Tricked again

Day: 328

Sunrise:
05:05

Sunset:
21:39

As the crow flies:
7,04

Daily kilometers:
11

Total kilometers:
1446

Soil condition:
Grass

Temperature – Day (maximum):
25 °C

Temperature – day (minimum):
20 °C

Temperature – Night:
5 °C

Latitude:
51°14’690”

Longitude:
099°30’865”

Maximum height:
1539 m above sea level

I move our horses at 4.00 a.m. in the early morning. The strange dog is still there and follows me wherever I go. “Don’t you have a master?” I ask. “The dog looks at me a bit strangely. “Don’t understand anything. I’m Mongolian,” he seems to say. Then I repeat the question in Mongolian, whereupon he wags his tail. I wonder how he got across the river. He certainly wasn’t on the ferry. As I retreat into the tent, he lies down in front of the door. Mogi barks jealously at him. As he is chained to his peg and has to look after the horses, he does not enjoy the freedom that his four-legged colleague has. At 6:30 a.m. I lead the horses to another feeding area and at 9:30 a.m. our paid prince gets up. “Would you like some tea?” Tanja asks him. “Hooouuuuu, dchinggiii, Hooouuuuu, dchinggiii,” he replies. “Has he gone completely mad now?” I ask Tanja. “I don’t know what he means by that,” she says in amazement. “I think he’s singing. He has the earpiece of his cell phone in his ear,” I say. “Odonbaatar! Odonbaatar!!!”, I shout loudly, whereupon he looks at me laughing. “Take out your earphones!” I shout and use sign language to show what I mean. Our husband laughs again, takes his little headphones out of his ears and asks; “What?” “Do you like tea?” Tanja repeats her question. “Tijmee,” he replies. After breakfast I tell him urgently that it can’t go on like this. “We hired you for the horses so that I have my back free for my documentation. Tanja is also busy with her English translations and can’t do everything. So the horses are your job. Do you understand that?” I ask. “Tijmee,” he replies with a laugh. “Where’s your water bottle?” Tanja asks to bridge the resulting silence because she is busy packing food and drink for the day. “I burned it yesterday,” he replies. “You what?” asks Tanja, horrified. I burned them. I don’t need water during the day. Tea is enough for me,” he explains. “Well, then there’s only tea for you. But don’t ask me for water later. Denis and I each have a bottle of water. We’ll have to make do with that until the next camp,” she explains to him, to which he just smiles disparagingly.

While he brings and saddles the horses, I dismantle the tents and stow everything in the duffel bags and messenger bags again so that I can tie them up for loading. Odonbaatar points out my poor charging technique again. “Okay, so that you don’t get on my nerves any longer, we’ll tie Sharga up today using your technique. Let’s see if the luggage holds,” I say. Odonbaatar smiles contentedly.

Just ten minutes after setting off, the duffel bags start to slide. We interrupt our run to straighten them out again. This happens every 20 minutes. “Tomorrow we’ll load again as usual,” I say. We’ve barely been on the road for an hour when Odonbaatar gets thirsty and wants to take a break. I breathe heavily and try to control myself. “This guy is a real imposition,” I curse quietly. Tanja takes the thermos flask out of the saddlebag and hands it to Odonbaatar. He sits down on the floor and greedily drinks one cup after another. He eats a bag of cookies that Tanja has also handed him. Then we walk on. Since he is constantly talking on his cell phone or listening to loud music, his presence is annoying. There is hardly anything to be heard of birds or other wildlife. “If that doesn’t change, we’ll have to let him go,” I say. Suddenly he is way behind. So much so that Tenger begins to long for his colleagues and causes Odonbaatar problems. All of a sudden Tenger breaks loose. The load slips and forces us to stop again to tie it up again.

After two and a half hours we reach a hut. Odonbaatar decides to call it a day. “That’s far too early,” I lament. “The horses are tired too,” says Tanja, relenting. “That may be true, but if we’re only out for such a short time today, we’ll have to walk more tomorrow. That doesn’t make sense,” I reply. Odonbaatar prevails, which is why we set up camp next to a small lake. A heavy thunderstorm rolls in at the moment. With wind force eight, it’s not easy for me to erect our large tent. “I don’t need a tent today,” says Odonbaatar. “Why not?” I ask in surprise because he loved his fabric house yesterday and hardly wanted to part with it. “I have to look after the horses. It’s no good if I sleep in the tent,” his answer amazes me. Apparently my morning speech worked. “I don’t believe him,” Tanja’s statement disturbs my mood, which has just improved a little. “Why?” I want to know. “Do you see the Baishin there?” she asks. “What kind of question? Of course I can see that.” “I think he’ll retire there tonight.” “Hm, I wouldn’t put it past him,” I think and ask Odonbaatar directly. “Do you think you don’t need a sleeping mat because it’s comfortable in the baishin?” “Not very comfortable because I sleep on the floor. But you’re right, I don’t need a sleeping mat today,” he reveals. “You won’t be sleeping in the hut, but here. We are a team and have to look after the horses at night. That’s what you’re here for. Have you forgotten that?” “Okay,” he replies, which is why I think I’ve nipped the next emerging problem in the bud.

Once our camp is set up and Odonbaatar has managed to light a fire despite the storm-like wind, we sit down together in the awning to eat something. All of a sudden, a motorcycle approaches. A man and a child enter our tent. Odobaatar offers them our cookies and tea in accordance with local custom. As the stranger and his little daughter are drinking from Odonbaatar’s slobbered cup, in which a few pieces of cookie are already floating around softened, Tanja gives them a fresh cup and a few cookies to go with it. It doesn’t take long for the stranger, his daughter and Odonbaatar to leave our tent. “Where are you going?” I ask our husband as he is about to leave without comment. “I’m going to the Baishin and will eat there with my friends.” “Aha, good to know. And when will you be back?” “At 9 p.m.,” he says. “Okay. See you later then,” I reply.

I sit in our tent, brooding. It slowly occurs to me that Odonbaatar has been planning this stay here with his friends for days. That could be the reason why he didn’t want to camp in the river bend yesterday. If we had set up camp there, we would have gone through the ford of the side arm and thus taken a shortcut in the direction of Ringinlhumbe. Only the detour around the lake forced us in the direction of his friends. “Clever, clever,” I mumble and grab my maps and the navigation computer to find the coordinates of our current location. I quickly transfer the data to the map and when I realize that I have walked towards Tsagaan Nuur again today and not towards Ringinlhumbe as planned, I am speechless. “He screwed us,” I say to Tanja. “What do you mean?” she asks. “All the fuss about yesterday’s camp site and the supposedly bad grass was a pure lie. He deliberately lured us here. He wanted to visit his friends,” I explain excitedly. “So we lost a marching day?” “Absolutely. The prince thinks he can take us on a paid vacation,” I mused. “And what are you going to do now?” “I’ll take the map, run to this Baishin and tell him nicely that he’s been exposed. He probably doesn’t expect us to know where we are. He’s probably never heard of a GPS,” I say with a snort and start walking. “Denis?” “Yes?” “Stay calm.” “I am calm. Very calm,” I reply and trudge on.

When I enter the Baishin, I hope to catch him drinking vodka. To my surprise, he is sitting on the floor drinking tea. Of course, I was seen from afar by the women and children of the house. That is why my appearance is not an unexpected event. I greet those present in a friendly manner, drink my tea, which is offered to me immediately, and only after some time do I get to talk about my request. As I spread the map out on the wooden floor, which is covered with the usual cheap plastic carpet, an elderly man looks at it with delight and points with his finger to various place names, lakes and rivers. He almost reverently pronounces the old Russian names that are listed there because the map material is almost 30 years old. Of course I would have liked to get more up-to-date maps for our horse expedition, but I was lucky to have got hold of any geographical navigation maps of Mongolia at all. “This is Tsagaan Nuur. That was our camp yesterday. So we walked back again. It’s just as far from here to Ringinlhumbe as it was from yesterday’s camp. You deliberately led us to your friends. If that happens again, we won’t need you anymore. In future, please talk to us about such solo efforts,” I say with a smile on my face so as not to embarrass our man too much in front of his friends. When I have finished I ask; “Oilogloo?” (Understood). “Tijmee,” he replies meekly. “What time are you coming to fluff the horses?” “At 11:00 p.m.” When you left, you spoke of 9:00 pm. Please come at 9:30 p.m.,” I offer a compromise.

Back at camp, Tanja and I discuss the pros and cons of letting our horse man go. “We could make enemies,” Tanja considers. “I don’t know. But if we go on with him, it will be very exhausting for us. He’s also no help with the horse thefts. He sleeps all the time and he certainly doesn’t keep his eyes open during the guard shifts. Now he’s even led us in the wrong direction.” “I think we have to see his presence as a ransom from the horse mafia,” Tanja ponders, “Odonbaatar has nothing to do with horse thieves.” “Not that, but he is Mongolian and comes from this area. His brother Boldor owns a hostel for tourists. He is a tour guide. It could be that thieves don’t want to steal horses from people like that or their friends. I think we should give him another chance and then decide again,” Tanja replies.

Odonbaatar arrives half an hour late. Normal in Mongolia. That is why we are completely relaxed about this. After he has pegged the horses at their feeding places, he wants to go back to the baishin to spend the night there. Tanja has had enough now. She really gets out of her skin and gets our man going. “Okay, I’ll stay with the horses tonight,” he replies, grabs his Deel and sits down with the horses. As soon as he has taken up his position there, his friend appears on his motorcycle. Now there are two men with our animals. Because we don’t trust it, we check his presence every two hours. At 4:00 a.m. he untied the horses from the stakes as agreed. I look at the place where he sat down with his friend yesterday. I am reassured to note his presence.

At 9:30 a.m., his friend’s motorcycle suddenly comes roaring up. Stunned, I see Odonbaatar get out of the back seat and greet us in a friendly manner. I look back to where I saw him lying just a moment ago. He probably draped his Deel ingeniously at 4:00 a.m. to give the impression that he was sleeping there. He has tricked us again.

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