Data collection in the Eastern aimags
People, I recognize it’s unfair to write in Hungarian. There are strong arguments against it. Google translator was not made for this language. Only around 11 million call it their mother tongue. Who can pronounce words like százszorszép? BUT. It’s my mother tongue, I like it and it has quite a few words in common with Mongolian: bátor, kék, tenger. So much for justification, but let’s get back to the topic. Mongolia. Or more precisely – data collection in the Eastern aimags.
When I first heard this term being mentioned in association with my name, I couldn’t decide whether to interpret it as a bad joke, a nightmare, a task that was simply totally impossible to complete or something I have always dreamed about. You have to know that I have always wanted to visit Mongolia. Already as a child I dreamed about seeing the plain lands of Attila’s origin, the tracks of the Transsiberian railway cutting through vast grassland, the big nothing. But then it’s around -20 degrees these days in Mongolia and I wasn’t sure anymore whether I really cared about the big nothing out there.
This weekend, I didn’t have a choice. As part of a cost-benefit analysis of different herding types for an Asian Development Bank funded project, we need household data. And I am the one who is going to get it, together with Enkhie, my local counterpart. So we drove five hours to the East, visited three herder families, talked with livestock experts, slept at a Chinese hotel and saw many animals. Some of this is documented below. But again, words and photos cannot describe what I have really seen. Honestly, it was amazing. This was really my dream come true. Stepping out into the chilly air and seeing the sun set behind golden-looking hills dotted with animals after drinking milky tea with an old couple in their traditional ger – I was even glad that my camera battery failed me. This way I’ll have to remember without help. So unfortunately for you, only pictures of “intensive farming”.
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ami a fejemen átmegy 
Katikám,
és miért nem vettél Tibi csokit?
Képzeld el! – Közép-Ázsiában ilyet enni – ezt sem mondhatja el mindenki magáról.
Éljen a megbonthatatlan magyar-mongol barátság és Tibi-csokiszeretet!
Puszi