Snow Bunnies

Engish - a hobbit amongst elves

Today - which is apparently a very auspicious day for people who believe in such things - was the first ever Ulaanbaatar Winter Festival.  When Engrish, Blondie, Champ, and I are old and grey, we just might be telling our grandkids (or great-great niblings) about the winter of 2014, and how we were at UB's very first winter festival.  We school-dwellers set out from the teachers' apartments with the newest newbies, Young and Love, for the Tuul River bright and early at 10:30 yesterday morning.  We should have known better - as much as I love Mongolia, things rarely start on time, especially when it's the first time - but I was really excited about this festival.  Ice archery!  Knucklebone shooting!  And the thing I was looking forward to most - dogsledding!

If you're not wondering about where at the river I was talking about, you should.  Where I come from, you just don't go out "on the ice" unless you're ready to get wet, because there's no guarantee that it will be able to hold you.  It just doesn't get that cold in the mid-Midwest, and I've fallen into the creek on my parent's place at least a couple of times in winter.  On the other hand, I know from experience that back in Iowa I can walk home from it and not have to have my toes amputated from frostbite.  Now, if the ice on the Tuul River is thick enough to drive on (and it is - Enkhaa and I were joking last week that if the traffic was bad we could always take the river), it's probably safe for even someone as Rubenesque as me, but the cracks in the ice and the bitter cold (around -30C) did make me consider how bad the frostbite would be before I got home.

We wandered around, watching them set up, during which we lost Young/Love (they went home because it was kinda cold and nothing was happening), but it was kind of interesting watching everything get set up.  We were particularly fascinated by seeing them get the archery course ready.  This is Uriankhai archery, a kind of Mongolian archery that - from what I can tell, involved shooting targets (snowballs, in this case) that are lying on the ground.  The problem was that there wasn't a back side to the course, so we spent some time trying to figure out which direction they were supposed to shoot from:  Engrish - in her rush to find Enkhaa at one point - nearly walked between the archers and their target.  The good thing is that if she had, the arrows are blunted.

Since my New Year's Resolution - if I believed in them - is to elf myself, I was tempted to get Enkhaa to ask them to teach me to shoot.  Engrish, on the other hand, was more interested in the knucklebone shooting....

These guys were shooting while things were still setting up, but later it became an open invitational, and everyone, including foreigners, were allowed to participate.  Engrish was a little too late to sign up for it, and because she's a nice polite Canadian she didn't force the issue.  Manners are overrated, and since I'm a loud American I offered to convince someone to let her take a shot, but she insisted it was fine.  So now I have to go find some shagai in town so we can try it out on the school ice rink.

Dogsledding is one of the things that's been on my list for a while now.  A friend got to do it here last winter, and I passed up the opportunity because I was supposed to be running an activity at church that Saturday.  Since November I've been trying to figure out a way to do it with the French guy in town that runs it, but his tours were too long and expensive.  I was determined to get in one of those sleds yesterday - and then I didn't.  Engrish got the brochure from the Mongolian guy who runs this company (ie, this isn't the French guy), and it's way more reasonably priced.  I might not get to do it this winter, but I'm definitely staying for another year, so it's definitely going to happen.

The events were great, but it was just a really good experience.  It was great getting out of our apartments and breathing some fresh (-ish) cold air (and - as Bear Grylls says - you burn twice as many calories at extreme temperatures!)  Seeing the kids all bundled up was too freaking cute, and I may have said, "I can't put my arms down!" more than once.  It also amazes me to see how well the Mongolians have adapted - and continue to live with - the cold.  Unlike some places where I have lived that are extremely hot, they keep living and thriving in the cold, instead of just staying inside for the worst of it.  Engrish and Blondie followed up the morning by even more walking around in the cold as we headed up to Gandan ONE LAST TIME after thawing out at California's (where Engrish was glad NOT to eat buuz!)  I STILL didn't get to see sand painting, so I guess it just wasn't meant to be, but I'll say it again, a monastery is never a bad place to be during a holiday, especially when it's a very auspicious day.

Shadows and Light

Well, after nearly a week's hiatus I've reached the end of my Harbin blogs.   There's a limit to how much I can blog when I'm not in the moment, and I reached it.  But the ice sculptures at Zhaolin Park were my favorite part of the festival, and I wanted to share them, so here I am.  It's Sunday and I've ditched church for reasons I won't go into (because it's a little embarrassing) and only got out of my pajamas because I needed to go retrieve my walking clothes from the school so I could wash them.  Total lazy slothfulness.  Gotta love it!

Like I said, Zhaolin Park was better for taking "artistic shots," because of their size and how they were arranged in the park.  The park itself lent a lot of atmosphere...walking in the dark, between the trees, lit by the glow coming off the ice...

If I was a better writer, I'd write a story about this land, sunk in darkness, lit by ice lanterns.  I'd include the pagoda below, because, you know, it looks pretty sweet, and stood out amongst the darkness and shadows with its glow. 

Honestly, I almost didn't go to Zhaolin Park.  I'm glad I did, but the only reason I did was the fact that it was literally a five minute walk from my hotel.  At 7 o'clock, coming back from my last visit to Macca's, I decided that it was my last night in Harbin and I still had money to spend, so I didn't want to just sit in my hotel room and read.  Since Zhaolin Park was so close, it became my destination - it's hard not to love a part of the festival that is so close that if you start feeling freezer burned you can be back in your hotel really quickly.  Somebody reviewed it on tripadvisor and wasn't that impressed - I'm glad I didn't listen to them in the end.  No, the sculptures don't have the scale that they do at Ice and Snow World, but they made up for it in atmosphere.  And they were way cheaper.

Grub Club: Ceylonta

This week's grub club was a bit of a trial for me.  My legs are still a little freezer burned, and walking around looking for a place doesn't help much.  It was supposedly -15C when I checked the temperature at Ti Amo on Seoul Street before walking to where I thought the restaurant was, but I was still in need of a good thaw out when I got to Ceylonta (and not just because I was cold...it's really embarrassing for me to get lost, and infuriating when it's not my fault).  It wasn't Five's fault; it was her first time as Alpha Dog and she took her duties seriously, sending out a link to a good map and decent directions.  I had been hoping she would choose Ceylonta when I sent her Places Mongolia website, and I thought I knew where it was.

I didn't.

It's funny to be writing this now, after just finishing the leftovers from Wednesday night (they were so good that I was willing to eat them, even though they'd been in the refrigerator for two days).  The rice in the picture above was one of Five's picks (we were all eating off of each other's plates) and, in my opinion, probably the most delicious thing on the table.  She was pretty sure she'd be happy with the restaurant, since the pictures she tracked down showed rice, and that's a must if you want your Filipina friend to be happy.

 

My choice was the chicken kottu - a dish of noodles, chicken and vegetables.  It was quite tasty (although not in the same league as that rice!); spicy, but not overwhelming.  There were also enough vegetables in it to make me feel like I was eating healthy (whether or not I actually was!)

Then there was the devil chicken.  Five and Geek both gave it a try.  I snagged a bite of Five's, and I must say that it was diabolically deee-lish!

The best part of all - probably the best dessert in UB - was their hot bananas with cinnamon.  Damned if I don't love me some hot bananas!  I will admit that this photo doesn't make it look too appetizing, and to be honest, it's not the photo's fault.  This is really what it looks like.  But - OHMYGOSH, the taste!  It was absolutely divine!  Anyways, if you want to go to Ceylonta and you DON'T want to freeze as you wander around looking for it, this is the simple way to do it.  Start at the Natural History Museum (the one with the dinosaurs).  Cross over to the east side of the street.  Start walking north.  It will be just before you hit the second block, very close to Metro Mall (another mall in UB?  Who knew?)

Sun and Snow

I am beginning this post while attempting to eat dinner.  Normally I don't have any problem eating dinner, but then again, normally I don't "diet."  I made an exception for this one because it was fairly easy (3 days on, 4 days off, then repeat if you like), seemed pretty balanced (ie, doesn't let you eat any damn thing you like as long as you don't touch carbs), and is mostly comprised of things I like to eat.  I don't like broccoli, but I didn't like any of their alternatives much better, so I'm attempting to choke down the last sprig of the cup I was supposed to eat.

One cup of broccoli is a lot more flowers than I generally eat in a given day.  But I finished them.  I kinda felt like I had to after scarfing down a bunch of peanut butter cups after school (not included in the diet, but I had a killer headache, and damned if the junk food didn't make me feel better).

So, now that I've gotten that out of the way, the topic for today in the blog-a-thon is the snow sculptures at Sun Island.  As I mentioned, they were Domestic Goddess' favorite part of the festival, and I have to admit, it's a great location - beautiful trees, the glowing light of sunset (because I didn't quite time it as well as I wanted), blue skies.  Picture perfect.

Also lovely was the contrast of bright red accents against the white snow and blue skies.  Made me feel all patriotic...for China during Lunar New Year.  Seriously, though, I loved the contrast - I hope the red accents are up for the whole festival, because otherwise those schmucks who came early in January are missing out big time.

In fact, unlike some parts of the Snow and Ice Festival, you really got the feel for China here.  While a lot of the sculptures had nothing to do with China, it IS a good use of space, and a lot of the sculptures, such as the feng-huang (phoenixes) below were accompanied by sculptures that complemented them brilliantly.

Like I said, though, not all of the sculptures had anything to do with China.  I was especially delighted to see my friends from Easter Island.  I thought the sculptors did an especially nice job on the nose of the one in the middle - I'm pretty sure I've seen that exact nose on a Rapa Nui native.  Trust me - I know my noses.

All in all, the snow sculptures on Sun Island were amazing - not my favorite (that's still to come), but pretty remarkable.  The snow castles (not pictured here - you'll have to check out my facebook photos for that) beat the hell out of the snow forts Shaggy and I made growing up, and the amount of detail they put into these things was amazing.  On the other hand, they didn't have a snow queen, and if they did, the Princess' snow queen would take her in a fight, cause that woman was one scary bitch!  Glad to know my artistic genes won't die out if I never have kids.

...Arctic Visits YOU!

Originally the last post was going to involve the aquarium as well.  I got halfway through it and decided I'd go ahead and make it two posts.

Harbin Polarland was not originally on my list.  I figured I had some extra time, though, and the posters advertising it made it look cool.  Although I've seen most of these animals in Omaha at the Doorly Zoo, I've never had pictures this good - oh, the difference a good camera makes!

The polar bears were hypnotic to watch.  They were swimming around and around their tank, and I loved how their fur swirled in the water.  Back when I had long hair I liked to watch my own hair swirl in the water - maybe that's a thing for me.  Whatever.  They were way cool.

They had arctic foxes (not ones you could pay to pose with, though), but I was fascinated by their wolves.  They were gorgeous.  One thing I've taken away from this trip is the knowledge that I will never own a fur coat.  I know it would be super warm, but unless the fur comes from an animal that is used for meat, I don't think I could bring myself to wear it.  It's such a waste of a beautiful life.

The seal and sea lion show is one of the aquarium's big attractions.  Parts of it were funny, but I've seen a seal or two in my life, and the narration was totally in Chinese, so I wasn't that impressed with it.  There was one part where the seal squirted water at the audience, though, which made me really glad I wasn't seated in the middle section.  I don't think my camera would have been too happy getting soaked - I sure wouldn't have been, especially since I was planning to go see the snow sculptures afterwards.

The stars of Polarland are their beluga whales.  They do an act to "My Heart Will Go On," called - get this - "Heart of Ocean" (copyright infringement much???)  The big finale involves the whales and divers smooching with their bodies creating a heart (I didn't get a good picture of that - it was really crowded), but the part that really amused me was when one of the whales got a little too...excited.  His diver (yep, his - you figure these things out pretty quickly under such circumstances) had to take him to the side of the tank to calm down before the little kids started asking their parents what that was?  I figured it served the diver right - you play romantic music, you lock lips with him...you can't just lead a whale on like that.  Anyways, the animals were cool and it was a nice way to come in out of the cold before hitting up the snow sculptures.

On Ice

The crowning jewel of Harbin in winter is, of course, Ice and Snow World (Domestic Goddess disagrees - she liked the Sun Island International Snow Sculpture Expo.  You can make your decision when I get around to making that post).  I guess if you're going to be ridiculously cold, you might as well do it in style, and they do. 

I took a quick spin around the park, started debating whether or not I actually wanted to go down any of the ice slides, and then saw the guys with the beautiful arctic foxes.  Aside from a slightly funny shaped head (compared to a regular fox, anyway) they were gorgeous, and before I had much of a chance to question the ethics behind making these animals pose with tourists, I had one in my arms and its Chinese handler was snapping pictures for me.  The privilege cost 20 kuai, but I guess they've got to earn their keep somehow, so I didn't mind too much.

I couldn't help thinking about my niece, the Princess, either.  As you might infer from the nickname I gave her, she is obsessed with all things princess right now.  In fact, I can't decide if I should send her the sky lantern I bought for her, or make her wait until I can be there with her to see her set it off - she may not be in love with Tangled anymore by then.  Anyways, I think she would have loved Ice and Snow World.  There were these large sculptures of some of the Disney princesses, but even more, I think she would have loved seeing the ice castles.  Heck, I'm not much of a girly-girl but I loved seeing the ice castles - there was something about them that was just magical.

See what I mean?

Ice and Snow World is best at night.  I didn't mean to go so early - I thought I would check out Polar Land, and then walk over, but when the taxi drove me over there, I realized they were not within walking distance.  Or rather, not what I consider walking distance when it's -25 C outside.  So I was a flake and told the driver that where I really wanted to go was Ice and Snow World.  Which he didn't understand because I was speaking English, but with heavy use of the word bing and lots of pointing, he got the gist of what I wanted.  And it was pretty neat seeing the ice by day, and watching the sun set.  I even decided that as long as I was wasting time I might as well go down the ice slides.  And after them, I decided to find out what this Harbin theater thing that started at 5 o'clock was.

Before the performance got started, there was an auction, which struck me as really amusing.  The paintings were beautiful and not too expensive but I had no use for any that big, so I just enjoyed following the auctioneer - "Wu-shi kuai?  Wu-shi kuai!  Yi-bai kuai?  Yi-bai kuai?  Wu-shi kuai, yi.  Wu-shi kuai, ar...  Yi-bai kuai!"

It's one way to keep an audience from getting too restless, that's for sure.  There were also waitresses that came around the theater to try and sell drinks and popcorn - I didn't end up having any, myself, but I was tempted and liked the idea - reminded me of the service at Avenue Q when Babysis and I went.

Something else I realized while watching the show?  The Chinese do not make the most appreciative audience.  They had skaters in these kung fu outfits doing freaking flips on skates, and they didn't clap.  I was amazed - I can skate going forward, and that's about it.  If I so much as try to skate backwards, I am likely to end up with a bruised tailybone.  If I tried to do a flip, I imagine I would decapitate myself on the blade of my skates.  Or if not me, definitely someone else.

The best part of the performance was this sort-of love story, with the girl doing acrobatics.  For the big finale of their act, she twined herself up in a silk ribbon and then let herself fall, twisting through the air as the silk unwound from her body.  I would undoubtedly have broken my neck.  She got to the end and simply hung suspended until her lover came and "caught" her.  It was beautiful to watch.

In my next life, I hope to be a little more graceful.

In my next life, I also hope to be a little more technologically literate.  I did something and my whole post just disappeared, and Ctrl-Z didn't make it go away.  I had to close out the tab and burn some incense to the Tech Gods that it hadn't saved after that.  Luckily, it hadn't.

When I got out of the skating performance, the whole park was lit up like a birthday cake and it was COLD!  I am, on reflection, very glad I didn't decide to come here when I was living in Shanghai.  I would have died.  I think I managed to get a little frostbite on my inner thighs in spite of my precautions (including buying heat packs to stick inside my long underwear).  Only living in Mongolia could have prepared me for that kind of cold.  I walked around this wintery fairy land snapping photos for most of another hour, and probably should have stayed longer - it cost more than $50 for admission - but dang it, I was cold, and the fact is, the sculptures were so big that it was hard to line up really cool, artistic shots of them (Zhaolin Park was much better for that).  So I wussed out and went back to the hotel fairly early.  And was completely okay with that.