„As the eighth child I was grown up surrounded by seven brothers, as the only girl among them, that is why my parents called me Suvd, pearl. That time, there was communism in Mongolia which means the nomads belonged to an especial communist community and obliged to foster camels and goats to deliver a certain amount of meat and wool depending on the plan, you know the communism provided us a planned economy, the amount was more important than the quality and production was not based on the demand. In the whole Mongolia the nomads foster mainly five kinds of animals like horse, sheep, goat, cow and camel, of which we use the meat and wool, but also leather. Horses are highly respected animal and mainly got used to ride like a motorbike, that would be a very rare emergency, if you kill a horse to eat its meat. But some people claim that horse meat is able to heal inner wounds, so people eat horse meat only for that purpose to be healed. In the desert Gobi, our family had hundreds of camels and goats which we bred and my parents worked very hard helped by my brothers, so they became famous nomads rewarded communist prices for their over plan performance of wool. By the way, Mongolian cashmere is counted to the world’s number two after Chinese cashmere, but in fact the Chinese bought raw cashmere wool from Mongolia, their advantage was the technology to refine the raw cashmere for the textile fabric. The part of the desert, where we lived was very different from the Sahara desert, which consists mainly of the endless sand dunes. In the Gobi there is also ground, which is not covered with sand. Our daily meal consisted almost exclusively of the product which we took from the camel and goat, by the way, the Mongolian camels have two humps and very wooly compared to the Arabian camels. So our breakfast was a kind of sweet cheese and tea with milk, and lunch and dinner consisted mainly meat and self made noodles. In order to buy products like flour, sugar, cigarette and so on, my father and brothers had to ride over 20 miles to a small communist center, a kind of village, where were some shops selling Russian cigarettes, teas, sweets, conserves and Mongolian sugar, flour and Chinese rice. But the latter one was not really part of our meal.“
Adrian broke Alice’s narration and asked,
„Your description of that era is really interesting, Alice. Did you live in the nomad’s tent?“
Alice: „Yes, of course, but you know, all day long we stayed outside and the dry wind and healthy natural food kept us out of any infection and illness which could be caused by the lacking hygiene.“
Billy: „I wonder that people of different culture had always adjusted to the environment and condition provided by the nature, even the immune of the people improve resistant to the lacking hygiene.“
Telly: „Yes, people can deal well with different conditions provided by the nature, but on the contrary, the circumstances provided by people is not really adjustable.“
John: „Well, it depends. Some people had to suffer from injustice provided by other people, for example slanders.“
Adrian: „John, let us stay by the nature. Alice, that time in the Gobi desert, was it possible to visit a school?“
Alice: „Of course, the communist Russian and Mongolian from Ulan-Bator, the capital of Mongolia, destroyed all the Buddhist temples and on their ashes, they built schools for us with a big picture of Lenin over the drawing board in each classroom. But the school was in the center of the community, to where I had to ride twenty miles every day, so I could visit the school only when I got nine years old regarding my height.“
Telly: „How did you be sold to the Russian army?“
Billy: „Is it not like the child soldiers in the Africa, right?“
Alice: „Oh, no, very different matter, we were not engaged to kill people as a child. In fact, that was not Russian army at all.“
John: „Then it must be a kind of soldier training like the civil service, right?“
Alice shook her blond head and told,
„My fifth year of the school, which I hated to ride so long way to attend the boring classes, in the year, when I was fourteen, in the center of the communist community, a kind of small village where I visited school, I met a woman with a Russian accent, dressed in green soldier uniform who asked my age. That was the era of perestroika and the wind of change also passed through the desert Gobi forming the dunes. I was attracted to her friendly, welcoming manner of speaking and I accepted her invitation to a club, a small building close to my school, where people used to have some socializing in a very communist way. As I arrived the club house after the school, she was there not alone, accompanied by another two women and men, who were not dressed in soldier uniform. The woman in soldier uniform introduced me herself as Maria and asked me if I knew around the desert well enough to work as a guide for a new built tourist camp. Of course, I knew every dune and natural beauty of the desert Gobi, where I used to ride feeling the wind and sun singing in the most extent of my chest, the most freedom. That time there was no danger for a girl riding alone through the desert, the nomads are very kind people trying to lead a virtuous life by thinking that every sin would hinder them to reborn as a human-being again. Well, in the club house Maria introduced me other people who were going to run the newly built tourist camp and I should be working with them all the summer during the school vacation which lasted from june till september. I accepted the offer gladly without any hesitation and further consideration regarding the salary and what kind of work it exactly was, I was just happy not to have to stand up before the dawn to take care of the camels and goats and to make cheese under the heat. That time was end of may, a week before the beginning of the summer vacation. The condition was that I had to stay in the tourist camp with full devotion, not going home, which was not a big deal, there was no right bound between me and my old parents and brothers, I had been a black sheep, maybe as an only female gender dominated by the seven brothers. The people paid me in advance and I, as fourteen years old nomad girl first time touched a bill, the money was enough that my brothers bought a hard Russian motorbike with three wheels and rowing double seats. My family thanked to me and let me go for three months. That was the last time I saw my family who I didn’t really loved, in other words I replaced myself with a motorbike. The tourist camp was about fifty miles away from the tent of my family, but only that summer, you know the nomads move every season to allow the animals fresh environment. The tent was never built on the same ground again. My work at the tourist camp was a piece of cake and a kind of luxury life compared to my nomad life. I stayed with three cook women in a tent and my only duty was to tell the driver of the tourist car, who was a friendly Mongolian man from Ulan-Bator, the right direction to any famous dunes and oasis. And teach some tourists to ride, who wanted to try Mongolian horses, compared to the Arabian horses they have short legs and the most endurance to ride long way without water and being fed. Some compare them to the zebras in Africa, but in fact there are few Mongolian zebras not striped and brown, which are considered special species, but I cannot tell them apart from the horses. Those zebras in the mountains are protected animals. At the tourist camp, all my stay was provided with meals and tourist tent, as well cloths, and as you know my work was already paid partly in advance.“
Telly: „Incredible, and as a fourteen years old girl, far away from your home, you must be really brave already that time.“
Adrian: „How many tourists did you have to serve?“
Alice: „I couldn’t count, but enough engagement not to get bored. There are of course other few men who had the same duty as mine. In my free time I helped in the restaurant kitchen and cleaned rooms, I mean tents of the tourists who were mostly from Russia.“
John: „Someone told me that there had been found remains of dinosaurs in the desert Gobi, like bones and stoned eggs, which dated back to million years. And, I had a possibility to wonder a rebuilt bones of a dinosaur in the natural museum of Ulan-Bator, where I arrived by airplane and stayed a few days. But in the desert Gobi, I hadn’t seen any, while I was riding through the desert by my motorbike.“
Alice: „I know which one you
mean, the biggest one, I mean the dinosaur skeleton in the natural museum of the capital city, giving the impression that the dinosaur was soon becoming alive and swallowing everything. Despite the lacking flesh and skin, is about five meters high and about twelve or so meters long. By the way, once came a group of archeologists from Japan visited the desert dunes, who I accompanied, but they couldn’t discover any hidden treasure, either.“
Billy: „Desert is mysterious with all its hidden treasures.“
John: „Actually, the treasures you can’t see, is just your hope or optimism to be able to endure the desert heat by making any colorful picture out of a blank paper in your imagination. Well, there are oasis to be found, on the surface.“
Adrian: „If you were riding the dunes looking for an oasis and imagine you can’t find any, so what would you do? Would you have died as a dried archeological treasure like dinosaur bones to be found out some centuries later by Japanese archeologists?“
John: „The future archeologists won’t have any chance to find my golden tooth digging the sand dunes, finding my bones guessing that I was a fallen Mars object or a passed away E.T., anyway, the animals in the desert would have given no chance for any remain of a human-being.“
Billy: „Well, the Fata Morgana’s would have kept you alive, giving you hope to keep on wandering on the desert dunes to get an oasis.“
Adrian: „That sounds tragic. Even though, I reckon with an appearance of the next Fata Morgana by the disappearance of the former mirage which kept you riding the desert dunes till that point.“
Telly: „What happens to someone who can’t see the Fata Morgana at all, but was wandering the desert dunes?“
Adrian, Alice and John looked at her in astonishment, Billy turned his head to her, there was a kind look in his eyes. After short hesitation Adrian replied,
„Then, you will land in the real oasis without being fooled by the nature game.“
Billy: „There is a kind of universal force to protect someone virtuous and especially who is not able to see.“
Alice: „Yes, I believe that kind of blind luck.“
Telly smiled as response and proved the gamblers her witch beauty again.
John: „Alice, when you were working at that tourist camp, how did you correspond with the tourists?“
Alice: „I just talked in my natural language, there was always a translator from the city accompanied by the tourist group. But during the months I could have learnt Russian exclusively by hearing, but good enough to keep up with the translator, even some words in English.“
Telly: „The tourists consisted of the people who came from abroad or there did come also Mongolian people in order to see the desert Gobi and relax in the camp?“
Alice: „Many people, but they took another guide, besides a family, whose tour I guided accompanied by the car driver.“
Telly: „Only once?“
Alice: „Yes, I remember very well, there was a girl about my age from the capital city Ulan-Bator, who was traveling with her grandparents. She was so fine and well dressed, very different from mine look of that time, which made me jealous of her, but more adorable than to become envious. Even after the tour I observed her all the time during her stay in the tourist camp, her way to talk, walk and dress. I really wanted to go to the capital city and to be like her fine and cultivated. In fact, her name was translated into English, Queen, as if it were expressing her way of being, especially her eyes extraordinary luminous reflecting a kind of brightness. I have never seen someone like her.“
Billy: „Now you have already overtaken her, what was her name, Queen? Some people name their newborn babies as strange as they assume the unforeseen future.“
John: „The nomads told me that the winter in Gobi was extreme cold, the very opposite of the summer temperature, but I suppose now the global climate change has also its impact on the weather of Gobi. The winter did you spend with your family riding to school twenty miles every day?“
Alice: „No, as I mentioned, I have never seen my family since then. But, before I left Gobi for the capital city, I used to ride in the winter to school looking like a ninja, my head wrapped with warm cashmere scarp and cap, only the eyes were left, because there was no school bus, which would have been slower than my horse, depending on the engine not adequate to the cold temperature and icy road.“
Billy: „That must be an exotic story! What do you think my dears, shall we change our gambling map into dinner table?“
John: „Yes, good Idea, I would suggest canceling the game now and continue tomorrow, me too eager to know the story.“
Adrian: „That would be a good therapy for Alice to get over the mourning and get everything off her chest. Our society is shackled by the chain of prejudice, you can trust us and everything what bothers inside you will be faded away like footprints in the sand desert.“
Telly: „Sand dunes in harmony with the wind never remain the same, and the Fata Morgana will be seducing your feet to step ahead.“
Alice: „I know. I think that would be a kind of confession what people normally do before saying goodbye to life.“
Adrian: „Alice, the gambling map shouldn’t lead you to death. Life is beautiful.“
John: „In a wider horizon.“
They all agreed and pat of sympathy touched Alice’s shoulder. The casino service was told that the gamblers will continue next day the play. Afterwards, they headed for the board restaurant. The delicious dinner was consisted mostly of the content of the rich ocean. As they were waiting for the desserts looking each other smiling in silence, Billy, who was the most attracted to the story, broke the air, asking,
„Alice, then what happened after the summer in the desert Gobi?“
Alice cleared her throat and told,
„Well, I didn’t know that my brothers had sold me to Maria, who was in fact looking for soldiers to make up her little group, who must be trained to be her soldiers a kind of slave and then all life long.“
By then desserts were served, besides Telly they all had ordered ice cream, but Telly had no appetite for sweets, so she decided for the most bitter coffee. Billy spooned of the pink ice cream bowl covered with hot blackberries and savored the smooth cold sweetness looking at Alice who was concentrated on the seducing creature in the ice-cream bowl in front of her.
Billy: „Alice, now you are not a soldier anymore, right?“
Alice nodded and spooned a little portion of chopped melon covered with chocolate ice cream, her brown eyes were filled with tears. John and Adrian kept silence, enjoying their ice-cream, Telly sipped her black bitter coffee served in the carefully painted fine porcelain espresso cup. An aura of indescribable sympathy was overwhelming the dinner table of the gamblers, and some souls were afraid of the tears. John broke the silence, saying,
„Here on the board, the service is excellent, right? Especially the food, you know, it is all house made, and bio organic!“
Adrian: „But the colors of your ice-cream bowls cannot be organic.“
John: „Oh, dear philosopher, that kind of details can be overseen, in a broader horizon.“
Meanwhile, all eyes noticed that Alice’s ice-bowl got already empty and her tears were disappeared, proving what people invented the sweets for, to smooth the wry smile, to balance the bitterness of the world.
Billy: „Anyway, you must have been happy with your love! I mean, the universal force had compensated you all the pain and tough luck you had been through with the happiness in love.“
Alice: „Well, frankly said, not really. But it was the love of my life, for what I had fought for and gained, but in the end I understood that forced love never makes you happy.“
Telly: „When did you encounter him?“
Alice: „I met him during my duty as Maria’s soldier, you know, I used to be one of her especial agent. She was a living devil.“
Telly: „Who do you mean, when you mention devil? Maria or Suvd?“
Alice: „Maybe both of us mu
st have been devils. Because she trained us into the devils as she is.“
Billy: „Oh, really? How did you get away from the destiny, in other words, how did you succeed to have changed the destiny?“
Adrian listened to them carefully, but John became impatient and said,
„The best place to continue our conversation seems to be only the gambling map over there in the casino hall, the absolute atmosphere to carry on the story.“
Adrian, who was a bit afraid of the next story, accepted the hint gladly and said.
„Yes, the service man said we can return anytime, if the mind would be changed before the sunrise.“
Telly: „I would like to.“
Billy: „Why not, carry on our desert story by playing cards is not a bad idea, sometimes mouth and brain don’t need to concentrate on the same thing at the same time.“
All laughed and they arranged to encounter at the gambling table an hour later, all dressed in the twenties they went to have some relax on their own.
The casino hall was as always full of life proving that greed never sleeps, besides one table that belonged to Billy, all places were fully occupied, the warm colored velvet wall and electric candles hanging under the middle-high rose ceiling, twenties music, smoke and smell of cocktails and perfumes, different topics, conversation and feelings flowing into a murmur symphony where the single word became lonely. John’s fear of being fully concentrated on Alice’s tragedy made the most idea to keep the souls alive and eyes dry surrounded by the liveliness in the casino hall. The broker had enough money and over satisfied greed that made the brain wander on the gambling map, but his humanity had not left the charity donation to protect some rare species keeping African and South Asian ecological balance. He disliked to show his sympathy and emotion so he needed another occupation to distract the attention. Compared to Adrian, John was eager to beat Billy’s superstition, even once. Adrian, the philosopher trained his brain and soul to be part of the whole cosmos, concentrating on the planet discovery overseeing shooting stars. Surrounded by the atmosphere of the twenties in the casino hall, he was proving, if a reflection of the cosmos on the gambling map was possible. Billy was a brave heart, who had crossed the biggest desert of the world, had learnt to appreciate that even an empty desert hides treasure to be discovered, but the most treasure was the human experience, precisely said, the footprint on the sand dune. Telly was as mysterious as her everlasting closed eyes, which were hiding her soul, giving her a kind of protection. She was laughed at by some who suppose her as Billy’s superstitious hands. It was Billy’s wisdom that made her follow him crossing the desert, but not the heart matter that was impossible with an everlasting closed eyes not able to make the souls correspond the feelings. Alice was still in the mourning for the love she had lost, her soul was empty, the gambling distracted her, but she needed to get away from the souvenirs to become lighter in order to survive in the ocean not to be part of the pirate preys on the ocean’s floor.
Footprints in the Sand Desert Page 3