Bayartai!

So this latest long hiatus hasn’t been because I’ve been gallivanting around the Mongolian countryside; it’s because I’ve been gallivanting around the American countryside. After my long flights from Mongolia to Los Angeles, I re-immersed myself pretty rapidly into American life, by seeing Hollywood at night and the Grand Canyon in the heat of the day, camping in the Colorado Rockies, driving through Vegas (just waving as we went past), and eventually ending up in my quiet little college town with a view of the California smog. In short, I’ve sort of been visiting America’s own sacred places.

An American Ovoo

So, though I have about 10 leftover things I’d like to post about eventually, this travel narrative is officially closed.

One would think I would emerge from this American road trip with some brilliant insights about this American life, but I think I was too busy falling back in love with my all-time favorite country to come up with anything intellectual. I do, however want to say something not about Mongolia or America, but about how where we are and where we’ve been sort of defines how we think and behave. I’m taking a class on Jerusalem, and when asked on the first day to define what makes up a city, everyone jumped to relevant aspects of Jerusalem (religious sites, political boundaries, ownership). My mind, however, still at least a bit settled in UB, thought of infrastructure and water/energy sources (not so important to Jerusalem, but crucial to UB’s existence), I nearly said “ger districts” when trying to talk about poorer areas of cities, and when we started a discussion of how topography defines a city, I envisioned my quintessential city as reigned in by mountains and oriented by Sükhbaatar Square.

This mindset is already fading, but that country song seems to ring at least a little true… You can take the girl out of Ulaanbaatar, but you can’t take Ulaanbaatar out of the girl. 

Mongolian Connections: Lingua Franca

Before Mongolia, I’d never traveled alone in a country of which I did not know the language. Though I was intimidated by this prospect at first, I’ve discovered something: I do know the language. Sort of. Not Mongolian, but English; one can get by in Ulaanbaatar with just English, and even in the countryside, “Hi” and “Thanks” seem to be pretty standard knowledge. Though I feel weird expecting people to know English, I also feel weird trying in Mongolian sometimes, when they probably do know enough English to help me. I’d never had to realize before how universal English is. Sure, plenty of countries don’t have many English-speakers, but generally nations are implementing English in their curricula (which is convenient for would-be traveling Americans who can teach it just about everywhere except Spain). One (very very strange) article I read in a Mongolian newspaper mentions the importance of educating people “in internationally recognized English language.” (There was more to that sentence, but I’m not sure exactly what it said; it in itself is evidence that there should be more English education in Mongolia.) And English isn’t in use just for the benefit of native English speakers; my Bulgarian friend who lives in Switzerland communicated with me and university employees completely in English, and almost all tourists here use English. At a café, I’ll hear a German speaking with a Mongolian, both in English. On one countryside-tour, the Frenchman in our group used an English translator, and he then translated into French for his wife. English has become the language of international communication. With European-Mongolian interactions, this is interesting because the language is a neutral third ground, what Esperanto was meant to be (and sort of failed, but we should keep working on it!) Of course, it’s only a neutral third ground for the non-American/British/etc. But I’m not complaining about that.

This de facto universal language just sort of sprung up organically, as, I suppose, languages have to. (Unfortunately for poor L L Zamenhof.) English is one connection here, but the idea of an international language of communication is another; of course, the idea of a neutral language that different nations used to communicate reminded me of one of my favorite things: Latin. In the Middle Ages, educated people spoke Latin; monks and scholars from different nations communicated in Latin, and texts were written in Latin so that everyone could read them. If you knew Latin, you knew that, even in a very regionally centered world, you could find someone with whom to communicate. In many senses, English is the new medieval Latin.

I wonder what this indicates about the world. The elite of the medieval world used an international language to communicate, before vernaculars came into fashion, and now, after a hiatus when the elite sort of just spoke all the languages they’d need, English has become a necessity for travellers and/or speakers of obscure languages. What does our age have in common with the Dark Age that necessitates such a language? Furthermore, I think it’s significant that not only the elite are speaking in this new universal language; for the first time in a long time (ever?) the common man in one nation can communicate with the common man in another. Of course, for the first time in a long time (ever?) the common man is travelling. But I’m not sure that’s all there is to it.

As much as the similarity between Latin’s function and English’s function interests me, the differences between the languages interest me, too. I’ve always thought English to be near-impossible to learn. Why don’t “through,” “though,” “cough,” and “tough” rhyme? It makes no sense. But when I speak to people who’ve learned English as a second language, they tend to have the same response to my denigrations of my language. They all say that English is easy to learn. Part of this, I think, is the fact that one is exposed to English all the time, even in a foreign country. But the other reason, as my friend K pointed out to me, is because English is so flexible. Though its irregularities must be frustrating, its lack of structure means that there aren’t grammatical tomes to be pored over. Perhaps it is very difficult to learn to speak English correctly (who/whom, “to boldly go,” final prepositions), but it’s pretty easy to pick up how to construct sentences.

English’s flexibility is also one of the things that makes it Awesome. It absorbs phrases and words effortlessly; “je ne sais quoi” and “fajita” are both equally at home in the English language. (Though you don’t even want to know how I just tried to spell that first one.) Somehow, they’re as at home as “whatever” and “hot dog.” Other languages aren’t like this, I think. K says that Chinese is so rigid that foreign words sort of just can’t be imported, while “home run” makes it into Spanish as the bastardized “jónron,” because that fits Spanish’s rules. In Latin, words have to fit a grammatical structure, and so foreign terms often had to be forcibly wedged into that structure. (And looking at how Ancient Greek imported foreign names can lead to hilarity.) English, however, takes words just as they come. I’m sure this isn’t true with some words, but for the most part it is more flexible than other languages.

This might be the reason for another difference between English and Latin: how they change. English is rapidly transforming, picking up new structures, new words, and new grammar in addition to new idioms. Latin, on the other hand? Though style, syntax, and vocabulary changed, I can read Plautus and I can read Abelard, and they were separated by over twelve centuries. Most English speakers can’t even manage Shakespeare fluently, and he was writing sort of recently. This is for reasons other than the rigidity and flexibility of Latin and English, respectively; I think part of it also has to do with who is speaking these languages. Latin was preserved by the intellectual elite, and it was taught to people as a second language. Little monks would be constantly corrected, and one wouldn’t put up with mistakes in scholarship. Latin wasn’t given a chance to evolve much in the structured settings in which it occurred. Compare this to how grammatical errors and stylistic faux pas are allowed not only in everyday conversation, but also even in published works and the New York Times (though not the New Yorker, of course). English and Latin both serve(d) as common languages, methods of communication across cultures, but the ways they play that role, the origins, the evolution, their use, and the repercussions, are quite different.

The modern English/medieval Latin connection is the subject of this Mongolian Connection, but I think I also, after a couple months of writing about why Mongolia is Awesome, want to remind everyone that English is Awsome, too.

(And I’ve used four words or phrases imported from other languages in this post, just by accident.)

Meditations: Marriage for Love or for Money?

Throughout the Secret History of the Mongols, and further throughout my readings on the Mongol Empire, I encountered a theme that’s common in pretty much all history and a lot of literature: marriage as a political tool. Genghis Khaan would take a wife in order to secure his relationship with (i.e. superiority over) that tribe. When you can have as many wives as you want, this strategy works pretty well. Morris Rossabi put it clearly when he stated that “the Mongols often used marital alliances as a means of binding non-Mongols to them.” The Ilkhan Abakha, for example, established a good relationship with the Byzantines because his wife was a Byzantine princess. Even Edward I of England considered marrying a Mongol in order to secure an alliance with them.

Of course this is not a Mongol innovation; East or West, children of prominent families have often been entered into marriages for political or monetary reasons. In fact, marriage was seen very much as a financial alliance for probably most of history. This is old news to pretty much everyone reading this, so I don’t feel the need to go into too much detail about it.

Reading about it this time, for some reason, I didn’t feel like many people do about the whole thing. The general cultural consensus is that we are much more advanced than those people, that our freer society allows us to marry for love, and that this is a much improved system. In our movies and books, girls (and boys) often escape arranged marriages (Pocahontas, Ever After, The Princess Bride, etc.) and end up in happy relationships with the ones they truly love. Awww.

But using marriage as a method of alliance was actually a very good idea. It does not apply so much anymore, because our political/financial systems just don’t work the way they used to, but I think it’s a mistake to view political marriages as just a cruel arrangement for the parties involved. Sure, a princess might get shipped off to a foreign land and wed to a man she couldn’t stand, but that marriage could potentially save thousands of lives. Wars have been prevented by beneficial marriages, and nations have been founded and developed because of a single partnership. In that sort of a context, a single girl’s romantic unhappiness just looks pretty insignificant. And of course, we need to remember that a marriage then did not mean what marriage now means. Mongol khans may not have spent much time with their wives at all, and even for European royalty, one simply was not expected to try to have some lovely romance with one’s spouse. A life in general then was different from a life now, and it usually was not intended to involve rose petals and affectionate glances. (That’s not to say that people in the past did not long for romantic love, just that it took a very different form and was thought to occur in a very different social context, usually outside of marriage.)

Our modern ideal view of marriage is that it should create a happy family; the old view of elite marriage was that it should create peaceful nations. And that seems to me to be a legitimate cause. So my point is, maybe we shouldn’t boo so much when a king insists his daughter marry the slow-witted neighboring prince. And maybe we shouldn’t cheer so much when she elopes with her true love and leaves the countries in the tension that could have been avoided with a  bit of personal sacrifice on her part.

This brings me back to the namesake of this blog, Our Lady of the Mongols. She seems like a heroine in a modern context, someone who stood up for herself and refused to be a victim of the system. Of course, hers is an extreme example, and being shuffled from one khan to the next isn’t conducive to any sort of happiness, and probably not going to produce much of an alliance, either. I do think it’s admirable that she chose her personal religious devotion over agreeing to be sent off to yet another khan on her father’s say-so. But that doesn’t make her father the villain; he was being a politician, and he probably thought he was choosing his constituents’ security over his daughter’s comfort.

Of course, times have changed, and Malia isn’t going to be betrothed to Prince Harry in this lifetime to preserve that “special relationship.” (Though if they fell in love on their own, the Sun would have a field day!) In our world, we are expected to marry for love, and if two young people are being used as bartering chips in corporate deals, we tend to get a little indignant. So why is this? As I mentioned before, the system itself is no longer one that benefits from marital alliance, so that changes things. But even when examining situations in historical contexts, we often think that people should not be unwillingly wed for the greater good. It seems to me to have to do with our culture’s broader philosophy of individualism. The individual now comes above the greater good, often above family or politics. Is this why we now view political/financial marriages as so barbaric? Because we place a higher value on individual happiness? Do we thus place a lower value on community security/success? Is it really a zero-sum game? Does our modern world value individual happiness because, in the newer system, it is thought to contribute to community security/success?

Of course, I don’t have any answers to these questions. (I never do!) But a scenario that lies on the cusp of the marriage as a tool/marriage for love transition showcases all of these themes, and then some. Some of you may have heard of Consuelo Vanderbilt. Consuelo was the only daughter of Alva Smith Vanderbilt and William Kissam Vanderbilt. (I list Alva first very deliberately.) Consuelo’s story is not a happy one; she made her debut in New York society as an elegant heiress, and she was secretly engaged to a man she loved. However, her mother wanted a marital alliance for her only daughter that would be advantageous to the Vanderbilt name, and she threatened/cajoled/manipulated her daughter into breaking off her engagement and instead marrying the Duke of Marlborough, a man Consuelo had met and disliked. The Duke didn’t like her any better than she liked him; Consuelo was marrying him to bring honor to the family name, and the Duke was marrying her for her multi-million dollar dowry. After a few years of unhappiness and the births of two sons, the couple divorced. Consuelo was no longer young, and though she married again, she never lived the Hollywood fantasy that she, as a girl with a secret fiancé and more money than she could possibly spend, could have hoped for. The Duke of Marlborough also married again, and that one ended more poorly than the first.

There was no happy ending for either Consuelo or the Duke; their arranged marriage was not one that ended in love like in the novels. It was just two people whose happiness was sacrificed in order to provide security for their families. But the thing is, it worked. The relatively new Vanderbilt family proved their worth and established themselves, and the Duke filled his family coffers. When I visited Blenheim Palace, the Marlborough family’s estate, one of the tour guides made a joke about me being American and said, “We like American money here. Without American money, we wouldn’t be here like this.” He explained that Blenheim is only privately owned because of the Vanderbilt money. The leftover interest of Consuelo’s dowry is still used to maintain the estate (now supplemented by entry fees), and the Duke of Marlborough lives in a private wing there. Unlike many estates, which could not afford their own upkeep and taxes, Blenheim Palace did not decay due to lack of funds, but flourished because of a single miserable marriage. On the one hand, Consuelo’s life is sad. And if a movie were made about her, we’d probably root for her to marry her secret fiancé. On the other hand, I like visiting Blenheim, and thousands of people now enjoy the estate that was built with a teenage girl’s tears. So what do we think here? Were those tears worth it?  If it were our own daughter, or our own estate, which would we choose, and which should we choose? Our posterity, or posterity in general?

Mongolia is Awesome: Blizzard vs. the Golden Horde

Some of you may be familiar with the gaming phenomenon “World of Warcraft,” or at the very least with the enlightening South Park episode about it. Part of the brilliance of WoW lies in the fact that people keep playing it, and keep paying for it. In addition to paying the regular price of the game, gamers have to pay $20 each month to stay connected to the World part of  Warcraft, and because the game is engineered to keep people playing, Blizzard makes millions from regular subscriptions, in addition to the money from selling the game.

But Orcs and Elves are no match for the Mongols. Apparently, in Mongolia, players just don’t have to pay the monthly subscription fee. Though they have to pay for the game (and a computer), apparently there is a nationwide hacked account that gives Mongolians access to the game for free. This was described to me as “an official Mongolian server” for WoW, but what exactly “official” entails was not made completely clear. Though I doubt that it’s official in the sense of government-sponsored, this is Mongolia, and the government could be just that Awesome.

Mongolia is Relevant: What Might Have Been

Okay, okay, I have a confession. Technically, my “Mongolia is Relevant” posts are a bit self-defeating, because if it were really relevant, you wouldn’t need me to tell you that. A blog on the USA doesn’t need to detail why it’s powerful, and a blog on China won’t bother to list the ways Chinese products impact your life. We’re aware that the US and China (and countless other countries) are relevant, because they are just so relevant. Mongolia impacts history and culture in a lot of ways, but it hasn’t impacted our world in a substantial enough way that the average Joe knows it.

But I’m here to tell you how close Mongolia was to being unquestionably, unignorably relevant. One of the books I read in my research is the story of Rabban Sauma, a Nestorian monk sent as an envoy from the Ilkhan to Europe at the end of the 13th Century. Rabban Sauma visited the Pope, the King of France, and the King of England, asking them to unite with the Mongols in an assault against the Mamluks. If European forces initiated another Crusade against the Muslim Mamluks in Egypt at the same time that the Mongols attacked from the East, the Mamluks would have been overwhelmed and defeated. Thus Mamluk assaults both on Christian Outremer communities and on the Mongol Ilkhanate would have been drastically reduced, and the Ilkhan promised to present Jerusalem to the Christians.

But this was not to be; while the Ilkhanate was desperately defending itself against the Mamluks, Europe was plagued by internal conflict, both between and within individual countries. Furthermore, parts of Europe (*coughcough GENOA coughcough*) were enjoying lucrative trade with the Muslims, and weren’t  eager to give up that income. So the alliance never happened, the present Ilkhan died, and his successors mostly converted to Islam. The historian Sir Steven Runciman expressed the potential significance of the alliance thusly:

“Had the Mongol alliance been achieved and honestly implemented by the West, the existence of Outremer would almost certainly have been prolonged. The Mamluks would have been crippled if not destroyed; and the Ilkhanate of Persia would have survived as a power friendly to the Christians and the West.”

So that whole Middle East tension thing? It might have been reduced (though probably never eliminated) years ago. Or, it could have been exacerbated, and maybe there might not have been a Dome of the Rock to fight over. But it would certainly have been different. And if the Mongols had exerted more control over the Middle East, they might still be in the Middle East, instead of confined mostly to Northern China, Outer Mongolia, and enclaves in New Jersey. I don’t know much about history, but this alliance would have been a big deal.

It may not have ended there… It would have been nice if the “Ilkhanate of Persia would have survived as a power friendly to Christians and the West,” but that wasn’t inevitable. Early European reluctance to an alliance with the Mongol Empire was based on the fear that the Mongol Empire, having conquered the lands to the east of Europe, would have seeped further into Europe itself. Though by the end of the 13th Century, the Mongols no longer retained their former power, this could have been a possibility. Once the Mamluks were defeated, the Mongol Horde’s total war may have been unleashed on the lands of their former allies, and, as the cliché goes, we might all be speaking Mongolian. (Though the US certainly wouldn’t have been founded under the circumstances it was, so you and I probably just wouldn’t be here, period.) Now, the Europe-Mongol alliance wasn’t exactly close to happening; a lot of factors prevented it, and there would have been more obstacles to a Mongol occupation of Europe… But it was possible.

So sure, Mongolia’s pretty remote now, but you should know that it could have ended up right in your backyard.

Mongolia is Awesome: Names Edition

After Mongolia became the Mongolian People’s Republic in 1924, they renamed the capital “Ulaanbaatar Xot.” Ulaanbaatar is technically two words, and Ulaanbaatar Xot literally means “Red Hero City.” It’s named after Sükhbaatar, the national hero who led the independence movement against China. Because he led a communist revolution, he was dubbed the Red Hero, and the city was named after him.

But “baatar” occurs in names that don’t involve nationalist leaders, too. It’s commonly found in people’s names; I’ve met a “Chuluunbaatar” (Stone Hero) and at least three “Ganbaatars”; “gan,” like Bold, is a word for steel, so Ganbaatar means Steel Hero. (This country rocks.)

Although having a bunch of Heroes running around is pretty Awesome on its own, Sükhbaatar himself probably takes the cake for the best compound of Hero.”“Sükh” is Mongolian for ax, so Sükhbaatar is simply Ax-Hero. I like to think that this is the equivalent of “George Washington Flamethrower,” or a presidential candidate named “M16 DESTROYER.” Hell, I’d vote for him.

And the moral of this Names Edition? If you are Holding Out for a Hero, get on the next plane to Mongolia.

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.