Slump City

Beauty Beheld

I came to Ulaanbaatar intending to like it. A friendly reception and a job I enjoyed made that easy for the first few months. And then, the city has its own merits. Despite housing something in the neighborhood of one million people, Ulaanbaatar feels negotiable; surrounded by hills, even its worn soviet architecture, interrupted by an occasional skyscraper, can be very appealing.

I grew accustomed to seeing the best in the city, overlooking or accepting what might repel me in urban America. Traffic, garbage, dirt, 20-degree handicap ramps, walkways for the blind disrupted by ledges and poles: I ignored these things daily. Smog? Well, the city kind of smells like camping all the time.

Cold Shoulder

Then it got cold—not so cold, but enough to make life generally less pleasant. Then things started going wrong. Previously I laid out the UB Post, wrote four stories a week, and ensured the paper had sufficient, reasonably correct, English content. After the editor-in-chief returned from the countryside and I relinquished some of these responsibilities, I found that I now struggled to finish two articles-an-issue.

Every sentence I wrote looked like a slug trail. I spent lunch hours staring at blank pages, and making matters worse, I suddenly couldn’t land an interview. An official with Mongolia’s Olympic Committee canceled on me and then disappeared to Korea. A teacher and a professor I’d counted on delayed our meetings. I went to the US Embassy and the Vice Consul fainted at a press conference before I could interview him.

Better Luck Next Crime

These events made for a few slow weeks, but then it looked like I’d have a pretty nice recovery. Snow arrived, as did my girlfriend (and now co-worker), Bijani, from America, and I prepared for things to start going my way. They didn’t. Within a few weeks of her arrival, I impressed Bijani by getting robbed twice.

First I hung my jacket on a restaurant chair and my wallet disappeared. A few days later, I stowed my backpack under a seat at an internet café. I was speaking with my mother and father via webcam when I looked down to see my bag was gone. I ran out the door. My parents sat at their computer for half an hour, staring at the Russian guy who filled my seat.

My bag had a spare key and the address of my apartment. After some reflection, I sprinted home and sat on my floor until getting through to my editor. He called a locksmith. In addition to the usual difficulties of living with someone for the first time, these few days didn’t allow me to give Bijani the best introduction to life in Ulaanbaatar.

Writers, Lock

It got worse. Returning home from a late dinner, we found the main entrance to our apartment locked. The door has a combination: push the right buttons and it opens. I don’t know what they are; it’s never closed. Normally in these situations, one simply presses the most worn buttons. Workmen had painted our door the day before.

(To be continued)