August 13, 2007 - Real Mongolian BBQ

Sain baitsgaana uu!! A fist-sized rock, a full can of beer from a 7th story window, 15 contacts, 5 new investigators, and a list of Mongolian business terms to be translated.

There’s a list of everything that’s been thrown at me this week. The rock and the beer can were just the usual deal, but the investigators and such came because we, the missionaries of Enkhtaivan Branch, have decided to further divide up the area between the elders and the sisters. Before the four of us just went wherever the work took us, but now we’ve sliced the area down the middle, trying to give everybody a little bit of buildings and as well as ger district. We had to do a bit of a switcheroo with investigators and new members and contacts and such but I think its going to work out.

My companion started temple prep class this past week. There’s a mass of missionaries from different groups all going together to Hong Kong this September because the last couple of groups were delayed for some reason. At each transfer there are usually about 6 or 7 new Mongolian missionaries and 6 to 10 missionaries from the states. This next transfer there are 14 missionaries starting their missions from Mongolia and 11 coming from America. I don’t know what we’re going to do with all these missionaries! Luckily, it’s not up to me to decide.

So, let’s talk about the branch picnic. It was awesome! We met at the church at 8:30 Saturday morning and headed out on two huge buses with about 100 2-liter bottles of water, over 100 pre-made shrink-wrapped “gangabers,” 5 very much already dead and skinned sheep-ies, and 20 huge watermelons. I was a little disappointed that we didn’t get to kill the sheep on site. Apparently that’s an old tradition, or maybe just the khuduu branches do it. Either way I got to sit next to the sheep on the bus and smell them all during the 1 ½ hour drive to Terelj. Also I think I got some sheep juice on my pants so it’s practically the same.

Everybody was split up into groups of about ten or twelve and we played a bunch of relay-tug-of-water-balloon cooperation games for the first hour or so. Then people just kinda laid around while the wizened old men and women got the Mongolian Barbeque on. Notice there’s no “BD’s” in front of “Mongolian Barbeque,” which means that it wasn’t a chain restaurant where the only thing with any jinkhene connection to Mongolia is the pictures on the wall. It was the real deal. Real Mongolian barbeque, or khorkhog, as I like to call it, is where they heat up fist-sized river rocks on an open fire and then pile the rocks and meat into huge metal cans. Then you close the lid tight and let the magic happen. It was soooo good!

After food the groups all had to put on a little play/talent show presentation. Our group was assigned the task of dramatically representing the First Vision, which was a bit of a challenge because of the taboo on portraying Heavenly Father or Jesus Christ, but our team pulled through and ended up winning! What was our prize? Leftover watermelon! Yay? Yay!

The weather was absolutely perfect. It was cloudy for most of the day, not too hot, and not too warm. There was a bit of a cooling drizzle after lunch while everyone was either napping or talking under the trees or out playing khul bumbug (soccer) with the young ‘uns. The bus ride over was loud and crazy with everyone talking and singing and playing trivia games. On the ride back everyone was passed out and slumped over the bus seats. Pretty much it was perfect.

Battsetseg, the investigator I mention a few weeks back, didn’t pass her baptismal interview, which is okay because it’s always for a good reason. Now she and her little sister will be able to be baptized together at the end of this month. Yesterday we met with the two of them to show the Restoration video. I show this video to investigators about twice a month and I never get tired of watching it. For one reason, I get to see every couple of weeks the slow but steady progress I’m making with the language as I understand a little bit more and more each time I watch it. More importantly, however, it’s just a beautiful movie with such an important message. Every time I watch it I’m struck by Joseph Smith’s situation and I have to think how horrible it would be to live without knowing the things I know because of this gospel.

I appreciate the Joseph Smith story more and more because of how my investigators relate to Joseph Smith, his desire to know the truth, and his inability to find it from any earthly sources. Since Mongolia opened up in 1992 hundreds of Christian churches have come, most of them from Korea. As we talk to people on the street this is what gets them interested in our message the most. They always say, “Why? Why all these different churches? I just don’t understand who this Jesus is and why there have to be all these crazy churches that shout ‘Hallelujah’ and play guitars and heal people on TV!” Mongolia doesn’t have a Christian background, but they are still affected by Christianity, and they still respond so well to the Joseph Smith story and the knowledge of the Great Apostasy.

If you have the chance, get your hands on a copy of the Restoration video and watch it. It’s a miraculous story that needs to be remembered again and again.