Beautiful America

So thats that. We are home. It was a long trip and Alli and I are exhausted (Alli of course more than me). I have been trying to think about some things that I would like to say about our experience in the Peace Corps, we are officially out by the way, but what can be said about an experience of this magnitude? Did we make the right decision in joining? Yes, I can say that confidently. Alli and I did a lot of good things and tried to set as positive as an example as possible. There are at least a dozen people in the world now who dont hate Americans. So thats good. More than anything we are going to miss our friends who we have left behind in Mongolia, American, Mongolian, and a sprinkling of Swiss and German. - What now? Who knows. What we do know is that the baby, Sukhbataar (Axe Hero) Prelaske will be born at the end of January or begining of February. Alli is going to go back to school to become a Psychiatric Nurse, and I need to find a job, a job that pays money. Well that is about all. Im posting some new pics. This blog will still be in use though but it is changing to a new format to chronical the begining of our EVIL ARMY. Peace- Mike and Alli

Peace Corps Baby!

Well for those of you who dont know I am sorry that you have to find out over our blog but we just found out on thusrday that Alli is pregnant and our Peace Corps adventure is about to be over. Of course we will be starting a much more exciting, infinatly longer, but just as smelly of an adventure with our impending Made in Mongolia baby. As per Peace Corps Policy we have about a week to pcak up our things and head back to America. Right now we are in UB but are heading back to Khovsgul today to pack up our Ger and say goodbye to our friends and host family, which we are really not looking forward to. Then on Thursday morning we fly back to UB to begin our Close of Service Medical Exams and should be heading back to the land of Cheeseburgers on Tuesday. Dont delete us yet though we still have some final thoughts and pictures to post on Thursday when we get back to UB.
Love Alli and Mike

Well this has been a week. Alli and I both had a brutal case of the flu all week and are finally starting to feel better again. Being sick in Mongolia is a terrible thing, our only solace was that we were in an apartment insted of our ger. Now being sick sucks no matter where you are but without the comforts of home it is really a miserable experience. But all is well now and training is in full swing. The trainees are safely tucked away with their host families and all seems to be progressing normally. I have yet to visit my old host family, something that i feel horrible about, i will see them eventually though. Thats about all, nothing really exciting to report. -Scott I dont have your email. Victoria- Hello, how is school? Parents- See I am just as neglectful of my Mongolian parents as I am of you guys!
Love Alli and Mike

Orientation Days

Well the new volunteers are here and in numbers, 65 of them in the new group. I was reading our blogs from this time last year and we said that we were about 50% sure that we made the right decision, we are still debating. Anywho, its crazy how fast perceptions change over the course of a year. I remember when we drove into Darkhan last year for the first time and thinking that this must be a joke, now they are going to take us to the real city, not the place that was used for nuclear weapons testing. Now however we look at Darkhan like a culinary paradise where we can make anything happen. I wish I could articulate this better but it is something that has to be experienced. Or as Fahd says "I would color it with detail but everything is just different shades of brown."

Happy Aniversary

Its hard to believe that we have been here for a year now. I imagine that we have changed quite a bit, but in all honesty I feel the same. I dont know. Well thats enough about us. Tonight the new group of Volunteers arrive in UB and then head to a ger camp and then come up to Darkhan tomorrow. We are all really excited to get to meet them. I will write a post on wednesday about them once they witness the glorious Darkhan Hotel. MWAHAAHHHAAA

Darkhan Days

Sorry it has been a while since we have posted but its starting to get alittle crazy around here preping for the new batch of volunteers. We made it to UB for our med check up (Paul has very gentle hands by the way) and for our dental checkup and cleaning AKA mouth torture by a mongolian. Just picture any horror movie with a dentist in it. We are all moved in to our apartment in Darkhan for training and tomorrow are going to the host families places to check them out for the arriving volunteers, I am going to have to eat a lot of tsuivan to check all of those jorlons. The apartment is great and its nice to have a TOILET! Its not nice to have cockroaches but I have declared war on them and have begun that war in earnest. My mother said that it is a war that I will never win, funny coming from the person who told me that I could do anything if I put my mind to it. So I;m going Taliban on their asses, there is going to be daily executions at the soccer stadium. No western music for the cockroaches, if they show themselves without proper atire they are stoned. Its going to be sick. There are going to be cockroach refugee camps in other apartments. I digress. The apartment is nice and big and we are in a good location right by our favorite restaurant. Ill try to post some pics soon. Love From Mongolia

Miracles Do Happen

Well the seminar actualy happened and it went really well. Thanks to the help of Alli, Beth, Brenden, Fahd, Joe, Salomon and of course our translator Baska. About 15 kids ended up participating in it and I think (well I hope at least) that they got alitlle something out of it. My favorite part of the entire seminar was when Salomon and Fahd proceedd to to tell the kids that it was alright to lie during an interview as long as they thought themselves capable of making that lie true in the near future. So that is done and to celebrate Brenden, Fahd, and myself went up to Lake Hovsgul for the day and had a real good time. Next week Alli and I are leaving for UB to get our yearly med checkups and then off to Darkhan to get ready for the M19s who will be here in just about three weeks now.

The Seminar of Doom

Well work is starting to wind down and at the same time speed up. For maybe the first time in the history of TEFL or CYD I am actually teaching more than a TEFL. Totally not what I signed up for, during CYD training all we did was practice making balloon animals. Which may sound easy but you go ahead and try to make a balloon sheep. This weekend I am putting on a seminar for graduating students and it is not going well so far. My original budget has been cut to a fraction of its former self and students keep ripping down the posters in school that I have made, oh and no one has signed up yet. Not gonna lie, Im freaking out about this whole thing. All is not lost however, Salomon and Fahd are coming up to help me teach the seminar and even if no one shows up it will still be fun. That and for the most part I have solved the crippling shortage of money that the seminar is suffering from, and most Mongolians wont sign up until the last possible moment. So who knows we still may pull this thing off. Did I mention that I have no idea how many people are going to show up? I mentioned that no one might show up, paradoxically that is not the worse senario. What is worse is if hundreds show up and I have no where to put them, this is a very real concern as my school has over 300 graduating students. Well stay tuned for the exciting conclusion to THE SEMINAR OF DOOM.

April, my arch nemeisis

Hello everyone. Well I am officially on my way to turning thirty. Thirty! AHHHH. I had a nice birthday because of my wonderful wife and great site mates. We made a bunch of pizza and Joe and Brendon brought over a bottle of whisky, which is a nice change from vodka. Things are going pretty good here, I feel a bit more respected in town now due to my advanced age. My math may be a little off but I am older than 70% of the population. Alli and I only have about four weeks of work left before we leave for the capital to train for training the new volunteers, so we are pretty excited about that. It is going to be real nice to have a toilet for a month and a half. On that note.

OHH Spring

Mongolia got us again. Just when you think winter has finally left, it plays a nasty little trick on you. The other day I was boasting about not having to make a fire in the morning for the first time since October. Of course MIke and I just happen to switch jobs during this week of blistfully warm weather (I had to chop wood, make fires and get water) and (mike was in charge of cooking, cleaning and dishes). So of course after my hands were beaten up and full of splinters we switched back--hahahaha it snowed today. We got about 3-4 inches of snow and Mike is once again enjoying making morning fires! Of course this does mean that he has to go back to swallowing my sometimes horrible cooking. I think I have gotten the best side of the deal all around.
Love Allie and Mike

Packing List- What not to bring

Because of some emails and posts we decided to update the packing list with stuff you dont need to bring.
1. An extra sleeping bag- you get issued a great sleeping bag from PC. We live in a ger and have never had a problem with being cold (while we were in our sleeping bag).
2. Do not bring a bunch of clothes- the clothes that you bring should be versitile, casual and business. Do not waste space with a bunch of clothes. You are going to have to drag those suitcases with you around the world so only bring what you really want.
3. Survival gear- you are going to be fine! PC takes good care of you the first three months. You are not going to need iodine tablets or magnesium strips or flint or anything like that.
4. If you are a woman skirts are nice when you have to tinkle outside ( says alli)
5. Travel gimicks- this is the same as the "survival gear". you probably wont need a solar battery charger, or an emergency radio (all the stations are in mongolian anyway).

Well we have to go to work now. Have fun getting your stuff together.

Packing List

Well its about that time for the new volunteers to start their packing. I cant believe that we have been here for allmost a year now. So because we had such a hard time packing and deciding what to bring we thought that we would give a little bit of advice to the M-19s. First of all pack two seperate bags, one of those bags is going to be kept in storage for the entirty of your training and you will not have access to it. In that bag put all of your winter stuff, you will not need it during training. The only clothes that you aregoing to need is something to sleep in two business casual outfits and two casual outfits, thats it, do not burden yourself with tons of crap during training. Besides for that here are a couple of things that we are really happy that we brought or that we really wished that we would have.
1. Our laptop- the best thing that we brought.
2. Camera- you are definatley going to want to bring this
3. A photo album- Mongolians love looking at pictures, you dont even understand.
4. really good shoes- you will be walking everywhere you go, do not cheap out on this!
5. Whatever over-the-counter meds you like- Nyquill, alkaseltzer... alkaseltzer saved my life last summer.
6. An iPod- if your married bring one for each of you because you will be split up during training
7. A knife- I brought a mid-sized buck and I use it for everything, but I also have a leatherman which is nice
8. Bring a gift for your host family. It can be anything- I brought my family a bunch of pictures of Chicago and assorted change and they liked them alot. They are not expecting anything huge.

Lets keep it real though, your going to be fine no matter what. Bring what makes you happy and make sure to bring a book, a big book. Looking forward to seeing you in june.

WTF?

So the olympics are over. Guess who's students took 1st through 4th place in 11th, 9th, and 7th grades? I'll give you a hint, it wasnt my students. Alli's kids cleaned up 85' Bears style. It was sick, one of her girls beat the next closest student by 50 points on a 200 point test, and this was the best students from the entire state competing. If I didnt personally judge the competition I would have said something was going down here. So now her three kids that took 1st will go to UB for the national competition, we will keep you updated.

March Madness

The Olympics are almost here and I dont mean that crap that is going to happen in Beijing. Im talking about the Regional Academic Olympics that grip Mongolia every March. This is a big deal people so listen up. MARCH MADNESS. There are Olympics in every subject and 3 students compete from each school in the state in their respective subjects. This is such a big deal that the students who are studying for the Olympics regularly dont go to school for about a month but instead spend about five hours a day studying thier subject. Next week Students from the entire Aimag will converge on Muren for the week to compete in the Olympics, coming from all over in a desperate search for fame and glory. -Oh and we finally got our internet working again. New pics too.

Mongolian Oprah

-So I have a new TV show, now I dont mean to point fingers but when Alli got her TV show and she asked for help doing it her loving husband said "ÿes of course I will help because I love you". I wish that I had a loving husband like that.
-Iveelmaa's 4th birthday was on the ides of march and we had a real good time spoiling the crap out of her.
-Once again we thought that we were going to get our internet problems worked out but once again Mongolia defeated us in a spetacular manner. We actually have all of the components at our place but no one knows what to do with them all. Hopefully soon. We love and miss everyone- Mike and Alli

The Windy City

Well it might be possible that we will once again get internet in our ger, let me stress the possible in that statement. Things are going well here Alli and I are pretty busy because of the upcoming English Olympics (a country wide English competition for students). I am determined to see my schools students beat hers this year, something which historically never happens.
The windy season is upon us. This was made clear to us as one of our windows was ripped off the top of our Ger and then sent flying through the air. Luckily for us Bymba was around and like everything else with a Ger he was able to fix it by cutting a new piece of glass and fitting it to our window, the guy is amazing. Now everything is bungee corded in place in preparation of the real wind that should be starting any day now. We were at Elizabeth’s house the other night and we asked her Hashaa family if our Ger would blow away and they laughed and laughed, “Maybe” was the reply.
I realized that we posted pictures of the Ice festival and didn’t say anything about it. Sorry. So we went to the Ice Festival the other week! It was cool. Get it! It was COOL. That was a play on words. Seriously though, it was freaking freezing, as you can imagine. We had a real good time, there was a horse sleigh race, Ice Sumo, and speed skating. Alli and I were able to take a sleigh ride and as you can tell from the pictures Lake Hovsgul is breathtaking. We are really looking forward to heading up there this summer. Hopefully we will get internet on Friday so keep your fingers crossed. Love Alli and Mike

PDM Baby!

Sorry the posts have become infrequint but with no internet at the site now it is getting difficult to get things out. We just finished our Project Design and Managment seminar that was held in UB this past week. Now I know that we just got back from America 3 weeks ago but we have been gorging ourselves on everything that we can get our hands on. I think that my personal favorite this trip has been the ham and cheese croisant from Michelles bakery, I have eaten about 7 of them in the past three days. Asides from food things are going well, Alli and I are both begining to write grants to create new english resource rooms in our respective schools. The rooms are scheduled to be operating by the begining of next year. We are heading back to site today and hopefully we can take care of this internet thing this week. Oh yea new pictures posted!

Back in the Sadle

We made it back, it was close though, the landing at Chingiss Khan Airport was a little rough. Im still not entirely convinced that we werent shot down. Funny story though we saw Brendan our sitemate at the Seoul Airport and he was on the same flight back to Mongolia with us, small world. Things are going well and the weather has gotten a lot nicer since we left which makes life in general much much nicer. We seem to be experiencing technical difficulties with our internet right now but as soon as we get them worked out we will send out emails and post a more detailed blog about whats going on right now. Love from Mongolia.

Still Here

For all of our brothers and sisters in Mongolia we just wanted you to know that America is still beautiful and all of the food is twice as good as you remember. For everyone in America heed these words "EVERYDAY you wake up in America is a good day" I know that the news is constantly saying how awful everything is and that the world is coming to an end but fear not, you are still in America.
We only have a couple of days left before we head back to Mongolia and in preperation have been eating everything that we can get our hands on. Today we reached the concensus that there are no more cravings left to answer, we have sated every glutonus impulse our minds could concieve. Let me tell you how great that feels. Love Mike and Alli

Jim Campbell 1953-2008

Yesterday morning Alli’s Father Jim passed away. He had been sick for years now and went painlessly surrounded by his family. He will definitely be missed by all who knew him.

Yaks, Planes, and Automobiles

Hello everyone. Well as many of you know Alli and I are now in America. Unfortunatley Alli's Father Jim is very sick and we were called home. Jim is on his third liver now and has been plenty sick before so we are of course hoping for the best. He became sick while in Alabama during Christmas and remains in the hospital in Huntsville as they are unable to move him back to Chicago. So that is where we are now. The Peace Corps has been great in this emergency, Alli's family called the Office of Special Services last tuesday and we were on the next flight back to America. Muren to Ulaanbaatar to Beijing to Chicago to Nashville to Huntsville. It was a long trip 21 total hours in the plane, so just three hours short of what it would have been to take a Meeker from Muren to Ulaanbaatar. Those things really put everything in perspective. So thursday morning it was -35 in Mongolia and it was 70 when we landed in Nashville over a 100 degree swing! Oh and apparently we smelled real bad, Josh (Alli's brother) picked us up at the airport and he confirmed it, luckily not like "wow those kids smell" but more like "wow those kids smell like a fire".
Beijing you all will be interested to know is easily the most polluted place I have ever been, seen or heard about. It was a cloudless day and it looked like it was overcast, I am not exagerating one iota. However, as we were flying into Beijing we did get to see the Great Wall, it just snaked across the ridge of a mountain line underneath us. One of those moments you know that you will remember for the rest of your life. So keep Jim in your heart and we will keep you posted. Love Mike and Alli from beautiful beautiful America

Meet the Family

We feel that it is about time that we introduced the people that have been keeping us alive for the past five months. Why we didn’t do this earlier we are not entirely sure, however, now we have a much greater appreciation for them and everybody else has a healthy degree of inquisitiveness on the subject. So it worked out well for everyone involved. Where to begin? Byambadorj, or Byamba- which means Saturday in Tibetan, how could you not like someone named Saturday? Byamba is 28 years old and works for an oil company at a local petrol station. His work schedule is unique; he works two days a week 24 hours a shift. He has his bachelors in Eco-tourism and management. He’s a great guy, my best friend here and makes sure that whatever we need we get. He beats me at everything we do except play chess and even that is close. Lately he has been bent on immigrating to Canada so that is what we have been doing, writing resumes and researching Canadian immigration law.
Dodoo- I am not positive what Dodoo means. Dodoo is also 28 years old and she is a Mongolian Language teacher at Alli’s school. Until recently Dodoo has been in Ulaanbaatar working on her master’s degree. Dodoo has a more normal schedule being a teacher and coupled with the child we don’t see her as much. She of course is as instrumental to us staying alive as Byamba is and has been teaching us how to cook Mongolian food and has been tutoring us in language.
Iveelmaa- or guardian angle in Mongolian is our little Mongolian child. She is three years old and we generally have no idea what she is saying at any time. This is a good thing because there is no way that we could say no to her. She has learned to communicate quite effectively with us though and knows how to get us to give her something to drink or eat, and she is not shy about telling us if what we gave her displeased her in the least bit. Apparently she has been speaking English to her parents at home but refuses to speak any English to us. Such is Mongolia.
Oh and there are a couple new pictures up. Bayertai!