Live From Mongolia

by Patricia Sexton

  I spent all day hunting down the items on my shopping list, and Tobie spent all night using Photoshop to carefully craft the homemade badges. By the next morning, we had minted our final product by glue-sticking our photos onto the forgeries. They were perfect.

  And that morning, just as we’d suspected, Tem never arrived at the station. In fact, no one else did either, except the receptionist. Everyone from TV5 was attending Naadam. But, as it would turn out, the receptionist was just the person we needed. On her desk were two official TV5-logoed jackets. Nothing would better complement our counterfeit passes than authentic clothing.

  “May I have two, please?” I said to the receptionist, as Tobie and I left the station for the opening ceremony. She was on her cell phone, texting, and had a habit of not looking up from it, ever.

  “Bish,” she said without looking up. “No.”

  I tried again. “Please?”

  “Bish.”

  “Yes?”

  “Bish!”

  The clock was ticking its countdown toward the noon start of Naadam. It was now thirty minutes before the ceremony, and between it and us was a lot of traffic.

  One last time, I pleaded with her. “Please, please,” I said.

  And for some reason, she relented. Still without looking up, she shoved the jackets at us and went back to her cell phone.

  “Thank you! Thank you!” we cried as we dashed out the door and into a taxi.

  “Sükhbaatar Square!” we instructed the taxi driver.

  “Bish,” he said.

  In Mongolia, it goes without saying that the locals are sticklers for pronunciation. This may be due to the fact that, at least to my ears, words and phrases with very different meanings sound exactly like each other. For instance, “I’m hungry,” sounds just like “Currently I’m drinking a glass of water.” When one made a request of a local, a language lesson would always come first and the request second, regardless of the urgency of the situation. Most of the time, this was incredibly useful, but on the inaugural day of Naadam, it was anything but.

  Once more, “Bish.”

  “Sokh-bodder?” I tried one more time.

  “Za,” he said, “Okay.” With that, we sat in traffic for exactly twenty-eight minutes.

  Finally, just as the prime minister was beginning his welcome speech, Tobie and I arrived. A brass band trumpeted off in the distance, and the crowd roared. Thousands of tourists lined the perimeter of Sükhbaatar Square. At the center of this throng, diplomats, royalty, and government officials stood on a large dais in front of a statue of Genghis Khan. Security was tight; police and even the military ringed the edges of the square.

  Up ahead, though, was the foreign press corps, just the place that Tobie and I wanted to be in order to film. Weighing our options, we realized we had only two. Either we could play it safe and watch from the sidelines, or we could try to get past security. Without further hesitation, we took one look at each other and made a run for it—right toward the prime minister and his government entourage, the enormous statue of Genghis Khan, and the press corps.

  “Stop!” a guard yelled in English, and we froze in our tracks. Pointing down, rather than at us, he didn’t take issue with where we were heading, but what we were standing on—the red carpet. Absolutely everyone seemed to be watching us. And there was only one thing to do—make another run for it. So that’s what we did, running as fast as we could until we reached the press corps.

  The BBC, AFP, and Reuters were all there, along with many other foreign news outlets and their correspondents. And so was TV5, with Tem and his crew of reporters and producers. Tobie and I knew he’d spotted us; the surprise was evident on his face from across the crowd of journalists. But we did like any jilted party would do and pretended otherwise, and so did he.

  Just then, a trumpet sounded off in the distance and the prime minister concluded his welcome remarks. Thundering past the eastern edge of Sükhbaatar Square, auburn horses stomped past, marching in time to a deafening drumbeat. Their manes had been brushed silky and lustrous, and they came with fierce cavalrymen on their backs. Decorated in overcoats of resplendent gold, rich red, and peacock blue, the riding warriors wore pointed metal helmets and heavy combat boots. There was no mistaking the analogy; this was meant to be the return of Genghis Khan’s formidable cavalry, after an eight-century absence.

  Heading south from the edge of the square, the cavalry marched, leading the crowds in a parade to the national stadium where the eight-hundredth anniversary Naadam games were about to begin.

  Centuries ago, the Mongol army enlisted soon-to-be-departed souls to fight in battles. Shearing a length of hair from his finest stallion, a warrior would attach the horsehair just beneath the tip of the spear. Holding this sulde, or “spirit banner,” upright while charging into battle, the warrior believed that, when he died, his spirit would be able to continue on, living inside the banner. Propped upright outside his family’s ger, or carried into battle by another soldier, the swish and sway of the breeze was believed to bring eternal life to the warrior’s spirit.

  Now, leading the procession at the helm, one of the soldiers held upright an enormous horsehair spirit banner. At the very front and center of the phalanx, it symbolized the soul of Genghis Khan himself. In fact, after his death in the thirteenth century, Genghis Khan’s sulde had been hidden in a protective place. When the Soviets came knocking in the 1930s, they wanted to know where it was, so that they could successfully destroy any notion of reverence for the Mongolian past.

  Fortunately, it had been hidden so well, just like Genghis Khan’s grave itself, that the Soviets couldn’t find it. Unfortunately, his sulde had been hidden so well that no one else has ever found it again either, including the Mongolians. But that wasn’t going to stop them from trying today, and they’d obviously masterfully re-created the original to mark this historic anniversary.

  The cavalry rumbled past and filed into the national stadium. Sonorously and deeply, drums thumped, tinny cymbals clapped, and the air was electrified and full of reverberating sound. Tobie and I followed the procession until we reached the stadium, where we found ourselves in a real mess.

  Up ahead, a riot had broken out. The stadium was filled to capacity, and those who’d been duped into buying counterfeit tickets had been refused entry. In fact, Tobie and I had actually been given tickets. The British company had paid for them, but when Tem had told us we’d been approved for press passes, we’d given them away. There was only one way to get in, and that would be to use our forged passes. We hadn’t done so yet; this would be our first attempt. The guards who’d stopped us on the red carpet hadn’t even bothered to check them. But it was now or never.

  Around the perimeter of the stadium was a private entrance reserved exclusively for dignitaries and royalty—as in the Prince Andrew sort of royalty. Tobie and I made our way there. Although we knew we wouldn’t get in, we wanted to test drive our press passes. The glue stick I’d used had come unstuck, and we’d already had to perform emergency repair work.

  Passes dangling from our necks, donning our official TV5 jackets, camera gear in hand, Tobie and I approached the private entrance. Flashing our badges, we waited for a response from the guard standing sentry.

  “Bish,” he said, dismissing us with a wave of his hand. “Journalist people, over there!” the guard ordered, pointing to the entrance reserved for the press.

  It had worked! Tobie and I were official. At least the guard thought so.

  At the press entrance, we faced a tougher challenge. The guard on duty was not just a guard but some sort of highly decorated soldier. He had enough pins on his collar and brocade on his epaulets to suggest he was part of Mongolia’s top brass. Upon closer inspection, we saw that his lapel was prominently sporting actual gold stars, several of them.

  Tobie and I handed over our passes to the soldier. Unlike his colleague, he took a long time inspecting them and removed mine from its plastic sleeve. Looking at me, puzzled, he
began to peel my passport photo away from the pass itself. Quickly and without thinking, I snatched it from him and told Tobie to turn on the camera. With the mike at my mouth, I pretended to chatter into it, as if we were about to go live.

  “Welcome to Naadam!” I shouted into the camera as Tobie filmed, picking his way backward through the doorway and scooting past the decorated soldier, who couldn’t seem to decide if he should interrupt a live news broadcast to make an arrest.

  And then, suddenly, we were inside. The soldier didn’t follow. The opening ceremony was just beginning. The drums and cymbals had stopped, and a morin-khuur horsehair fiddle was whining a solemn welcome to Mongolia’s most important guests of honor, a man and woman dressed as Genghis Khan and his long-lost bride, Borte. Tobie and I silently tucked into the anonymity of the press box and looked around to spot none other than Britain’s Prince Andrew sitting just behind us.

  Circling the pitch on a track ringing the field, Genghis and Borte led the last of the procession, which was making its way around the stadium to close the ceremony. Decorated horses curtsied to the crowd and pranced past; costumed children performed traditional dances. Enormous skin drums boomed and resonated. At the end of this magnificent parade, Genghis and Borte waved regally to the crowd. He was sporting an elaborate handlebar moustache, she a luxurious fur deel and matching hat.

  As the opening ceremony ended after only a half hour or so, the press corps was invited onto the field to film and photograph. There, Tobie and I shot video of the ornate spectacle and interviewed dignitaries and guests, one of whom had flown from as far as Canada to attend Naadam. All of them had come to watch the ancient sporting events that Naadam is known for. These would begin the following day and last an entire week.

  After we finished filming and interviewing, Tobie and I collected Meg, who’d also attended Naadam, and headed for lunch at a local Turkish restaurant.

  “I’ll have the ‘Meat Covered With Garbage,’” I said to the waitress. It was the restaurant’s most popular dish and my favorite, not least because of its misspelling of cabbage; it happened to be absolutely delicious—a casserole of savory meats and tender vegetables. While we waited for our food to arrive, we drank cold beer and smoked a hookah pipe stuffed with Kuwaiti apple tobacco.

  “Are you free this afternoon?” the restaurant owner said, stopping by our table. “Because I’d like you to interview someone, someone important, someone from my country.”

  Several times a week, every single week that summer, Meg and Tobie and I visited the Turkish restaurant. Not only was the food tasty, but the owner had become a friend. That day, he’d even reserved a private room for us in his restaurant. This was quite a courtesy to extend, considering how many Turkish dignitaries had come to Mongolia for Naadam; they were all dressed in dark suits and darker glasses and sat in the main dining room, eating their own plates of mouthwatering Meat Covered with Garbage.

  How the restaurant owner had arranged to have Tobie and I interview the Deputy Speaker of the Turkish National Assembly was a complete mystery to us, but we were both very eager to put a more formal spin onto our interviews. So far, we’d been filming the lives of regular people on irregular paths: the German brewmaster, the Mongolian hip-hop brothers, the Irish cyclists. But this interview would be altogether different. This was what real journalism was made of.

  After lunch, Tobie and I headed to the Turkish embassy. We were led through security into a plush drawing room. Half a dozen men in those dark suits sat on striped satin sofas, sipping thick espresso and chainsmoking cigarettes. While Tobie set up the shot, the deputy speaker’s assistant approached me and introduced himself.

  “There are some rules,” he said right away. There would be no questions about politics; the interview was to be conducted solely on the speaker’s impressions of the Naadam festivities. “And,” he added, “the interview must take place in Turkish.”

  “You know I don’t speak any Turkish, don’t you?” I said. “Not a single word.”

  “Oh,” he said. “Then I suppose I will have to translate.”

  Now somewhat anxious, I sat stiffly on one of the satin sofas while I waited for Mr. Deputy Speaker to arrive. Across the room, the men in suits continued to drink their coffee, smoke, and stare in my direction with that penetrating gaze all diplomats seem to possess. In turn, I smiled and then busied myself with finding anywhere else to look. Finally, Sadik Yakut arrived.

  After butchering the pronunciation of his name so many times that he took my notebook to spell out his name phonetically for me, we began the interview. Through his assistant, I dutifully asked Mr. Yakut how he was enjoying Naadam and what he thought of this momentous year’s celebrations compared to other years. Hoping to circumvent the assistant’s warning to refrain from asking about politics, I inched toward a compromise. After all, if this was going to be my first shot at being a foreign correspondent, I’d better make the most of it.

  TIKA, the Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency, delivers aid in the form of educational, social, and cultural projects in developing countries. Mongolia is a beneficiary of these projects. That year, in 2006, Turkey provided assistance in support of youth theater, the Mongolian National Library, and a symposium on the history of Mongolia. This last project interested me because the Turks and the Mongols don’t exactly have a polite history with each other.

  In the middle of the thirteenth century, after Genghis Khan had died, his children and grandchildren (aside from Ogodei, the wayward party animal) didn’t waste any time annexing more land and people. In 1243, they knocked on the doors of the Seljuks in Anatolia, what is now Turkey. Although the Mongolians were outnumbered, they roundly defeated their adversaries, the Seljuk state crumbled, and its people became vassals of the mighty Mongol Empire.

  Right around this time, Mongolian warriors had come up with some rather creative ways to kill their enemies, such as stomping them to death or stuffing their mouths with dirt and rocks until they choked. It seemed inconceivable to me that the Turks, even many centuries later, were providing any sort of aid to descendants of warriors who may or may not have stuffed dirt and rocks down their ancestors’ throats. That seemed like the kind of grudge one would be sure to hold on to. In any case, I found it fascinating that the Turks would be willing to shed light on a part of history that had all but emasculated a significant part of their heritage.

  “So, Mr. Deputy Speaker,” I imagined myself saying, “what do you say to worldwide claims that the Mongol horde, just eight centuries ago, routed your own people?”

  In a 2001 interview on the BBC’s Hardtalk program, host Tim Sebastian sat down with the wife of former Yugoslav president, Slobodan Milosevic. His legendary tough line of questioning caught Mira Markovic off-guard, and the interview supposedly ended abruptly when Markovic insisted she would “only answer the questions I want to answer.” And this was after she touched up her hair while being asked about claims of genocide. Sebastian’s style has always seemed to me to be investigative journalism at its best, and for a moment, I thought I’d try out a few of those same tactics on the genteel Turkish deputy speaker.

  But unfortunately for me, he wasn’t hiding anything, not that I’d have figured it out if he had been. I couldn’t understand a single thing the deputy speaker was saying, I could barely understand what his assistant was translating, and the men in the dark suits were still staring me down. So I politely asked about Naadam and wrapped up the interview. Afterward, the men in suits offered us coffee and baklava.

  CHAPTER 25

  Fashion Means Forward

  The closure of the Nailakh coal mine has resulted in an increase in unemployment in this district. Because the local government coffers are now unable to turn a profit, the central government has begun to implement a plan that will direct foreign investment to the region.

  —Lead story, MM Today broadcast

  After the Naadam Opening Ceremony, its actual sporting games were being hosted all aroun
d Ulaanbaatar and the surrounding countryside. Over the course of a week, contestants would compete until a winner was declared in each event.

  While Olympic athletes compete in dozens of sporting events, Mongolian Naadam athletes compete in just three: wrestling, archery, and horseback riding, and a distant fourth if you count flicking dried knucklebones at a target. The first three, the “three manly sports” as they’re called, date back to a sort of warrior boot camp, when combat training was necessary for survival. Centuries earlier in the steppe, as competitions grew out of these training sessions, local festivals began to sprout up, matching one neighborhood’s best athlete against another’s. This went on every third year for about three hundred years, until the 1921 revolution when someone decided they’d better make this age-old tradition an official party. From then on, every July, to mark the anniversary of the 1921 revolution, the national Naadam festivities take place in Ulaanbaatar, and athletes from all over the country come to compete. As one local magazine described the event, “If you do not have a good time, you are just not trying!”

  Each of the three sports has its quirks, to say the least.

  The national pastime, wrestling, is by far the most popular. Dressed in tight blue underpants, tiny red jackets that cover only their forearms and the small of their backs (instead of sleeveless shirts, think shirtless sleeves), knee-high go-go boots, and a rather phallic-looking cap, competitors are not put into weight categories. This can make for pretty good viewing when a scrawny David is up against a Goliath beefy enough to register on the Richter scale. The first wrestler to simply touch the ground with anything other than his hands and feet loses the match, and winners are awarded with an animal title after performing an “eagle dance” (which looks something like a cross between ballet and sumo) in a ritual honoring the horsehair sulde spirit banners.