. I also got the chance to go the 90th anniversary event of cooperatives in Mongolia (even though it was all in Mongolian and I didn't understand any of the presentations..).

I have always been passionate about development, and I feel that this experience will definitely heighten this interest, especially in terms of community planning and development for rural and regional areas.

And one last thing – I have my own set of business cards for the Agency! This is definitely a sign that I have been fully accepted into the organisation!

A day in the Mongolian countryside

This past week has been pretty busy but very productive. I’ve settled in to my new apartment, shopped for groceries and household goods at several markets and supermarkets spread around UB (it’s impossible to get all your shopping at one place here), and began language classes for three hours a day. It was also filled with lots of social events - on Tuesday we went to another group of AYADs apartment to watch the Melbourne Cup and on Thursday night a big group of us went out for dinner and to see a Mongolian band called Altan Urag. I really loved this. The band consists of six members, playing mostly traditional Mongolian instruments (including the horse-headed fiddle) but play a cross between of punk/rock/folk. They’re also pretty famous and have played at the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan. Unfortunately though sets in Mongolia last for just 15-20 minutes so after just four songs the band was packing up to go home…

After such a busy week, I couldn’t think of a better way to spend yesterday (Saturday) than to go out in to the countryside of Mongolia for some fresh air, beautiful views and lovely company. Our in-country management team organised for a group of us AYADs to visit a traditional nomadic Mongolian three-generation family.

On the drive there we stopped by the roadside where a Mongolian man had a couple of eagles. In western Mongolia, eagles are trained since birth as hunters to catch marmots, rabbits and small foxes. This has been a Mongolian Kazakh tradition for centuries. These particular eagles that we saw had had their wings clipped however, so it was possible for any person to have the eagle sit on their forearm and upon which the bird would balance while the person lifted their arm up and down. A few of the AYADs did just that (I couldn’t bring myself to go near those claws after a few too many bird swoops at home).

The drive to and from the family’s ger (literally meaning ‘home’, the ger is the traditional Mongolian tent, called a yurt in English) was absolutely stunning. We even got to see a group of camels with two humps, along with many goats, sheep, cows and of course, Mongolian horses.

Upon arrival at the family’s ger we were greeted by the elders through hugs and instead of kisses, sniffs on both cheek. We then went into the mother and father’s ger, entering in to the left hand side of the door. We were given a cup of white tea that instead of sugar, is flavoured by a few pinches of salt. I thought it actually tasted quite nice.

There were also some snacks for us to try that were kind of like bits of hard donuts.

We had brought along food to made a hor hog, the real traditional Mongolian barbeque. The father of the family was responsible for cooking this (not that different to an Australian BBQ) so while it was being prepared we were told to take a walk and a look around their beautiful property. During this time we also visited the elders ger, which was actually a traditional Kazakh ger. They were really lovely and even let us try on a traditional Kazakh outfit. The hat I’m wearing is actually made out of fox feet!

A few hours later we all sat down in the ger (around 25 o f us) to enjoy the meal. The meat of the hor hog was mutton, and we had cooked some vegetables and made salads to go with it. It was delicious. By the time we had all finished our meals it was getting late so we had to say our goodbyes.

On our way home back to UB we stopped at the big Chinggis (Genghis) Khan statue, which shows Chinggis riding a horse. According to legend, this is where Chinggis had found a golden whip. The statue is 40 metres high and apparently you can climb up to the head of the horse. Unfortunately it was getting quite dark (not to mention FREEZING cold!) so we’re hoping to go back again in the daytime.