Hanging out in Ulaanbaatar

No photos today as I'm sans card reader at a little internet cafe. I'm surrounded by prepubescent boys who are playing online games like Counterstrike. It's a little surreal, actually!

Yesterday we managed to get a lot accomplished- we got cell phones for the month, bought groceries for our (borrowed) apartment, went to the black market and bought a few small things like sponges and soap, and ate some really good Mongolian hooshur, a kind of fried mutton dumpling.

As we walk down the streets of Ulaanbaatar, approximately every tenth person says, "Uunder hun" ("Tall guy") as John (who is tall, at 6'9") walks by. It's understandable but I'm sure it's going to get redundant by the time we leave! At the black market, John was the talk of the town- as we walked down the aisle that sold traditional Mongolian clothes, a woman stopped us and had him try on a del (I'll post a photo of one later). One seller actually pulled out his camera and took a picture with John-- a first for me; I'm usually the tourist taking pictures!

More to come- thank you all for your comments, we're reading them diligently but due to the fact that blogger here is in Korean, I'm having some trouble figuring out how to respond. Keep 'em coming, though, it's great to hear from all of you!