One of the best trips I have had since arriving in Mongolia is to the harvest celebrations with our family gardeners in Bayankhongor. I never had to worry about finding vegetarian food - vegetables were everywhere. Below is a quick collection of notes and impressions I wrote down when I wasn't eating!
Quote on the thermos on the breakfast table "Planted in spring herbs eventually bear fragrant whiffs of joy"
I am sitting in the hotel dining room. The ADRA DJ is flicking through the amazing amount of music stored on the computer. He pauses at "We are the Champions" by Queen. The DJ is wearing a hoodie, nodding his head to the beat - DJ's seem to look the same in every country. We continue to get 30 second bits of songs. The next one is Elton John "Can you Feel the Love".
Representatives from the soums (local small towns) that are participating in the project arrive in dribs and drabs and start setting up their produce (lots of jam and pickles) on their tables. This project works with people from poor families. Their faces reflect their hardships, some are aged by weather to look much older then they are. Some children cling shyly to their mother's legs. There is a mirror on the wall before the door to the hall. A few women stop to check their hair and face before coming inside. I see some faces I recognise from my previous visit, back in spring.
I have to make a speech so I talk about my own little attempts at gardening, which are small and poor compared to the hard work these people have put in outside over summer. Then the ADRA workers conduct games, sing songs and give awards. I am involved in judging the best table according to the criterion of: beauty, creative, homemade and homegrown. I prefer to just take pictures and let the other staff do the serious judging. Food bribes are proffered at every turn by the participants. I am offered beetroot juice in small goblets carved from carrots (these guys won based on creativity). While we eat an older guy in a del and hat sings a traditional long song. A woman in the audience starts a duet and I feel shivers up my spine. The music here can do that, it evokes the hills, the openness, the sky.
At 4pm all the awards are done and people pack up. Outside it is dusty and windy. In my hotel room I hear the cry of the announcer at the Black Market. I think he is announcing which buses are ready to leave for various destinations. On the wind it sounds like a call to prayer. On my desk I have watermelon, a bag of fresh peas and a bag of puffed barley, all gifts. I have eaten so much I won't need to eat for another week.
This photo was not part of the harvest festival, but who can resist a table of carcases in the neighbouring room!
