Doing Countryside Research in Ulaanbaatar Taxis

Is it possible to do Mongolian countryside research riding around the taxis of Ulaanbaatar?

That's the question that's been on my mind this week and I'm sure that Jono's post Cab drivers and ethnographic research that I read earlier this year had something to do with it.  Here's the rest of the story.

Last Wednesday night, I was on Peace Avenue opposite the Central Post Office, looking to catch a taxi over to the Wrestling Palace.  It's not the easiest place to find a lift, so when I saw a woman with a baby in her arms getting out of a cab, I yelled after the driver.  The woman held the door for me as I shuffled across the icy sidewalk and climbed into the front passenger seat.

Exchanges with taxi drivers are never the same, but there are are some typical questions from both sides.  This time I rode in with a man in his late 20's driving a white Hyundai Excel.

Driver: Where to?
Me: Wrestling Palace.
Driver: You living in Mongolia?
Me: Yeah.
Driver: How long you been here?
Me: About a year now.
Driver: Your Mongolian is really good.  I mean, the way you yelled 'Hoooyeeee! Yavah uu?'...*
Me: It's not great, but not bad either.  I need to speak Mongolian for my work.

Me: Are you from the city or are you from the countryside?
Driver: From the countryside.**
Me: Which aimag?
Driver: Dundgovi.
Me: From the capital?
Driver: No, no.  From the real countryside.
Me: So you were a herder?
Driver: Yeah.

*I get that quite a bit, but don't think my Mongolian's all that good.  My theory is that most long-term foreigners don't bother to learn the language, so the expectations aren't very high. The foreigners I know who have put in the effort speak quite well.

**That's not a normal response.  Drivers almost always say they're from the city, even when they've only been in Ulaanbaatar for a few years.  I always follow up by asking where people grew up.

He explained that he moved from Dundgovi after the winter of 1999, in which half of his animals died during the dzud.  Dzud is a winter disaster following a dry summer, characterized by extreme weather - severe cold and/or excessive snow.  As we discussed changing weather patterns, he told the story of how a micro he was riding in from Ulaanbaatar to Dundgovi several years back broke down in the countryside.  He was wearing his fur-lined deel at the time.  "And you know how warm fur-lined deels are, right?" he asked.  It was so cold that, in walking from the micro to the nearest ger, the beer-for-the-road that he had stuffed inside his deel froze.

So far this year, I've taken about 295 taxi rides, almost all in the city.  Of those 295, about 230 have cost 1000 MNT (US$0.85) or less, meaning no more than 4km.  I've spent somewhere between 24-48 hours sitting in taxis - they've been a wonderful place to safely talk to complete strangers, like hitching except a bit less dangerous.  Fortunately I've only been in one accident. 

The taxi system here is a mix of official metered and unmetered cars, mostly Hyundai Accents and Excels imported from Korea.  Without the unmetered cars, the system would clearly not be able to support demand.  The unmetered taxis typically charge 300 MNT/km nowadays because of increases in benzin prices, with rounding to the nearest 100.  Since any person can give a ride to any other person, I've gotten rides from the odd teacher, cop, and retiree.  There was even a time when - for the same rate - k, mb, tater-tot and I were taken from the National University to my apartment in a 2007 Nissan Maxima with a few hundred kilometers on the odometer.  Quite often though the drivers are countryside transplants, which relates back to the question that started this post.

[Rural-to-urban migration is happening fast in Mongolia with a single domestic destination for migrants: Ulaanbaatar.  The handbook in the photo left was published in 2006 by the Open Society Forum and its title translates to "You are about to become a city person".  I found it last week in the bookshop on the 3rd floor of the State Department Store, perhaps not the best place for its target audience.]

I usually let the drivers lead the conversation, which is how in the past couple weeks we've talked about these various aspects of Mongolian society: the most recent sumo tournament, climate change and disease, soft prostitution, nutrition and life expectancy, and parliamentary corruption.  After revealing what I do, I've even discovered relatives of bagiin emch, including one man whose wife worked as a bagiin emch in Zavhan for 7 years before they moved to the city.

I wonder if Andrei could do his work on pastoralism and climate change, if Sunmin could do her work on long song in transition, if Sean could do his work on alcoholism treatment, and if Red could do her work on perceptions of disability this way.  The connection between Andrei's research and the driver from Dundgovi is what really got me thinking about all this.

Gender bias is an issue, since female drivers are rare.  Of those 295 rides I've taken, only 15-20 have been women.  And I don't really think the whole of countryside research can or should be done this way.  But it sure can be a great source of supplemental perspectives and another way to find informants.

On the other hand, walking sometimes has its own research payoffs.  In the past week, I've separately run into colleagues from the National University of Mongolia and the Asian Development Bank on the sidewalk, and had valuable and timely exchanges with them.

Comments

[Andrei]

Interesting post.
Short answer: No, I don't think I could do my research in UB.
Longer answer: it'd definetely be interesting to talk to people who moved to UB as a result of dzud for example, but the thing is environmental /'climatic' memory is just as elusive and unreliable as any other kinds. You do get this kinds of anecdotical stuff in the countryside too ("I lost my urga in the grass and in the morning I couldn't find it cause the grass grew so much...) but you can't place the anecdote in context which might help understand it better. Not to say that these anecdotes are usually spread (heard the urga story from 3 different people: ex-MP in UB, herder in Dundgovi, policeman in Omongovi). So, taxi-serial-hanging-out would be useful but it can't replace the so-called ethnography!...Hahaha!

[Jaspal]

You're right about that. Placing these stories in context is crucial. That's something that would be hard to get without our so-called ethnography. I wish you had been able to make my talk (aka story hour) yesterday. Would have been great to get your thoughts. I look forward to your article on climatic memory in a transitional pastoralist society!