UB40 - 40 Fun Facts About Ulan-Bator/Mongolia

1. Mongolian children are extremely cute
2. Roads are 90% INcomplete
3. Despite this they employ an army of road-sweepers to remove the never ending dust, although most of the dust they put on their shovel blows off before it reaches the bin.
4. High heels are IN...
5. Radio stations play the best music we've heard since leaving Mother England (Mongolian house! Brrraaaap!)
6. They have a large statue/monument dedicated to The Beatles in the centre of UB... For no apparent reason!
7. There is dust EVERYWHERE.
8. All the young men have designer man bags, from Burberry to Ralph Lauren.
9. Chelsea are big here...
10. The traffic is horrific, cross the street at risk of death!
11. Each day only cars with certain registration plates are allowed into the city... The police stop them if they try on their banned day!
12. It's the coldest capital city in the world (not at the moment though!)
13. It has one of the three most important buddhist monasteries in the world.
14. They let their children play with pigeons, picking them up by the wings!
15. Mongolian Dads are really attentive to their kids (but let them play with pigeons!).
16. Crime is apparently rampant... Not that we have seen any!
17. Mongolian food is AMAZING!
18. People are super friendly in comparison with the Russians!
19. People really do live in Gers, even in the city.
20. They have gophers
21. You can hold eagles and vultures for £3.50 on the side of the road
22. Mongolian hillside children, know how to use iPads!
23. Mongolian cashmere is really cheap
24. They have cows with long hair on their bellies which makes them look like they are hula skirt wearing cows!
25. The monks have zip wires in the grounds of their monasteries.
26. Only 2.7 million people live in an area as big as western Europe.
27. They gave Sally a camouflage on the outside/Burberry check on the inside sleeping bag... Weird!
28. They have a large poisonous worm that spits venom...and can kill you!
28. Mongolian horses rest their weary heads on each others rear ends.
29. They cook awesome spaghetti bolognese and new york cheese cake.
30. It's really cheap!
31. They used to be communist.
32. The next Dalai Lama will be from Mongolia (so the rumour goes!)
33. Juice is called Cok in Mongolian. You can get 100% Cok at most supermarkets and in lots of flavours!
34. Mongolian is a very hard language to learn. The letters look russian but sound different to anything we have heard before.
35. Mongolian men don't have beards.
36. Basketball is one of their favourite sports.
37. The cows come home by themselves before sunset every day.
38. They put cow dung on the roof of their huts and we don't know why!
39. There are a lot of flies
40. There are a LOT of spiders!

Dan and Sally xx