This morning was yet another beautiful day, albeit a little cold. I again woke up late and wandered down to the bakery owned by Brigette, the old lady. I found she had bagels there and was dying for one but ended up buying 8. I also got a great veggie sandwich for breakfast that had fresh cucumber, tomato, lettuce, and cheese.

When I got back to the guest house, the doctor from the mobile street kids clinic, and a few other people from the Christina Noble Foundation were planning on heading out to a local river to relax in the sun for the day. Since I was looking to get out of the city as well, I decided to go along. I got some snacks for everyone for the day while they organised a taxi to go out there. I was amazed that they bargained 10,000 tugrik for a 30 min drive each way, and for him to wait for us for 3 hours. That's only $2.50/hour, including fuel and car wear and tear. I honestly don't know how they survive! Anyway, I ran to the store and got the fod. I got a mix of some junky bready things and some fresh fruit and vegetables. The junky bread things were only about $2 total while the fresh produce (4 apples, some grapes, and some small tomatoes) turned out to cost about $12. I was thinking that any sort of fresh produce is way out of the budget of any Mongolian, so it's really hard to eat healthy. It's one thing to say "eat healthy" but when you only have 2,000 tugrik for food for the day, you could either buy one apple or enough bread, cookies, and pastries for several people for the day. It's just simply not within the budget of locals to eat healthy. It really reminds me a lot of the problems Aboriginals have with regards to access to healthy food choices.

So our taxi was quite crowded - I sat in the front while the four others piled in the back - don't know how I got lucky! The ride out was fine but I have to say that women are SO picky! The other four were all women and they were directing the taxi to the river but they were never satisfied with the location so we had to drive around an extra 30 minutes to find just the right spot. One place had too much rubbish, the next not enough grass, the next not enough trees. I felt so bad for the driver who was being so patient. We were driving over what should have been a 4 wheel drive track in a 2 wheel drive sedan that was overloaded. I'm surprised the car even made it.

We finally got to a place by the river with few other cars and groups of people also enjoying the day. It was close to the Mongolian Hotel outside of town. The landscape was arid and the river was more a large stream flowing at a slow pace. The water was cold nd had the occasional plastic bag making its way downstream. We walked about 10 minutes to find yet an even more perfect spot (or so they say) and on the way we passed several groups of wild cows, which I of course took lots of pictures of. When we got all our stuff settled down, I ran some food and water back to the taxi driver so he have something to eat and drink while we were gone. When I got back I found the the taxi driver had taken the opportunity to drive the front wheels of the car into the shallow part of the river and was using a rag to give his car a nice wash. Indeed when we came back later it was spotless! When I got back to the group, I found that there was some sort of movie filming going on. Apparently, the local TV station was having some sort of reality show going on called something like "Mongolia's next top model". they had these poor women standing out in the river in varying amounts of clothes freezing their butts off. Anyway, it made for some amusement. I spent most of the time there working on my Mongolian from my phrasebook and thinking through what questions I'll be asked in the interview tomorrow. My interview is for potential hospitals at which Ill work next year.

While I was there, I actually asked a few of the people how the taxi driver can afford to charge so little. What I realised is that to Mongolians, this is actually quite good pay. Earning just 10 or 20 thousand tugriks in a day is actually quite good. But what I have a hard time reconciling is the fact that many internatinal companies pay local workers Mongolian rates while they pay international workers overseas rates for the same job. For example, a chartered accountant with full qualifications and several years of experience would only earn $4000/year as a Mongolian . The same company pays an international person with fewer qualifications $45,000/year to start. I understand that overseas people have other commitments back home like mortgages that have to be paid, but this must cause a lot of resentment for the locals. Certainly the company can't value one inexperienced worker 10 times more than another with years of experience. I don't know the solution but it just sees like there are two different sets of rules and pay for locals and expats. Anyway, it's still something that bothers me and I haven't figured it out yet. So, after some conversation, some study, a brief nap, and some interview preparation, we headed back to the taxi.

On the way back, the driver was very safe and friendly, and I was very glad for this. At one point we saw a car coming the other way swerving violently back and forth, going all the way off one side of the road and then crossing all the way over and going off the other side, kicking up lots of dust in the process. It was going at quite some speed and my heart started to jump just a bit hoping our driver would get out of the way, which fortunately he did right away. Just before we reached the other car, it skidded to a stop about 2 meters from a concrete phone pole and luckily it didn't hit anything. About 6 very shocked young Mongolian men jumped out and started swearing. It looks like the driver just lost control and then kept overcorrecting and ended up skidding out. Anyway, all was ok there and we all made it home safely. It made me really realise how much trauma is a big problem here and it's just prt of everyday life here in Mongolia.

This evening I wanted to make it an early night for my interviews tomorrow so I headed out and grabbed some local Korean food that was actually quite tasty and relatively cheap. Right after dinner I made a quick call to say hi to Michelle and got to sleep nice and early.

G'night!