Jet-Lag

We are in Mongolia and are almost over our jet-lag. We left Salt Lake on Saturday 12/14/13 and flew to Los Angeles where we spent 6 hours with Deni's sister Robin before we flew out at midnight. We flew all night and landed in Seoul, Korea at 6 AM on Monday morning. We were in Seoul till 1 PM and then on the tarmac for a few more hours. Seoul was the nicest airport either of us were ever in. They offered FREE tours of the city of 1hr, 2, 3 4 or 5 hours. We were going to take one of the tours but we had over 100 pounds of "carry on" luggage that we were hauling around the airport and airports don't allow any luggage left at the airport anymore. They don't have lockers or any other way to leave them and we weren't going to haul them around the city. Instead we took advantage of the "cultural experience" and we took a FREE lesson on making a silk coin purse. We then took advantage of the FREE automatic chair massage, we lounged in the FREE lounge chairs, watched the FREE TV, and took a nap on the FREE resting lounges. It was a pleasure to have a nice long layover in Seoul, Korea.
We arrived in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia at about 5 PM on Monday evening. We had to go through immigration and customs and then get our 200 pounds of bags to take out with our 100 pounds of carry on. We were the last ones out of the terminal and the mission assistant was there waiting. He had been there most of the day since he had to take some missionaries to the airport earlier in the day and thought it would be better to wait until we got in about 2:30. Our flight was delayed and then we took forever getting out. When we walked out of the terminal Deni started to cough and our eyes started to water. It smelled like something dirty was burning. Turns out that they burn coal for heating the cities water and all the homes and the cars all burn dirty fuel so the air is filthy. We loaded our heavy luggage into the car and headed for the city and the mission home about 6:30. It is only about 45 miles but the traffic is amazing and it took us about 1 1/2 hours to get to the city.
We got in and met with the mission president and his family of 4 children and his wife. They had waited dinner till we got there and had a great meal of beef stew that was delicious. We had tried not to sleep much so we could get accustomed to the time difference as quickly as possible and we fell into bed as quickly as we could. We died as soon as our heads hit the pillow.
On Tuesday morning I woke up at 3:30 and couldn't go back to sleep. We had breakfast at 7:30 in President Benson's apartment with his family. (He had to leave earlier for a week in the field so we haven't seen him all week.) We were taken around and introduced to the other missionaries in the office as well as the building staff. The mission home is right in the middle of the city and right on a busy main street. Everyone was so excited to have us here and we are excited to be here.
We were told that we had some government paperwork to be done so we couldn't be taken to our home area until Friday but we were put up in a nice dorm and had the week to get adjusted to the time change and to the country. Each night a couple had agreed to take us to dinner and get to know us. The first night we went with the Wood's and the mission doctor and his wife, the Stewart's. We went to a nice restaurant and had delicious salad and a fancy pizza. We were really surprised at how good the food was.
On Wednesday the Wood's took us to the bank to take out 800,000 tugriks (they call them toogs) (the max the ATM will allow withdrawn) which is about $450. Inflation keeps driving their money down and they have bills of 1 toog which is $.0006 and a 100 toog bill is 60 cents. It is so hard to go into a store and see that a bag of almonds is $30,000 (which is still about $20.00) but we are trying to adjust. After the bank we went to a few stores (Pictures attached I hope) and were surprised at how expensive their food is. They have ANYTHING that you would want but most things are more expensive than at home. They have a lot of Costco Kirkland brand items and we will be able to stock our shelves just like at home BUT we will have to pay for it.  Another couple said that when they first got here they weren't going to pay those prices but then they got hungry so they just stopped looking at the prices.
Deni needed to get a hairdryer so we went to a very nice department store and found one for $39,000. She pointed to the sign and the girl went to get the dryer. I took out and gave her two $20,000 bills. She shook her head and showed me the register. She charged $59,000 for the dryer. Deni said No and turned to show her the sign above the sample dryer but the sign was gone. We didn't buy the dryer.
Wednesday we had a delicious dinner at the Ney's apartment. She made Indian tacos and they were really good. The most amazing thing is how good the food is. It isn't processed so it is really fresh and good.We learned more about the way the missionaries live and what they do.
Today we drove about an hour out to the Genghis Khan memorial with Elder and Sister Wood and Elder and Sister Linford. It should have taken 2 hours but Elder Wood thinks he is a race car driver and he doesn't let a little thing like cars and pedestrians stand in his way. We completely went off the road once when we passed a car that was already passing another car on a 2 lane highway going about 60MPH. We stopped along the way and had our pictures taken with an eagle, a vulture, and some reindeer.The weather warmed up to about -15 and it was a really exciting day. The monument was truly amazing. The pictures don't nearly do it justice.
After we returned from our adventure at the monument we were shuttled off to the government immigration office for fingerprints and paperwork. Apparently we passed because we are being taken to Darkhan tomorrow morning to move into our own apartment. We are told that we have a temporary apartment for about 6 months that is so small that it couldn't have a bed and a couch so it only has a pull out couch. We will update you on how it is once we have moved in.