Slowly towards China

We're thinking of heading out to the countryside for some fishing tomorrow..

Breakfast at Manlai's guesthouse:



We applied for our Chinese visa yesterday, so we'll probably be moving on towards China after next weeks friday..

In Ulan Bator

So We are in Ulan Bator at the moment and still staying at Manlai's guesthouse. The city itself is generally in a pretty ugly state with large concrete boxes of appartments and seemingly wery little resources to restore the city's once beautyful details and roads. But there is development. Restoration of old and building of new areas with innovative architecture.
Here's a new set of luxury appartments:


Yesterday we took a hike and climbed up to the Zaisan Memorial, which is a soviet-built landmark overlooking the city.

Here are some nice views from along the way:

Gers on the slope of a hill:

"The International Buddha park"

The Zansai Memorial itself:






The Memorial has an impressive mosaic inside it's ring describing the victory of the soviets over the japanese and the nazis and the friendship and peace between the soviets and mongolians. The soviets have also taken a mongolian into space, which the mosaic also illustrates.

Here's a funny detail: locals found our looks(two blondes and a redheaded redbearded guy) exotic enough to take a picture of themselves with us on two separate occasions. Also a lot of honking of horns and remarks yelled from cars driving by.

Here's a detail I thought was one of the nicest parts of the mosaic:


After the climb we decided to grab a snack out of a stall at the beginning of the stairs up to the memorial:


Later that evening Ile and Pete decided to go out for a beer in a nearby restaurant to celebrate the "one week mark" of our journey. I was tired and not really in the mood for a beer, so I decided to stay behind and be plain boring and watch a movie..
Guess what: the guys were about to almost get mugged!
Luckily the boys came out with only Pete getting a few scraches.
Here's about how it wend down:
They were on their way back from the restaurant -there are wery few (working) streetlights in town- and they decided to take a leak in the bushes. One of three guys came from somewhere behind and knocked Pete on the back of his head. Pete fell down, but luckily Ile kicked this guy and started to yell out loud. Pete got up meanwhile and also started yelling, so the posse decided to flee. Later on we pondered about it and came to a conclusion that the guys probably thought that they were drunk and that Ile might have been a girl due to his long hair and the darkness. What a surprise for them when he repelled the attack! Lesson learned: Beware, humanity ain't always kind -especially when in need.

You might also want to check out Ile's and Pete's Blog from my links

And its on!

So we took the train to moscow on the 18th and got to spend a whole day wondering around the city. I have to say I've always been a bit intimidated by Russia and well, I cant say that I no longer am, but lets say slightly less. Moscow is hectic and clearly booming with growth, but there are two opposite worlds with extreme powerty standing beside glamorous wealth. Walked a lot and was generally pretty exhausted after just walking and walking and walking. Good times though..



It's an impressively big city. I think I'll go back there some day..





And so we embarked on the train to Mongolia..



The train was faster than expected: the whole trip took only five days and was filled with cardgames, socializing and vodka. Loads of sweeds on the train, so I got to speak a lot of swedish..

And so we got to Ulan Bator with no big losses, but maybe a few braincells. We found this nice small guesthouse which I managed to bargain for only 3$ a head for the three of us. So now we have a private room for ourselves for 9$ a night! Cozy..

Take a look at the view from our window:

So long and thanks for the Corner!

So I managed to move out from "The ol´Corner" last week. Thank goodness for my dear friends who helped me out as my ability to carry things isn´t that great at the moment.


But get a load of this:
The folks I had arranged for to move in to literally weasel´d out on me on the last minute. We had agreed on all of this months ahead and this boyfriend of the landlady calls me up on the last minute as I´m allready on my way to their place to sign the contract and tells me:
"Uh.. This isn´t a good day.. and.. um.. the whole thing.. doesn´t work -bye-click".

Imagine the expression on my face!
Well, the world is full of bastards that can´t be trusted, but I have to say I had my faith on the wrong people this time.
Blitz und Donner!

Grawl! Hell will freeze before I´ll let any of those sorry bastards spoil my grandiose plans! I´ll sort it out. I´ve got plan b and c. But the sheer amazement is just keeping my mouth open..

Anyways I´m crashing at my mom´s house at the moment trying to relax and sort things out.