Think I gave myself a bit of a cold running around outside too much yesterday. I was running late for almost everything I did yesterday, so I ran everywhere I had to be, which my body didn’t seem to be too happy about today. Ah well, should clear up soon, then I can enjoy the big weekend that’s planned ahead. There’ll be pics and posts about that too, no doubt.
Let’s see, I believe it was Saturday morning that we went out to a music studio to meet Mongolian rapper Quiza, to talk about having on our show. That was really cool, because he was actually recording a new single while we were there, so we got to watch him record some verses. Very cool track which samples a 1920′s Russian communist propoganda song. Quiza’s one of the only Mongolian rappers who raps about real life, politics and social issues. He’s a really interesting guy and if I can get some translations of his raps off Benj, I might post them here.
From there we headed out to see some Mongolian wrestling. It was the 2nd biggest tournament of the year, behind the Nadaam Festival one. It took a while to understand what was happening, because they don’t have a conventional ring or mat where 2 wrestlers go one on one. I can’t remember the numbers or the rounds, but basically they throw heaps of them in at once, pair them up and wait for them all to finish. Winners go to the next round and it works it’s way down from there til there’s only 2 left. I don’t know their actual names, but the 2 in the final were dubbed Tower and Boob. Obviously Tower is just massively tall and powerful and Boob has humungous pecs. Tower won, but did himself a injury on the way. Very dramatic. It was a really interesting thing to watch, because there’s a lot of ceremony involved. The wrestlers have to do certain things when they enter the ring. The officials hold their hats while they compete and the hats have tails on them, with different stripes signify the number of competitions they’ve won. There’s also a ceremony to be done when they win, which involves doing a bit of an eagle dance, a little thing with the person they defeated, their hat’s replaced, then they do a lap around a sort of monument thing, then see monks who give them tea and goodies to throw into the crowd. When competing, the wrestlers can go anywhere in the arena, so they often run into each other, officials, monks, photographers or whoever’s in their way. The officials try to keep them in check and make sure they don’t do any damage. There’s also a lot of butt-slapping, which I think is a hurry-up, but haven’t got a proper explanation for. Funny though. Oh, and do I need to mention the costumes? They speak for themselves:
Saturday night was a big party at our place for Cath, because she’s leaving us very soon. Huge party no less. Gargantuan. Mighty. Well, there were several vomiters, many people making out by the end of the night (2nd hand info because I’d already gone to bed, reasons for which follow), a broken door and a dog left behind. It was a great party and people had lots of fun, vodka and there was dancing all night. I ended up going to bed because I was angry about the dog thing (some people we didn’t know brought a stray dog to our party and left without it), then I was summoned to the bathroom to help get someone out who got locked in and they ended up smashing their way out. After another minor debacle, I just said “Fuck this, I’m going to bed” and walked off. Literally.
The next morning was the first day of Tsagaan Sar, the Mongolian/Asian/Lunar New Year. Basically you go around and visit your closest family and friends, in order of age and importance. Everyone makes hundreds, if not a thousand buuz (Mongolian dumplings), which you have to eat many of at every house you visit. You also have to drink lots of vodka and depending on the household, airag, the fermented mare’s milk drink. There are a lot of really interesting customs and traditions involved, mostly to do with greeting elders and so on. I won’t go into any of these because I don’t know enough, but some involve, in no particular order, a tower of bread/cake, a big, cooked, fatty sheep’s back, snuff and knives. I went around with my friend Toko, who used to work at ESP, and visited his grandfather and other relatives. It was really interesting, but I did feel a bit ill by the end and couldn’t really face doing it again the next day, when I probably should’ve. I relaxed instead.
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