How to ride a Mongolian Horse

Inner Mongolia, Tibet, and Indonesia

So with the Nepal trek closed and an open summer ahead of me, I took up a very enticing invitation to travel in Tibet. But as long as we’d be in the hinterlands, we thought we might as well visit Inner Mongolia also.
First, I learned that if there was ever a battle for the most representation on tours between mainland Chinese and foreigners, the Chinese won long, long ago. I saw no other foreigners in Inner Mongolia, and on the plateau our foreigner group was outnumbered by Mainland tourists by at least 10-1.
The most famous land feature in Inner Mongolia are the grasslands, on which ride the famed Mongolian horses, whose masters reside in the equally famous roundhouses, eating giant servings of pure lamb meat. The visits to the Mongolian villages are a little touristy, with brief trots on horses, Karaoke lunches, and ongoing negotiations for goods and services. But when you can get away from these small negatives for a moment, and just look out over the expanse of land, and sit and watch the sunset, it’s really relaxing and pleasant. And the lamb was *delicious*, worth every jiao. But back to the horse-back rides: The Mongolian tour directors only let you ride very slowly, but I knew they can ride the horses much faster. How to get them to do that? To answer that question, I took a page from the Cargo Cultists of post-World War II. The Mongolians wear iconic, large brimmed cowboy-style hats, and I was watching some of them hit the horses on the rump to speed them up. (I happened to buy such a hat because I thought it looked cool). Adding a shred of creativity, I took my new hat off, and whapped my horse on the rump with it, and the beast TOOK OFF! I had never been so fast on a horse in my life, and when my initial surprise wore off, the speed was really enjoyable – the horses glide along more smoothly and comfortably at speed than they do in trot. As soon as my horse had gotten this impulse, my Mongolian minder shouted from his increasingly distant point “Drop the hat! Drop the hat!” no doubt hoping desperately that my stilted Chinese possessed the relevant vocabulary. I savored the experience for a few final, memorable seconds before I decided to be an obedient tourist and threw off the cowboy hat. I inferred, correctly that the hat is used in training so that the horses respond to it uniquely.
The grasslands turned out to be lacking in grass in favor of small shrubs. It turned out there were consequences of this which we learned through horseback riding. My horse was tripping every so often on apparently nothing.
“Me: My horse seems so tired . . . “
“Mongolian cowgirl: Didn’t you notice how skinny he is? The rain has been light the last year, the grass for him to eat so little”.
Turns out the horse was indeed scrawny, and I felt bad. I thought that in the US we solved these kinds of shortages with hay cultivation, markets, and transportation, but I’m not a farmer so what do I know . . . By contrast in the opposite corner of the country, the Tibetans definitely have hay figured out to feed their yaks . . .
Following a punctuating bubble bath party back in a Beijing Sanlitun nightspot we proceeded to the Tibetan plateau. If you ever gain the inclination to visit Tibet, please please take the pressure acclimatising train the 48 hour train in and don’t fly. The entire south-western third of China sits on a plateau. So we’re talking about a vast swath of planet Earth raised 4000 meters, or 13000 feet, above sea level. Turns out that the meter-feet conversion is important, because to an ear accustomed to customary units, the number 4000 sounds harmless enough. When the airplane sets down, the airport pharmacy (by the way, the airport has a pharmacy) chiefly sells oxygen bottles. And they are *very* necessary if you come into the country by airplane. Fatigue and headaches settle in quickly, and days later we’re making out way to 5000 Meters (16,500 feet) at Everest Base Camp. More than half of our troupe suffered altitude sickness at this altitude, and while the view of Mt. Everest was valuable, I suspect the sickest among us were unsure their malady-stricken stay at the camp was worth the photos.
We took the train back from Lhasa, and the rolling hills covered in (grassy) grasslands grazed by yaks was delightful. Our train passed through the highest train station in the world, a factoid which the train PA system dutifully recognized. The train sped straight through this notable station without stopping – I decided it was a tribute to the host country’s sense of face that they built this station – because there were no inhabitants, buildings, or crops to justify the station's existence.
Well with these travels completed, there really was only one more logical destination to pursue. Obviously I’m talking about Jakarta. Yes, with two weeks to kill, I had to go somewhere before my itinerary for a class business trek (observing and meeting with exotic tribal chieftains in Silicon Valley) kicked in. My thinking proceeded thusly: I had already visited or traveled through 70% of China’s provinces (which officially means its high time I saw as much of the US . . .). Therefore Jakarta, the rambunctious, unrestrained, burgeoning capital of Indonesia was the last backpacking itch I had to scratch. ( I'm saving Mt. Rushmore for later :) )
From an urban planning perspective, Jakarta is best compared to Los Angeles – a concrete jungle with little planning with respect to zoning and mall developments everywhere, while the megalopolis manages to avoid the street chaos of Mumbai or Delhi. I happened to show up at the opening of Ramadan (as the hedonistic revelers of the world do one big collective face-palm) which pretty much shut down recreational life in the city. That's okay - I always enjoy urban observation (I like to keep my eyes open to in any new city), experience a foreign lifestyle (I managed to observe Jakarta’s hip and beautiful while making friends with expat helicopter pilots in Social House - thanks to GN for the tip!). I skipped over to Bali in pursuit of kite-surfing. As I write I’m in Bali’s beach-chic Seminyak planning my itinerary to Lombok and the Gili islands where I hear the wind and facilities are appropriate for this.

PS, for this posts' photos, I know the bulk of mainstream readers like to see food and cultural stuff, but until the day this blog becomes reader-supported, you get what I like to post, namely . . . Solar-powered GSM phone antennae at 4000 M altitude!



and a solar powered water boiler near Sugatse!! Can there *be* anything cooler??



Since that picture I was in immense pain from a splitting migraine stemming from the reflected sunshine off the cooker. That moment was the last time I smiled that day. :(