Historical and Musical Mongolia

Oh lovely Mongolia. We are here and safe. We spent some time at some cultural events over the last couple of days. Yesterday (Tuesday) Amanda and I went to the Museum of Mongolian History. It was awesome. Really. I have so many thoughts and things I've been writing about in my journal about this place. The idea of ethic cleansing. The benefits of living in a socialist state. Rebellions. The role of religion in a community. The nomadic lifestyle, but I don't have time to get into all of it right now. But it was really amazing. I will be happy to talk about this (maybe write about it more later).

Anyway, we went to Sukbattar Square and there was some military event going on. All the speeches were in Mongolian (of course), but I'm quite sure that it was to celebrate Mongolia's independence from China.

We also went to a conert/performance at the Palace of Culture and saw some fancy dancing, and heard a lot of music. Most of it was classical - integrating some Mongolian instruments like the guitar-head violin.