The second site I went back to was my eastern Ondorkhaan site in Khentii aimag. You may remember my slightly less enthusiastic post about my first trip out there. The people living around Ondorkhaan tended to be a bit more suspicious of me, and I picked up a sort of unfriendly vibe. So I was a bit nervous in bringing the gardens out to this group and worried about their reactions.
In the morning Chingerel and I hired another driver from the streets of UB, packed up the car, and headed off. Halfway to Ondorkhaan our driver Davaa turns to me with a confused look on his face and says in Mongolian: "Is your name really Alaska?" Haha! It turns out the pronounciation of my name in Mongolian, "Alayks", sounds a lot like a popular ice cream called "Alyaska". We all had a good chuckle once that was sorted out.
When we arrived in Ondorkhaan we called up Ganbaa, the driver I hired for our first trip. Although he lives in a haashaa (fenced in yard) in town, and he had asked if his family could have a garden as well so I said sure. We met up with his family, helped set up his garden, and he showed us the road to where the other families were living.
Again, I didn't need to be nervous! The families had all warmed up considerably since I first met them. I last visited this site in April, so it was a little trickier to find all the families since more of them had moved, but we found them in the end. See some photos!
I let the families decide where and how to put their gardens up. This family had a wagon caravan/trailer they use to move. So we put the gardens up on either side of it, so it drapes over like a saddle bag.
Herder kids are really strong. This little guy scooped up this lamb, nearly the size of himself, in one arm and posed with his bean plant in the other. Probably one of my favorite photos of all of them!
This family had found an orphaned foal a few days before. It was the cutest little thing, wandering around after us, nickering at us, flopping down to sleep next to their yurt, and tolerating lots of petting. When the time came for the garden photo it following it's 'herd' into the frame and the kids held it for the photo.
Gardens hanging from a shed.
An old couple with their nomadic garden. Another family looks after their animals (they're retired) so their gardens could be set lower than other families'.
I got a few nice pictures of Demoiselle cranes!
Making the gardens together.
Chingerel was cooing over this little filly even worse than me!
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