Night 1 & Day 2: Lun, Mongolia


Our driver with a James Bond assortment of changeable license plates sped us onto our first night's destination near the city of Lun. A strip of sand dunes extends many kilometers into the distance and like any tourist stop, people were there ready to take your money.


It was admittedly pretty country.



Entrepeneurial nomads offered pictures atop camels, horses and even rides out on the dunes for your own "Lawrence of Arabia" in Mongolia experience. Unfortunately we encountered a two-tiered pricing system that charged "x" for Mongolians and 2x for foreigners. Stinginess or principle kept me from playing this game. I am a river to my people but not to overchargers in the countryside.






We did spring for a ger as our accomodation for the night after a long day. My first night in a ger!



Others in our party went with tents.


The nomad family lives in the gray one and ours is the white one.


Some of the family's herd of animals.



              хонь!     хонь!


Our host for the night on his herding vehicle of choice with his son.





Impromptu Mongolian wrestling practice



Our new van was bought used from Korea and the previous owners were Christians.





                                       Packing up. More driving is ahead of us.







A skull discovery by L3.


Religious procession at Erdene Zuu, the oldest Buddhist monastery in Mongolia. It was built in 1585.








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Everything I Have Is Yours

Image
   Well today is my birthday and we should celebrate all things me. I agree. Let us celebrate Louis M Cook. But that is not me. I am Louis M. Cook, Jr. That is a fact I made sure my teachers knew and acknowledged as a young and probably bothersome youngster. My Dad is Louis M. Cook. He can put a Senior behind his name or not. As the first one, he has that option.    I do not want to forget my Mom but she has told me that giving birth to me was not a tough ordeal. The next few decades were much more trying for her. I wanted to write this last night but I laid down with my wife and son and told them a few stories about my Dad. The sad fact is that my sons and soon daughter do not and will not know the Dad who raised me. His mind has been attacked by a heinous disease known as Primary Progressive Aphasia. I write this and other stories and tell tales to my kids so that through me they might know and remember him.   He made a living and a unique life through wor...
Read more

Are you useful? Are you willing to be used?

Image
   As a parent I find myself rhetorically asking my son how many times he needs to be told to do something. The answer should be once but that is not the reality. I am working on stopping that question because every time it comes out I am reminded by the Holy Spirit that I am guilty of needing repeated warnings, reminders and training in my life.   I watched and listened to a sermon by David Platt given at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary recently. Three Questions from Luke    I had to listen to it three times and I know I will go back to it again. Platt is a fine preacher of the Word but I think his greatest strength is his passion for the Lord. It is palpable. It draws you in and makes you examine God's word and how it applies to you. That is a powerful gift and he uses it well. His message or better yet God's message clearly stated in Luke is a call to serve Him unconditionally and to love your neighbor as yourself . I am guilty of making le...
Read more

Wanna make God laugh?

Image
You might know the punchline to the saying, "How do you make God laugh?" It is, "Tell Him your plans." It is true. It hit me again today and tonight about the wondrous love he has for us and me and that he has plans for me. Growing up, and I am still growing, I had plans upon plans of what I wanted to do. What I planned to do. I can tell you that not one of them had me living in California for over a decade. None of them had me marry a Mongolian woman. Now they all had me naming my first son after myself but that is about the only one that has happened as I planned. Yet it only occurred after I had decided that my lot was to be a lifelong bachelor. Again God laughed at me.    If you asked if me back home in South Carolina about the chances of me ever meeting a Mongolian much less marrying one and taking our baby boy to celebrate Nadaam in Golden Gate Park, well I would have laughed at you and asked that you lay off the Humboldt County herb.    Yet here I am...
Read more