Enkhee prepared super yummy French toast for breakfast at 9:30 this morning. Can you imagine I taught Enkhee to make French toast three weeks ago and she made better French toast than me now? I guaranteed the success of Enkhee's restaurant, if she wished to open one. Enkhee had culinary talents and she was curious about adding flavors and varieties to her dinner table. Tobbi seemed to know that I was about to leave, he snuggled in my arms most of the time. I was as generous as usual to share with Tobi my food in plate.
After breakfast, Enkhee took out two farewell gifts from the drawer, to my big surprise, a beautiful matching set of bamboo necklace and two earrings she bought in Cambodia, and a black embroidered handbag with brick and silver Kazakhstan geometric motif. I was overwhelmed with her gracious gestures.
At noon, Enkhee prepared farewell lunch, mashed potato, steam rice, coleslaw salad, beef stirred fry. We toasted a bottle of Fusion beer to wish each other luck in the future. Enkhee and I shared many things in the past weeks, from recipes, clothes, shoes, to childhood memories. I wish we could continue exchanging emails in the cyber space. After lunch, I put on an outfit with silver accessories I got in Ulaanbaatar to leave UB upon Enkhee's suggestion.
At two o'clock, Ganbayar came to pick me up and drove me to Chengiskhan Airport. To be honest, I couldn't wait to leave the freezing Ulaanbaatar for a change. But, when Ganbayar handed me a Certificate of Appreciation on behalf of Mongolian Risk Management Association, Office of the President of Mongolia, and Academy of Management, I almost burst into tears. There was no way I could thank Ganbayar enough for connecting me with many people in Mongolia. Mr. Ganbayar, I thank you and I admire your determination to serve your country. One day, your personal legend will be recoginized like your grandfather's by the people in Mongolia.Before my plane KE-0868 departed from Ulaanbaatar Buyant-Ukha Airport at 5:50PM, I was in fact three hours ahead of time. I didn't waste a single second shopping for souvenirs, vodka, key chains, postcards, poker cards, and handicrafts. At the last souvenir shop, I spent my last tugrug, and made friends with the young and pretty shop owner. With her consent, I found a chair in front of the shop, browsed all English books on the shelves in the sun. Dr. Sharav Bold's books on medicine and health caught my attention.
Being a pharmacist, I'm interested in ethnic medicines, Tibetan medicine, Mongolian medicine, even I was trained mainly in the field of western medicine. In "Insight Into the Secret of a Mongolian Healthy lifestyle", Dr. Bold wrote about four seasons and five colors, black and yellow diet in Spring; white in Summer; green in Autumn; and red in Winter (October to January) and the magic of Khalkh Tea (Mongolian tea). In the past three weeks, my diet was in red, mutton, beef, horse meat, beets, carrots, and I drank a lot of Khalkh tea.
In "History and Development of Traditional Mongolian Medicine", Dr. Bold talked about four skills preferred by women, including honest behavior, wise words, nice appearance, and sewing skills. And Mongolians glorify women as they are deft and skillful in sewing, wise and clear in speaking, holy and fair in actions, of kind and calm character, passionate and sympathetic, with sweet and melodic voice, with smooth and light steps. In my eyes, Mongolian women are beautiful and invincible. While taking care of family chores, many of them also win the bread for their families.
"In modern Mongolia, the biggest health treats are cardiovascular and renal problems among Mongolian men", I was told. Mongolian men eat a lot of meat, drink a lot of vodka, and smoke a lot of cigarettes. Smokers could be found everywhere in UB, in the cars, in the restaurants, both private and public places.
When KE-0868 took off at 6PM, I gave Ulaanbaatar a last look in the sunset! What a beautiful city of one million residents in the big landlocked country! How much it would and could change in the next five years! With 15 strategic mining projects of coal, copper, gold, uranium, on going, such as Oyu Tolgoi and Tavan Tolgoi, Mongolia would certainly be the fastest developing country in the world. Not to mention there would be a huge government investment in infrastructure, including a second railway between Beijing and Ulaanbaatar, a new freeway in Mongolia, a second power station and a second International airport. The GDP of Mongolia would be estimated to double each year to reach US$15,000 in 2015 from US$2,000 in 2010.
The flight from Ulaanbaatar to Inchoen was smooth. The young man sitting next to me was from the Philippines. We both ordered fried fish and bean curd with egg fried rice as the main dish. I loved the side dish of smoked salmon, but the Filipino lad didn't have a bite of the salmon. I was not sure what he did in Ulaanbaatar for two days vacation or business (?), I knew he would need to fly four countries before he got home, Mongolia, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines. I joked about the mileage he could collect from his zigzag way to get home.
Before 10PM (Korean Time), I got on the Hyatt Regency Incheon Shuttle Bus. The clean and flat six-lane roads in Incheon were a big contract to the bumpy and dusty ones in UB. I thought of the joke told by a Mongolian friend. A Japanese visitor asked the tour guide if the persons making the roads were in prison when he first saw the wrecked roads in UB. His Mongolian tour guide answered, "Sir, on the contrary, they are moving up the ladder in government office."
Everybody knew about the long winter in Mongolia was detrimental to maintain good conditions of the roads, but it would be hard not to believe that the politicians and businessmen must have profited a great deal from the road construction. And it's not a uncommon practice (or fault) in developing countries, from anthropological point of view. Homo sapiens would only change their behaviors when the society accumulates certain amount of wealth, moral, discipline, and security, to encourage and appreciate the altruistic ways of life. It would take much longer time to evolve, culturally than economically, for any given country in the world!
It was a fast ride from Incheon Airport to Hyatt Regency Incheon. Before 10:20PM, I checked into Room 1059. After a curious tour of Hyatt for 20 minutes, I retired in bed for the night, watching TV till 11:30PM, from CNN, BBC, Bloomberg, TV Australia, to Japanese BS 1 and 2.
PS: There are 63 channels in UB in every language, but not Japanese. Why? Where are Japanese? Toyota Landcrusers are everywhere in UB.
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