06/03/2026
Day two in Kharkhorin — and I still haven't made it to the monastery.
My first two full days went to work (nothing like being the founder of a nonprofit), with a few hours stolen here and there to explore the town. The highlight so far: meeting a couple of lovely Mongolian women at a café nearby, one of whom turned out to be a lawyer — my second lawyer sighting since arriving in Mongolia. The café has a resident cat named Ruby whose only job is to sleep all day in the best seat in the house. Turns out Ruby is a boy — the owners had him pegged as a girl by mistake. A name change is definitely in order.
Living in a ger has been better than I expected. It gets hot during the day, but the rain comes at night and sometimes during the day too, and when it does, the temperature drops fast. Lucky for me, my host left a heater to warm the ger — easily the best part of this space.
In the center of my ger sits my office table, where I look straight out the door. A tabby cat has wandered past a few times, glancing in to check on what I'm up to. He still hasn't accepted any of my many invitations to come inside. I love having the animals around — roaming, herds of them — goats, sheep, sometimes cows, and one time, horses right outside my camp! I'm just a few steps from sitting down in the grass to hang with them. I'm outnumbered by animals here. I see more of them than people, and that's exactly how I want it.
As I write this, I'm in awe that I get to live in a ger camp entirely on my own. The women at the café laughed at my predicament — the owner just up and leaving me here alone. He called to check in today, this time saying he's 300 km outside UB. What happened to the passing of a loved one in Ulaanbaatar? Hmm. Anyway — at least he cared enough to call.
Back to those women at the café: they joked that the owner should be paying me to look after his camp — that he left me to tend the place and house-sit, even though I paid him for the nights I'm staying. A ger camp with no service… maybe I did get duped? Maybe they have a point. But the truth is, I've loved having the whole place to myself. There's no proper kitchen, but I get by — breakfast at the camp, a meal bought in town — and that forces me to walk into town every day.
Life is pretty good. Sometimes I forget. But today, on the short walk between my ger and the bathroom, I looked up as the sun was setting and thought exactly this —
Some people are afraid of being this alone. I've never felt more at home.
