A Day in the Steppe
At last we set out for the Mongolian outback: the Gorkhi Terelj reserve. 90,000 hectares of steppe and wild horses. Our guide helps us with our Arctic exploration gear: a pair of sheepskin boots and not much else… We are ready for the moon. That icy moon that we saw from the windows of the Trans-Mongolian finally comes out into the open, under the weight of our soft steps.
We set out from the capital in a little Korean van; it has no snow tyres or chains, no four-wheel drive, and nor do we have a satnav, our only link with the rest of the world is the mobile phone of our driver, Pakà. For the first 20 km, the roads are actually roads, but then they disappear into one big valley, where the driver has to count on his experience, instinct and sheer good luck to find the way.
We reach our destination. We are in a valley where everything is covered in snow. Outside the temperature is around -20 °C, and the icy crystals glisten in the sunlight, revealing their wondrous construction. I have never seen snow like it: there are no flakes as such, but precisely-structured grains of ice. Outside it is a glorious day. We are the guests of a nomadic family, staying in their guest tent, where we all sleep together. The tent is shaped like a small circus scattered with wooden planks, an old coal stove stands in the middle of the room, electric lighting is limited to a small strip light hanging from the roof by a thread, while the beds are real beds, with patched-up blankets and pillows.
Having dropped off our stuff, we set out towards a mountain on foot. A Buddhist monastery perches on the slopes of a snow-thawed peak: monks and the faithful gather here for long months of meditation and prayer. The silence is broken only by our words, there are no cars, and certainly no shops or other people, no sounds from settlements or the surrounding landscape: only the wind, and our footsteps - so loud in this silence. This is what we are doing today.
Each road leading to a monastery is uphill to go in, and downhill coming out again. The doors face east in honour of the sun, of tomorrow, and of the new day arising.
