Two Videos from Mongolia

Collection of short clips taken with my camera.
The music is from the Tumen Ekh performance highlighted below.

Tumen Ekh, the Mongolian National Song and Dance Ensemble, performs their nightly show at the National Recreation Center. July 18, 2009.

Buddhist Rock Art in Mongolia

The predominant religion in Mongolia up until the communists takeover in the 1920's was Buddhism; more specifically, the Tibetan style of Tantric Buddhism. Since the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990's Buddhism has reemerged as the dominant religion once again.

The Yellow Sect of Tibetan Buddhism began to take hold in Mongolia during the late 1500's under the patronage of Altan Khan and his successors. He is the one who granted the Dailai Lama his title. Prior to Buddhism most Mongolians were followers of native shamanism and there are a great number of shamanistic influences in Mongolian Buddhism and Mongolian culture in general.

The communist government shut down most monasteries and exiled or killed the Buddhist monks during its rule from 1921 through 1992. We visited two of these monasteries during our visit. The first is a small temple in Gorkhi Terelj National Park up the valley from Turtle Rock. The second is the huge temple complex of Manzushir Monastery (which I am fairly certain is named after the Boddhisattva Manjusri) that was completely destroyed during the communist era and which has had only one building rebuilt. The ruins of several of the old building remain.

At both places we saw examples of Buddhist rock art that had survived from earlier eras.

Inscription in the old Mongolian alphabet, in Gorkhi Terelj National Park

Book Review - Persian Fire

Persian Fire: The First World Empire and the Battle for the West, by Tom Holland

This book came very highly recommended and it did not disappoint. It is the story of the Persian Empire's attempt to conquer Greece in the 5th century B.C. Holland is a very good writer and the story unfolds almost like a novel.

He starts off with a history of the fall of the Assyrian Empire to the Medes from the highlands of Iran, and then of their conquest by the Persians further to the east. He explains how Cyrus ruled his new empire and was succeeded ultimately by Darius, who ordered the first invasion of Greece.

He also explains the history of both Sparta and Athens and their different paths toward a government system that would provide stability for their citizens. Only halfway through the book do the Persians and the Greeks meet on the field of battle.

The first invasion in 490 B.C. is foiled by a surprise victory by the Athenians over the Persians at the Battle of Marathon. Holland explains how the Spartans refused to fight because of a conflict with their religious festivals.

Ten years later Darius' son, Xerxes, returns in person with a larger army and fleet to reattempt the invasion. The famous Battle of Thermopylae sees the death of the Greek contingent, lead by King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans, guarding the pass between Thermopylae and Athens. Athens is sacked and Sparta and the Peloponnesian states blockade the Isthmus of Corinth and prepare for a Persian attack. However, in the end, the Athenians, who had in ten years time built up a substantial navy from scratch, lead an naval battle at Salamis, just south of Athens, and cripples the Persian navy forcing Xerxes to withdraw.

Holland points out repeatedly the importance of these Greek victories. Democracy as a legitimate form of government was begun by the Athenians only a few years before the Persian invasions. Had the Persians successfully conquered Greece the history of the world would have been quite different indeed.

He also points out more subtly, the parallels between this bit of history and the modern conflict between the West and the Middle East. Holland implies a great deal of similarity between Darius' professed devotion to Ahura Mazda, the god of Zoroastrian monothesism, and the professed devotion of the rulers of modern Muslim nations to Allah. There is also a parallel in the contrast between the autocratic rule of the Persian Empire versus the relative freedom enjoyed by the citizens of the Greek city-states.

I really enjoyed reading this book and would recommend it to anyone with even a remote interest in history.

Partial Solar Eclipse

My Best Photo

There was a solar eclipse today in India & China. Apparently it was a total eclipse in Mumbai and Shanghai, but it was cloudy and rainy in both places. I heard the weather was perfect in Iwo Jima which also had totality. Here in Seoul, it was a 74% occlusion at the maximum around 10:48 a.m. Class was scheduled to start at 10:50, but I delayed the beginning of class until 11:10, well after the maximum.

I heard about the eclipse when I turned on the TV this morning, which I normally do not do. On the way to work I stopped by an office supply store and bought some blank CDs because they are pretty good light filters for an eclipse. However, the ones I got had some sort of grainy finish and everything looked blurry. I went back and got several sheets of red filter paper that the shop owners was selling for looking at the eclipse and they worked wonderfully. It was almost impossible to get decent photos with my camera because of the high contrast between direct sun and the background of the sky. The filter sheets were too wrinkly to allow for good focus. However, I did get one or two good shots when the clouds partially obscured the sun and you could see the eclipse through them with the naked eye.

Pinhole image of the eclipse from Frank McDonald's equipment

Frank McDonald who is teaching organic chemistry had a pinhole in a piece of cardboard and you could see the eclipse in the image shining through the hole on a piece of white paper. Classes let out at 10:40 and many of the ISC students gathered in front of Woodang Hall where we hold most of the classes. Iit was a rather festive atmosphere. A few minutes before the peak occlusion the clouds went in front of the sun for 10 minutes and we missed the maximum, but it was still very impressive nonetheless.

Students Watching the Eclipse in front of Woodang Hall

My next shot at a full eclipse is August 21, 2017 when the shadow will travel across southern Idaho and Wyoming. I am planning on camping out the night before in a very dry place with little chance of clouds.

Update:

Jen Youngstrom, who teaches psychology here this summer, forwarded some excellent photos from the fellow in the apartment next to her family in the CJ International House.

Trip to Mongolia 2009

Ger just outside Gorkhi-Terelj National Park

I suppose I ought to give a more coherent account of my trip to Mongolia with Tom & Ed, so here goes.

We left on Thursday afternoon after our last classes ended at 4:10. Tom had everything planned out in terms of the logistics. We took the bus to Incheon International Airport and then a Korean Airlines flight to Ulaanbaatar, arriving at 11:30 or so local time. It was a three hour flight from Korea. After clearing immigration and customs we hired an official taxi, one of the only ones in the parking lot with a real, true taxi sign on the top, to take us to the Ulaanbaatar Hotel for $10. We had reservations for "superior"rooms, but apparently they were all taken so we were bumped up to "junior suites". The hotel was quite nice. A bit old, but it had free high speed internet which Ed needed for the online class he taught on Friday morning.

Fried Mutton Chest

Dinner last Friday night was interesting, to say the least. We (meaning Tom) were searching for a restaurant that came highly recommended by both the Lonely Planet book on Mongolia and by Phil Nichols, one of the professors here at KU for summer campus. When we couldn't find it because it appeared to have disappeared without even leaving a building behind, we went looking for alternative eats.

We tried a street with lots of restaurants, but were having a hard time deciding which one to patronize. Tom really wanted Mongolian food, and Ed was just hungry and wanted to eat. Finally, Ed picked one that had a reasonable number of customers figuring the food must be at least OK and the wait wouldn't be too long. Ed and I ordered the fried mutton ribs, which were pretty good, if a bit fatty. Tom, however, made the mistake of asking our waitress what she recommended. I think his exact words were "number one." Now, in all fairness, she may have misunderstood and thought he was asking which dish had the most food, not which was best. Or perhaps she saw no distinction between the two. In any case he ended up ordering the "fried mutton chest."

As it turns out this was quite literally, the whole chest of a sheep. Not a lamb, mind you, but a fully grown sheep. When this generous bounty was delivered to the table and the shock wore off enough for Tom to speak, he said simply, "I can't eat this." Both Ed and I initially thought he meant there was too much food and he was offering to share. Looking more carefully at the meal on the plate and his grey face, however, we realized he was being quite literal.

He did pay for the meal, but quickly left without touching his food. Somebody feasted on free mutton chest that night. Tom ended up eating at the Indian restaurant in the hotel. Ironically, he had the lamb curry.

"Fried Mutton Chest" is now a running joke with us. If you see Tom ask him how it was. Be careful, however, as I think he is still experiencing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Riding Mongolian Ponies

photo by Ed Monsour

I took a trip this last weekend to Mongolia with a couple of good friends from Korea University's International Summer Campus, Tom Doherty and Ed Monsour. Tom set everything up as our designated tour leader and Ed and I went along for the ride. On Friday we went to Gorkhi-Terelj National Park, which is just northeast of the capital city of Ulaanbaatar. Our guide, Tselmeg Erdenekhuu, who goes by "Meg" talked me into going horseback riding with Tom and Ed while we were there.

Her regular 4WD was in the shop getting fixed up for a 15-day tour, so she took us out on the dirt roads in the park in her uncle's Toyota Celica. We were planning on visiting a monastery after lunch, but the roads were wet and muddy, and Ed really, really wanted to ride a horse, so I was talked into going with them on horseback, rather than just walking. Being a bit on the portly side I was concerned that I might be too heavy for the poor ponies, but I think our hosts took this as a bit of a challenge and were intent on proving how tough Mongol ponies really are. They got one of the larger ones, a male, and he did just fine. They were a bit worried that he was, perhaps, too spirited for an obvious greenhorn like myself and kept him on a lead most of the time. However, every once in a while Ed's pony would stop still and refuse to move. When our teenage guide went back to jump-start the pony I got to do some riding "off the leash".

An interesting incident occured as we were getting ready to set out. The children in the family that owned the horses had been riding around the area while we were eating lunch and afterward their father called them over to turn over their ponies to Ed and Tom. The girl whose pony Tom got took one look at the three of us and turned to her father and begged him to let Tom (the least heavy of the three of us) be the one to ride HER pony. It was one of those moments where the meaning came through crystal clear even though we couldn't understand the language. No translation necessary!

Photo by Tom Doherty
The young man in the hat was our wrangler

Photo by Tom Doherty

Photo by Ed Monsour

Photo by Ed Monsour