THE TRANS SIBERIAN EXPRESS (PART 5) MONGOLIA

The bus dropped the group at a hotel in central Ulaanbaatar. The room’s décor was a throwback to the early eighties, though it was clean and comfortable like the rest of the hotel.


The room had an old television standing in the corner so I switched it on to see type of shows they had on Mongolian TV. The first few channels had what appeared to be local soap opera’s, another had Mongolia’s national sport wrestling. I watched intrigued for a while as two huge men wrestled in traditional costumes while cheered on by a large outdoor crowd.

I changed the channel again and I stopped and stared at the TV amazed as there on a TV screen in a hotel room in Mongolia was a rugby league football game from Brisbane, Australia, my hometown. I couldn’t believe it. The game was only a day old and was being shown on the Australian Broadcasting Commissions overseas satellite service. It was a little surreal sitting there in a hotel room in Ulaanbaatar watching my favourite team play.

 The group had free time which allowed me to go and explore the city by myself. I walked into the city centre and just wandered around. There were not any true high rise buildings and only a few modern buildings. Most of the buildings appeared to be from the Soviet era, bland blockhouses in a state of disrepair.

A large ceremonial square dominates central Ulaanbaatar with a monument to the national hero Sukhbaatar. The spot was chosen because that was where Sukhbaatar's horse had peed (a good omen) on July 8, 1921 during a gathering of the Red Army. At the other end of the square are government buildings and Sukhbaatar’s granite mausoleum. It reminded me of Red Square, Moscow.

There were few shops that catered to tourists and in these you were able to pick up a variety of Mongolian art and wares at very cheap prices. It appeared that the busiest places were the internet café’s that dotted the city. Inside the café you would see a veritable united nations of travelers pounding away at the ancient computer keyboards keeping in touch with far-away homes.

In all my travels around the world I have only felt unsafe twice and one of those places was in Ulaanbaatar, where I was stalked by a group of you men on the way back to the hotel.
It was late in the afternoon but still light when five young men started to shadow me down the road. There were only a few people about and I had to pass some areas of vacant lots and ramshackle buildings on my way back to the hotel. The five never deviated from the same route as I, sometimes one or two would move ahead whilst the others dropped in behind me.

I was starting to get a little worried.


I was fast approaching the vacant lot area and wondering what I should do when I saw a local taxi approaching down the street. Without hesitation I leapt onto the road in front of the cab which screeched to a stop. I jumped into the back seat and motioned the driver to go. As I drove down the road I looked at the five young men who grinned at me as one drew his finger across his throat, a motion that left me in little doubt about their intent.


When I arrived back at my hotel I reported the incident and a few days later I read in the local paper that a number of westerners had been assaulted and robbed in the area where I had been pursued. I was lucky!

The next day the group reunited and we did a tour of the sites of Ulannbaatar. First stop was the Gandan Monastery which houses a thirty meter high statue of Migjid Janraisig. It is a working monastery and we were able to enter the inner sanctum and watch the monks carry out their chants and rituals.

We next stopped off at the Winter Palace of the Bodg Khan, the last monarch of Mongolia. The palace is now a museum which was in a poor state of repair at the time of our visit. Most of the exhibits in the museum are the personal possessions of the Khan and his wife. The last stop on the day tour was at the lookout at Zaisan. This gives the observer a panoramic view of Ulaanbaatar, but the most interesting part is the mosaic that commemorates the cooperation between the Mongolian people and soviet Russia.

The day was finished off by a hearty Mongolian feast and then a traditional Mongolian concert which presented a group of throat singers which was a very strange experience and we were all amazed that a human could make such a weird noise.


We had an early start the next day and Nemo came to our hotel and escorted us all to the railway station to board the Trans Siberian for the next leg of our journey and after a lot of heartfelt farewells we boarded the train and set off westward.