Close Encounters of the Mongolian Kind

Natural beauty abounds in Mongolia.  Even the least-talented photographer with a disposable camera (i.e., me in 2005) can come home with stunning imagery of a countryside that seems to exist on some other plane.  The ease by which the camera transforms the Mongolian landscape into aesthetically-pleasing pieces and portions can lead one to imagine that it is a static, albeit lovely, thing.

The landscape is in fact in constant motion, constant flux.  Perhaps it would be better to speak of Mongolian landscapes, the plural denoting multiplicity, overlap, and interdigitation of the lives and spaces that create one another.  These landscapes are in a state of becoming as a result of ongoing interactions between living things, the environment, and the past that create and occur in the landscape.  Thus, while the last post focused on imagery of natural beauty, it could not entirely banish the active, living participants that we encountered throughout landscapes in the Mongolian countryside.  This is quite appropriate: the summer of 2014 was one of numerous encounters with people, animals, and the landscape throughout Central Mongolia.

Clouds, yaks, and a parked motorcycle in Uvurkhangai:
a moment of stillness amidst the ever-changing landscape.

Ямар уужуу юм бэ монголын тал нутаг

The last post focused on the archaeology of summer 2014.  That, however, was only a part of the adventure and a sliver of the amazing visuals, scraping the surface on a multi-faceted field experience.  Our project photograph, Ellen Platts (http://ellenplatts.com/) did a fantastic job recording our reconnaissance as well as the landscape across which we moved.  All of the images in this post are hers and all credit goes entirely to her.

The title of this post, "Yamar uujuu youm be, Mongolyn tal nutag", is taken from a Mongolian folk song extolling the parallel virtues of the Mongolian countryside and the Mongolian people.  The line roughly translates to "How spacious is the Mongolian homeland", but could also be translated as "How peaceful is the Mongolian homeland".  Whether considering the wide rolling steppe, the endless sky, or the slow glittering rivers that cut through the countryside, this sentiment rings true.

The following images are in rough chronological order from last summer's time in the field.

Mountains outside of Orkhon, Bulgan

Orkhon soum (analogous to county) of Bulgan province is split by the river of the same name, one of the country's longest and widest rivers.

Khunnui River, Arkhangai

The winding Khunnui River is lined by short willow trees in some places and in others widens and deepens into little pools for bathing and swimming.  Throughout the day and night, herders, local families, and various animals alone or in groups come to the Khunnui as the main water source in the valley.

Herds of sheep, goat, horses, and cattle in the Khunnui Valley, Arkhangai

The portion of the Khunnui River visited in the summer of 2014 runs through Khairkhan soum of Arkhangai Province, where the famous Gol Mod 1 Xiongnu/Khunnu cemetery lies in the sandy wooded slopes east of the river valley.  In fact, the sands around Gol Mod 1 are visible in the photo below.  Our group spent the majority of our time in the valley examining Bronze Age features distributed around and a top a small mountain just west of the river.  Some of Ellen's pictures of these sites can be seen in the previous post.

Khunnui Valley with a view of Gol Mod 1 site (major Xiongnu/Khunnu elite cemetery site).  Can you spot the khirigsuur in this photo?  [Hint: look for geometric shapes in the distribution of rocks]

Stack of rocks in Suujiin Valley, Bulgan

Spanning Dashinchilen and Rashaan soum is Suujiin Valley, which runs basically north-south from the town of Dashinchilen to Khungun Khan/Ikh Khan Uul monastery.  Suujiin Valley is a mixed steppe-desert environment, with stunning rock formations and scrubby vegetation in place of the lush grass of Saikhan soum or the dense grasses and wildflowers of northeast Khentii Province.  Despite feeling like a drier and harsher environment, this part of Bulgan had lovely sunsets:

Sunset north of Khungun Khan/Ikh Khan Uul monastery, Bulgan

The summer of 2014 is dead. Long live the summer of 2014!

The BMA 2014 project didn't work out.  Rather than dwell on the unhappy particulars, this post will focus on the good things that did happen during the summer of 2014 in Mongolia.

Most of the student volunteers who had signed up to work on the BMA project journeyed to Mongolia in order to gain field experience and make the most of their summers.  To that end, our small teams conducted informal archaeological reconnaissance excursions through five provinces.  The team visited numerous significant historical and religious sites, reconnoitered in a variety of ecological zones (mixed desert-steppe, steppe, and khangai or forested hills), and got a crash-course, rough-and-ready education on all things Mongolian.

The majority if not all of the photos below were taken by Ellen Platts, one of the team members and archaeological reconnaissance photographer.  She did a great job capturing our progress.  I encourage you to visit her blog - http://ellenplatts.com/ - for her posts on the summer of 2014 in Mongolia and more images.  The photos below are organized in chronological order but it's difficult to explain the rhyme or reason of the reconnaissance routes without preparing and uploading a series of maps and dates.  Instead, an impressionistic highlights real of the archaeological component of the summer conveys the 'meat' of the team's experiences.

Field reconnaissance:

Recording a khirigsuur in the Khunui River valley, Arkhangai

Identifying rock art in Suujiin Valley, Bulgan

Community relations in Khentii

Our field team at the Orkhon waterfall (Ulaan tsutgalan, Uvurkhangai)

Our traveling REI photoshoot:

Sunset along the Khunui River, Arkhangai

One year later...

Incredible as it seems, it's been almost exactly one year since I last updated this blog!  My apologies for not sharing my stories, thoughts, pictures, and plans with all of you who follow my journey here.  Let's just say that the 12 months have been extremely eventful.

Caution: major changes underway!  (Alternatively, mind the abyss and floating geometric shapes)

It's high-time that I resurrected this blog and I've got a huge backlog of stuff to share.  Stay tuned for posts with the highlights of the last 12 months, news about some imminent activities and undertakings, and more!