Starch and dairy, dairy and starch

The second day in the grasslands we found ourselves ravished around lunchtime. The only place close was the canteen at our tourist trap, so we ventured in. Max placed our order.

First out of the kitchen was sliced carrot sautéed with lamb. The carrots were nice, not overcooked and sliced wonderfully. The thin oil and vinegar sauce was a nice accompaniment. The lamb, however, was not a treat. Continuing the theme, it was overcooked, gamey, and hard to eat.

Next was sautéed eggplant, green peppers, and potatoes - a dish I would learn later is called "three treasures." This was wonderful. Each vegetable had been cooked well, the dish was piping hot, and the sauce was slightly sweet and full of flavor. The potato slices, in particular, were thinly sliced, crisp on the outside with enough soft mash inside to remain delicious. This did not last long on the plate.

Finally, and again, there were milky noodles with lamb. All I can say is, ugh. I was in no mood for a bad tasting dairy-filled bowl of noodles. I tried to pick out some of the noodles but to no avail. I was forced to push this dish away.

A bit unrelated, but...on the way out of lunch, we saw this very large two-humped camel. Not sure if it was a good sign or a bad omen, but there it was.

Hospitality in a yurt

We reached the collection of yurts and a man came toward us. First he began to speak in Mandarin (I think) but quickly realized it was no use given our blank stares. So he switched over to hand signals, and welcomed us in. We were led into his kitchen / dining room.

He offered us some water, which we gratefully accepted and began to drink. After a handful of minutes, out came a couple of nibbles.

There were seasoned tofu disks, julienned potatoes with bean sprouts, and diced spicy green chillies. The chillies were tremendously hot, so much so that a small chopstick amount required an infusion of potatoes afterward to bring down the heat. All were tasty.

Next, a bottle of somewhat official moonshine appeared. With a wolf on the label, we knew this was serious stuff. Simon, the name of our host, shared that it was 38% alcohol. He had some 62% alcohol in a jug, should we want to graduate to that. We quickly said no, the 38% was great, thanks. He poured a small shot for all four of us (we were joined by the cook at this point), and with a quick "ganbei" it was down.

Then, we began to converse. Well, communicate as best we could. We shared our ages, 30 and 31 on our side and 46 and 54 on theirs. We told him about our walk and the perilous barbed wire fences we encountered. He told us they were a bunch of contruction workers building a small complex for the summer sports festival, when typical Mongolian sports would be played. wish we could have been there for that!

After a lull in the conversation, Max suggested we break out our playing cards. We did and it was a hit. We started with Blind Man's Bluff. Simple to learn and fun to play, we each placed a card on our heads. We looked at each others' cards but not our own. Then, we put them down and the low card lost. We graduated from that to Blackjack, a surprisingly simple game to communicate with your hands. Then, perhaps overestimating our ability to share new games, we switched to Russian Poker (where you have 13 cards in your hand and make one 3-card and two 5-card poker hands). That only sort of worked. But we had a great time, lots of laughing and traveler friendships.

Then it was time for dinner. The cook took me down to the meat cellar, and I saw various parts of lamb on hooks, curing for later use.

He hacked off a piece of lamb from the left leg and brought it upstairs. He began to cook it in a large wok.

I am sad to say that it did not taste very good. The method of cooking for this easy-to-be-gamey meat was boiling in plain hot water. It quickly got overcooked and dry, with little good flavor left to its name. However, there were a couple of interesting condiments to try topping it with. One was awful, little white cubes in a red sauce. I could speculate as to what they were but would rather not. The other, though, added a nice pesto-chilli flavor to the meat. We hung out with them for another handful of hours. It was a great and unexpected night!

Thanks to Simon and his friends for taking two weary travelers in and showing them some great Mongolian hospitality!

The grasslands are greener

We reached Jinzhanghan quickly and were delighted - mostly. It turned out that the main place to stay was a kitschy, overdone tourist trap that had dressed up their Han Chinese staff in Mongolian outfits and put on all manner of ridiculous shows. We tried to come up with a plan B for somewhere to stay, but drew a blank. So we dumped our bags and quickly made for the grasslands.

And it was heavenly. Within 15 minutes, we were over a hill from the schlocky camp and amidst the lovely grasslands.

This was big sky country, halfway around the world from Montana. The sky was clear with a couple of clouds (incidentally, one of the very few days in which we've seen the sun in China). The grasslands just went on and on. We were in a small valley with a winding river running through it. On either side there were gently rolling hills. We began to walk in one direction. We came across horses.

We came across sheep.

We came across dead sheep.

And, every once in a while, there would be some kind of livestock fence. Sometimes we could walk for a bit and get around it, other times the only way through was over or under.

It was a great walk, in the broad sunlight and with a slight breeze in the air. The hills in the distance appeared to shimmer with happiness.

We saw a small group of yurts off in the distance and made our way towards them...

Beard overload!

With so many weeks gone, we'll have to add a couple of Track My Beard shots to the flipbook. They also provide a sneak preview of some of the China posts to come. Last one will stay on the right page of the blog, the rest are for posterity!

Early in Shanghai, on May 20, this is me on the Bund in front of one of the ubiquitous Expo advertisements.

At Zhouzhuang, the water town, on May 24, in front of Ruyi Pagoda.

Bearded in Inner Mongolia, this is me on May 30 with the grasslands.

Back in Beijing, on June 3, next to a very large bell in the Bell Tower.

And, finally, in Beijing on June 7, hanging out with a dragon stellae in the Lama Temple.