This is some of our FHE group.  On this Monday night we had a birthday party and celebrated everyone's birthday.  We had cake and soda, and the 1st councilor in the branch presidency and the Elder's quorum president made cotton candy.  We had everyone sing, "Happy birthday to Me." 

 This was the first stop on our retreat. This is President and Sister Clark, Elder and Sister Gledhill, Elder and Sister Richardson, Elder and Sister Ford, us, and Elder and Sister Martin at the Chinggis Khan monument.  It is the largest statue of him in the world.

 This view is to show you his golden riding crop.  Legend has it that he found this crop in this very area.  There is quite a bit of property at this park and someday when it is finished it will be quite the attraction park.

We went up inside of the statue and came out on top of the horses head.  Elder Shrope is at the top standing in front of Chinggis ( also known in world history as Genghis Khan).

 Then we went to the 13th Century park.  It consists of six different areas.  This is the first one.  The young man lives and works here during the summer.  He has been to Tennessee and speaks English.

 This is the gateway to this area.

 This sign says that this is the guards area.  They call it the men's camp.

 Inside the guards main ger, the men were allowed to dress in some of the clothing and gear of the guards of the 13th century.  Notice Elder Shrope's sword!

 President Clark donned the winter clothing they wore.  He was quite toasty in it!!

 This is a Mongolian bear skin.  The guide didn't know the name of it in English, but said they also have the brown bear and the black bear here.

 There were several herds of horses, camels, and yaks in the area.  This is just one of the small herds of horses that we passed as they grazed on the side of the hill.

 This is area number 2 where we ate lunch.  Among the things we were served was fermented mare's milk and a meat dish called hooshures (or something like that).  We did not care for the milk but the meat dish was good.

 This is the two young ladies that served us our lunch.  This side of the building built into the rock is a very nice restroom.  The other side is the kitchen where our lunch was prepared.

 In this main ger, we not only ate lunch but we were allowed to dress in traditional clothing.  The chairs were for the king and queen.  Don't we look great as 13th century Mongolians?

 These posts line both sides of the entry way to the camp.  These are original 13th century symbols and so the Nazis were not the first to have this symbol.

 This is camp #3, the Buddhist shrine area.  As you look around, you are told not to touch the scarves, they are prayers.

 This camp also had different styles of gers that were used in the past.  Only the men were allowed to go into the last one, it was forbidden for the women to enter it.

 

 This one is an actual teepee covered in animal hides.  It does have a wooden doorway and wooden frame like the other gers.

 This was inside the teepee.  It looks alot like some of the outfits of the American Indians.

 Here at the 4th camp Elder Shrope is going to ride a Mongolian horse.  Notice how small the saddle is and how far forward they sit.

 And here I am riding a camel.  It was a lot smoother ride than on the horse!

 And Elder Shrope decided to ride the camel also.  Probably a once in a lifetime experience.  It was fun.

 The 5th camp was the library.  Chinggis Khan was the one to introduce the written language into Mongolia.  Before that it was only verbal.  This is what the ancient writing looked like.

 A neat rock that sits outside the entry to the 5th camp.

 This camp is the craftsmen camp.  These are some of the things they crafted all by hand.

 Here the guide is showing us how they grind wheat.  He had made a type of donut out of the wheat for us to eat.  It was good.

 And this is his three year old daughter who entertained us by riding her wooden stick horse.

 This camp had a walkway that went through the rocks to a lookout post below.

 That is the lookout tower below.

 These are the two young sisters that booked our outing and were our guides.  They are both returned missionaries and served in the states.  Yes the yellow t-shirt does say BYU-I.  She served in Idaho and Rexberg was her last area.  The other sister served at Temple Square.

 This is the Tiara Resort where we stayed the night.  It rained on us Wednesday morning as we all went horseback riding.  But a little rain can't stop senior couples, so after the ride, we continued seeing the sights.

 This is Turtle Rock.  Can you tell why it is named that?  They have alot of turtle designs in their decor because the turtle is pretty easy-going and peaceful.

 This eagle was pretty heavy!  It took both my hands to hold him up.

 Of course Elder Shrope had no problem holding him up high.

On the way back to the city we stopped at this Cusack graveyard.  Here they are all buried above ground.  They still use this graveyard today.
Well that was our two day retreat.  We had a blast learning alot about the history of Mongolia and trying some of they traditional foods.  We would not have missed this experience for anything.

I forgot these two pictures that I took at the garden project to show how they use things we would just throw away.  The first pic is of a old car door used as a gate to the garden area.  The old bed springs in the second pic is just one of several we saw used as fencing.  Very ingenious!

 This week we went with Elder and Sister Richardson, the Deseret International Charities couple here, to see one of the garden projects here in Ulaanbaatar.  These garden projects are where the Church teaches about gardening to the members interested and then supplies them with seeds and other things to garden with.  This project was on about 5 acres and is worked by 12 families.  It was a beautiful garden.

 This is a well for irrigating the garden.  There is one at each end of the garden area.  The pumps are some of the things the Church supplies.  The wells are about six meters deep.

 They also have an area where they do box gardening.  It was also quite a large and nice garden.

 They use these glass windows as greenhouse tops on the box gardens.

 This is the sister that showed us around the large garden project.  This is her yard and the greenhouse the Church supplied to her for her own project.  Most projects are private ones in their own yards.  As you can see, her garden is doing well.

 These are two of her four "root cellars" that she has dug in her backyard for storing her vegetables she grows.  They are three meters deep and then go in for one meter.  She has one for potatoes, one for carrots, one for onions, and one for another vegetable.  She is a remarkable lady!

These are two more beautiful little wild flowers we saw growing around the garden project.

On Wednesday there was a farewell party for Elder and Sister Clark.  They have been here in the Ulaanbaatar Mongolia mission 3 out of the past 4 years.  They have served two 18 month missions here.  They were our guides and our mentors when we came here.  They know just about everyone and every place to shop or eat.  They were our partners down in the basement and we will miss them.  These girls did a traditional dance for them.  Most are returned missionaries.  The one in the pink, Iggy, was their translator.  The other one in the pink in the next pic runs the computer lab where people can take online courses through BYU-Hawaii.  One of the other girls is married to the secretary in the mission office, Jiguur.  He was the emcee for this party.

 This little girl is quite the contortionist.  Here they call them flexible girls.  She is only about 8 or 9 years old!  They start training when they are very young.

 She makes it look so easy!!

 What strength she has in her arms and hands.  Yes she is only using one hand!

 Here she is spinning around whilr hanging from the straps.

 This young man played the ukelele and sang "Leaving on a Jet Plane" since the Clarks were leaving the next evening on a jet plane headed for Florida.  In fact we just got an e-mail from them saying they were safely home.

 Last night we attended the finals of Mongolian Idol.  It is more like America Got Talent because there were other things beside singing.  This man played a flute, a free hanging xylophone, water glasses, and here he is playing pipes.

 This was an older gentleman dressed in traditional clothing and singing a traditional song.  He was accompanied by the man playing an accordian.  He had a great voice. He took 2nd place.

 This was a group of children.  They were dressed as animals and first did a story dance.  Then they danced to the theme song from Dirty Dancing and the two ypoungest ones could really move! They got 4th place.

 This was another singer.  He was accompanied by a group playing traditional instruments.

 This was a dance group of all guys.  They did the modern, almost robotic, style of dance.

 This was a lady in traditional dress, singing a traditional song.  She was accompanied by dancers.  I did not get any pictures of the winner because we were in the top seats and it was to hard to see her through the camera, but she was amazing.  She was one of the three "flexible" acts.  She would have the top half of her body facing front and the bottom half facing the back, while lifting her arm or leg.  She looked as if she had no bones in her body at all.  When we got out from the show, it was still raining and the roads were flooded from curb to curb.  Needless to say, walking home we got wet!!

Today we only had sacrament meeting because it was Naadan, the national holiday, out in Nalaikh.  We passed these trucks carrying missiles on our way home.  Maybe they were going to Naliakh to be on display.  There were six trucks with missiles.  The rest of our Sabbath has been spent quietly at home.
On Friday evening, John Larcabal, 2nd counselor in the bishropic at home in Oceanside, stopped in for a visit.  He is here on vacation and to attend Naadam.  He brought us a 4 lb. bag of chocolate chips from the Bishop's family.  I just finally saw one of those bags at an American goods store here.  It is very rare that you find them and it costs 30,000 tugs ( I'll let you figure the amount in dollars--the rate is 1258 to $1).  So those chips will be cherished.  We will see John again before he leaves.