Mongolian Connections: Money Talks, and People Listen

This connection isn’t exclusively Mongolian, because it’s just related to Buddhism in general, but if it weren’t for Mongolia, I wouldn’t have learned about the life of Buddha, and thus wouldn’t be able to make this connection…

For those of you who haven’t been to Mongolia and thus haven’t read the Shakyamuni Buddha’s biography, Buddha was the prince whose father did his best to keep him isolated from the world in order to keep him from becoming a holy man instead of a king. (This is related to a prediction made on the day of Buddha’s birth.) Buddha was raised in incredible luxury, with several palaces, no work to do, and eventually, with a royal wife and child. Despite his father’s efforts, Buddha decided that material wealth was not enough and wanted to meet some of his subjects. When he left the palace confines, he encountered an old man and was so horrified, he decided to become an ascetic to avoid becoming old himself. (And I thought modern America had a problem with aging!) I’m simplifying a lot here, as other subjects came into play, but the gist of the story is that Buddha decided to renounce his royal power, his wealth, and his family in order to live as a beggar. After escaping the palace, Buddha became a mendicant, then a hermit, and finally, after adopting a lifestyle of moderation and meditation, he achieved Nirvana under the Bodhi tree.

Nothing about this story struck me as too remarkable, but as I continued to read about Buddha’s life, a pattern emerged. Another character in the story had a similar tale: Yasa, “the son of a millionaire,” was brought up in the most luxurious of lifestyles, but one day became so repulsed by the excess of his world that he ran away from his home and came upon Buddha teaching. When Buddha preached to him, Yasa became his disciple and eventually achieved enlightenment.

This story—the renunciation of wealth in pursuit of higher ideals—is a pretty common one, not only in Buddhism, but also in other ideologies. Probably the most famous Christian example is St. Francis, the son of a wealthy merchant who decided that charity and poverty were more fulfilling than his friends’ and family’s lives of luxury. He left behind his father (and his father’s wealth), first living as a mendicant, and then founding his own mendicant order. On the political scene, Engels was the son of a textile manufacturer, and if I remember the movies correctly, Che and Castro were both pretty upper-middle class. Though I’m not sure if these guys renounced their wealth exactly, they at least had to put down that sort of lifestyle a bit in order to lead their revolutions, I think. (I am not a historian, so the communism part could be grossly inaccurate, and Wikipedia is being less than helpful. Corrections welcome.) A google search on “renounced his wealth” doesn’t quite know which religion it wants to choose, so common is that theme. (Interestingly, “renounced her wealth” reveals mostly Christian saints, and I’m sure someone who knows better than I could analyze that.)

Buddha and St. Francis were both charismatic leaders who led by example when it came to worldly renunciation. They each gained a cult following and founded pretty influential and enduring movements… So what about this theme is so convincing? Is it just that seeing an example of renunciation leading to spiritual fulfillment makes others more likely to make the leap? (Clare of Assisi, one of Francis’s first and most devoted followers, was a common result for “renounced her wealth.”) Did Buddha and Francis serve as before/after pictures for adopting poverty as a lifestyle? Is this made more convincing because renunciation of property is seen as such a drastic action that it makes people take notice and makes people think, “If he gives up wealth for this cause, it must be a big deal”? I’m not sure, but rich people who choose to become poor seem to have quite a presence, and this theme endures across cultures and centuries.

At first, it may seem like a great thing that these religions glorify figures who give up the material joys that our society so values. They’re sticking it to the capitalist system, right? Except, as your own foray into hagiography may have shown you, (everyone makes a foray into hagiography at some point, right?), this has a major flaw: Only the wealthy have wealth to renounce. The poor that Buddha encountered in his journey? They don’t make much of a statement when they give up their BC equivalent of a cardboard box. In the medieval Christian world, the Church made a big deal about the wealthy devoting so much time and money to charity; this actually gave the upper class a spiritual leg up over the poor, because they had time and money to give. It may be harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but with enough money, all things are possible, and this was especially true if one aspired to sainthood. A boy who was born a beggar would probably be too busy trying not to starve to strive for spiritual enlightenment, and if he started preaching about the beauty of his lifestyle, I don’t think anyone would have cared. This is a complicated issue, and one that’s worth a bit of examination. (Keep in mind that not all grand religious figures follow this pattern; it’s significant that Jesus was born in the humblest of circumstances, and if I recall correctly, neither Mohammed nor Joseph Smith, both also from humble beginnings, took vows of poverty.)

That idea carries over into modern times; we value philanthropy on a grand scale, but you can’t be a philanthropist without being pretty rich first. Warren Buffet gives so much money to charity that his net worth dwindles into single-digit-billions, and he’s a hero. Brangelina adopt more foreign babies for their nannies to raise, and they start a trend. But the everyday families who can’t afford vacations, much less yachts, and still scrape enough out of their pockets to pay their taxes and give to their local shelter? They don’t usually get news stories. In fact, some of them sort of get a lot of flak, on a cultural level, because they aren’t necessarily educated, and they probably aren’t ambitious. And couples that give up their time and freedom to give foster kids an extra chance? Sure, our country values them in theory, but it doesn’t necessarily offer them too much support or encouragement. 

Imagine if People Magazine did a celebrity-free issue, where instead of covering the latest cheating husbands or movie-star elopements, they covered the guy who walks two miles in the rain to help his daughter change her flat tire, or a low-budget wedding only made possible by the help of friends and family. (Though good fathers and happy families are probably harder to come by than gross celebrity antics.) But of course, that’s not what people want to read about. And that is part of the problem; probably it’s not so much that the system values the rich better, it’s that the people in the system (and that means you and me) value the rich better. Once we start paying to hear good news about good people, the media would start covering it… But I guess if we want to read about that, we’re just going to have to wait until Madonna gives up her career and starts working at a homeless shelter.

Meditations: Nomadism and Us

I don’t know why I have always been fascinated by nomads. As someone who shudders at the thought of packing for anything, and who looks forward to finally never having to move again, nomads shouldn’t necessarily be on my radar. But for whatever reasons, the concept intrigues me, and nomads were what first sparked my interest in Mongolia.

In Ulaanbaatar, I hadn’t gotten to experience nomad culture, and I was still really pretty fuzzy about how the whole thing worked. Even driving up to Darkhad, stopping by gers and checking out the setup, I was confused about the social intricacies of the community, (is there a community?), as well as the practical aspects of moving, staying, etc. But after living with nomads for a few days, I’ve gotten a much better idea of the lifestyle, and I can’t help but compare (or contrast) it to the increasingly mobile lifestyle of the modern American.

In case you’re as clueless as I was, here’s a rundown of how Mongolian nomadism works (as I’ve seen it): The nomads live mostly in gers, huge, warm tents made of a sort of lattice (for the walls), and stakes (holding up the roof), then covered in thick felt or tarp. The gers have a stove and basic furniture, like beds, stools, and trunks (the trunks in beautiful bright colors with painted patterns). The entire ger, including most of the furniture, can be easily disassembled and loaded onto oxcarts or jeeps. In areas with taiga (thick pine forest), there are also quite a few log cabins, though the furniture is still ger-style furniture. Ger or cabin, the homes generally only have one room (or sometimes an additional kitchen/food storage room), and people sleep on the beds that double as couches or on the ground. Families live all together in the single room, sometimes including grandparents, which means as many as six or seven people may live in one space. The gers/cabins seemed to come mostly in groups of two to four, in a large extended family unit. The family I lived with had two cabins and three gers, along with a storage shed.  I think most of the family was descended from the patriarch, a medicine man who shared his cabin with his daughter and her children (and for the week, with me and Prof C). Nomads move one to four times a year; they pack up their entire ger and carry it all to a different location. I can’t say “new location,” because they sometimes have established spots for each season, from a mile to ten miles away. A winter home by the mountains (as protection from the wind), a summer home on the steppe (fewer flies), etc. This way the herds get fresh grass, and people live as comfortably as they can in the extreme conditions. Though people live in extended family units, they are also part of a much larger community, including all the families in the area. To find someone’s ger, you can stop by another ger in the area and ask; they know where it is and can point you in the right direction. People often ride (or perhaps drive) to other gers in the area to have tea with their friends or help with big projects (building a new cabin would be an example). They enjoy stopping by and spending time with their friends as much as we do, and in the evenings a whole family may play volleyball or frisbee, often with friends from other families. I’m not sure if the whole community moves to the same new area for each season, or if one’s winter friends tend to differ from one’s summer friends. In any case, it seems like if you know most people in your area, and you’re only moving a few miles away, you’ll know most people in that area, too. So that is Mongolian nomadism in a nutshell.

I did not expect the nomadic lifestyle to feel so settled. Their gers are very homelike, very lived in, and are decorated not only with orange furniture, but also with photos of themselves and family members; many nomads also have shrines of some sort, with heirlooms (snuff boxes and precious bowls), religious pictures, offerings, and other religious paraphernalia, like scarves or fake flowers. Most gers have solar panels (or occasionally miniature windmills) that provide electricity, as well a satellite dish and a TV inside. They are warm when it’s cold outside, and there is almost always someone inside, usually stirring up something delicious. Nomads don’t have a lot of stuff, but this means they use all their stuff. No boxes of clothes they never wore or shoes they forgot they had or books they will eventually someday maybe read.

So I’m already starting to compare it to the American life. As Americans, we value the acquisition of stuff, and acquisition is part of what makes a house a home. At weddings and housewarmings and baby showers, people receive bundles of gifts from Ikea or Pottery Barn, as if these things might all add up to feeling settled and complete. Having vases and martini glasses and blenders is supposed to make one feel at home. But how does stuff that one doesn’t use and is generally unfamiliar with make a home? How do two sets of china and a big screen TV increase the utility and familiarity of a house? It seems these things just take up space, and although champagne flutes might be useful, honestly, what should matter is with whom you’re drinking the fizz and how you feel about them, not that you might have to use plastic cups. Part of this, I’m sure, is the commercial, material culture we live in, in which somehow we are convinced we need all this stuff that we simply do not need. Period. Or worse, we’re convinced we need stuff that we don’t even really want. And I think I’ll probably return to that concept in another post.

But here’s something else I find interesting. I have my own perspective on this, influenced by the school-a-year plan I seem to have fallen into. As Americans, and especially as young Americans, we move a lot. I might be an excessive case, but even so, kids move to go to college, then move for their summer jobs, move into a different space (if not community) each year, then move when they graduate, and then probably move a couple more times before they’re thirty (especially with the new trend of travel and post-college gap years in the form of Teach for America, WorldTeach, etc.) Yet because we live in nice sturdy apartment blocks or houses with yards, somehow this doesn’t qualify us as nomadic. I’m going to point something out: We are sort of nomads. Moving is often seen as a sign of success; people who choose to stay in their hometowns are often looked down upon by those who leave. (A friend of mine who left her Midwestern city to go to Vandy lamented that most people from her high school stayed home after graduation and went to state schools. She insisted that they just weren’t trying to make something of themselves, and though I pointed out that maybe they preferred familiarity and family to society’s definition of “success,” she didn’t buy it.) It’s not just individuals, it’s the whole community who moves, but unlike Mongolian nomads who still remain as a single community, we split up into separate sections and establish “homes” with entirely new communities, practically every couple of years.

Apart from just the physical packing and storing and unpacking and repacking that accompanies moving every year into new housing, young adults in America also have to pack and unpack something much more significant: a community. This might not happen every year (unless you’re crazy and switch schools all the time………) but it still happens sort of frequently. Kids go to a college and find a new social network. Then they graduate and find another social network, based on a few existing friendships, but also on new co-workers, new neighborhoods, new haunts, etc. A few times a year, they might go home to visit their families and old friends, but generally, they stick with their newly established networks. Then they get married, maybe have children, move a couple new times, and though they retain some old friends, the scene of their social interactions completely changes. And this is still seen as part of a non-nomadic, “stationary” sort of lifestyle. Hm.

So here’s the thing: Mongolian nomads have communities, they stick with their families, and over the course of their lifetime, though life changes in natural ways (growing up, getting married and getting their own ger, having children, having grandchildren, etc), they get to stay with mostly the same people, utilize mostly the same skills, and live on the same areas of land. They understand their community and land in a way that many Americans don’t get to. (Hey, where does your water come from? Which direction is north from your house? Which plants are naturally endemic to your area? Which nations settled your land, and in what order?) It seems to me that nomadic lifestyles, in which people move locations frequently but retain the same (few) possessions and the same (many) relationships, are actually a lot more settled than the socially mobile modern America. Nomads move their location, but they keep the things that are really supposed to add value to life: People, a job, a lifestyle, and a home.

Am I way off-base here? Am I overestimating American mobility? (Probably based on my own experiences.) Am I glorifying a traditional culture that has its own hardships and ought to progress in our direction? Is the American method of finding new locations and, consequently, social circles really that bad, or is it a great way to experience different environments, encounter new worldviews, and adjust one’s network to one’s (ever changing) personality? Is the American system actually an advancement over either nomadic cultures or completely sedentary cultures in which people never traveled farther than one’s village? Or have we lost something precious in our quest for better-more-faster-greener?

Regarding just American mobility, do new inventions like Skype and email, as well as the ease of air travel, facilitate people moving while not feeling like they are losing their old communities? Or are Skype and email and air travel increasingly important because we are moving more often? Is either the mobile lifestyle (looking for financial/career success and new experiences, and trying to change or improve the world) or the sedentary lifestyle (like the Midwesterners who never left) superior? Or are they just different lifestyles for different people? If so, does our culture really view them as such? Should we be making more of an effort to preserve our communities and social networks, rather than go where the best career prospects are? Or does success take precedence over relationships? Does moving even really interfere with relationships at all, now that we have all the modern conveniences of instant communication across distances? I could go on and on… And I might return to this later, having thought about these questions and probably a bunch of others I haven’t even gotten to.

Meditations: Is stuff just stuff?

One of the most significant works of classical Mongolian literature is a book that describes the life and conquests of Genghis Khan, called The Secret History of the Mongols. (Yeah, a Westerner clearly chose that name.) Incidentally, it is one of the only works of classical Mongolian literature. Not much written by the conquering Mongols survives, and I’m not 100% sure of the reasons for that yet.

In any case, I’m reading The Secret History, and it’s an interesting work. It reminds me, actually, of the Celtic mythology I had to read for my Oxford tute, and I might expand on that more later, but the point of this post is to talk about a specific incident in the life of Genghis Khan. Though the details are fuzzy, the story basically goes down like this:

Genghis Khan, shortly after getting married, went to an ally of his father and presented him with a black sable coat. In return, Ong Khan (the ally), pledged to Genghis that he would unite the fractured Mongol people in return for the coat. Later, Genghis came to Ong Khan and asked for help destroying some pesky enemies who stole his wife.  Ong Khan’s response was centered around the coat; he recalled the gift, and recited a poem that ended with the pledge, 
“I shall now fulfill that promise

In return for the sable coat

I will destroy all the Mergids

And rescue Borte-ujun

In return for the sable coat

We shall crush all the Mergids

And bring back your wife, Borte.”

Note: The punctuation is pretty ambiguous/nonsensical in the version I have, so I just left it all out. Read it as you will.

The scene confused me a bit, because as much as I would be willing to do a lot for a sable coat, this khan did seem to be resting an awful lot on that coat. But the key seems to be in the word “promise.” The coat was not just a coat, it was a promise. It was a symbol of an alliance, and a gift that really meant something. This made me think a bit about what property can mean. We tend to view things as just things, and our culture both reveres stuff and looks down on reverence for stuff. Conspicuous consumption is very much alive, but discussion of money and flashiness are considered gauche.

A fur coat is great, and people work themselves half to death in order to make enough money to buy a fur coat (whether or not they actually buy one), but one isn’t supposed to revere the fur coat. And if the fur coat gets paint thrown on it, the proper response is not to throw a fit—after all, it’s just a coat, right?

But in this story of Genghis and Ong, the fur coat was more than just a coat. That piece of property symbolized a pledge. And I think that our culture, though it is materialistic in its relentless pursuit of stuff, has perhaps forgotten how an item can be more than just an item. We crave things to have them, but we convince ourselves that we want to use them. You’re not supposed to admit that maybe you just want that iPad to have it, and that you’ll probably get tired of it in about four days anyway. You’re supposed to want it because it’s useful, not because you want to show others that you worked hard for your money, and you can spend it on something frivolous and sort of fun. One traditional use of money was just to show power, and in a world with an increasingly ambiguous power structure, maybe this is a worthwhile use. (A six-thousand dollar suit might not look better than a $600 one, but it does look more powerful. And that makes it worth it, right, Gob?)

That’s probably a bad example, but here’s another: jewelry. The symbolic nature of wedding rings and engagement rings is obvious—we wear them as a symbol of our commitment, dedication, etc., etc. No one blinks an eye when, in a movie, an angry fiancée/wife throws her ring to the ground. She’s not discarding the material aspect of the ring, she’s discarding the symbolic aspect. But how about a less popular jewelry symbol, the post-cheating jewelry? Kobe Bryant bought his wife a four-million-dollar ring after his cheating was discovered, and she stayed with him. Though people weren’t necessarily surprised, there was commentary on such a blatantly mercenary attitude. She stayed with a cheater for just a piece of jewelry? But the thing is, it wasn’t necessarily just a piece of jewelry. Of course, I can’t comment specifically on that case, but when a cheating husband buys his wife a diamond necklace, he is (perhaps subconsciously) making a pledge to her, and showing that he loves her, thousands or millions of dollars worth. He’s using a piece of property as a symbol of his dedication. This isn’t so different from an engagement ring, or even parents putting a down payment on a house for their newlywed child. (I’m aware of the crucial difference that one is an apology for wrongdoing and the others are spontaneous pledges, but that’s not the issue here.)

Somehow, it seems our culture has, while seeking money and things more relentlessly than ever, managed to forget one of the things makes stuff worth having: What it symbolizes. We’re more materialistic for material’s sake, but less willing to attribute meaning to the material. But that’s just my perspective, I guess. 

So think about it: How has property and its value changed over centuries? Do we really seek property more, but value it less? What are some examples of property in our society that do have a symbolic value? Is this mercenary, after all, and should we mean our promises without needing to materially commit to them? And if it’s true that we value stuff for its own sake, not for its sake as a symbol, does that make us more or less materialistic? Is it that simple?

Just so you know, I will unite your 
fractured people in exchange for this coat.