APR 26, 16 .. УЛААНБААТАР, МОНГОЛЫА (ULLANBAATAR, MONGOLIA)

Will someone please tell me where the time goes? 

The time? 

Will someone please tell me what-on-earth the above title says? 

It has been almost one full month since I last showed one of the meeting rooms that I frequent here in Ulaanbaatar.

УЛААНБААТАР is our English word Ulaanbaatar written in the Mongolian Cyrillic Alphabet just in case you were wondering. МОНГОЛЫA means Mongolia. 

I will make it a little easier for you to see:

Ulaanbaatar             Mongolia
УЛААНБААТАР   МОНГОЛЫА

Yes! I am learning (slowly .. one character at a time..) the Mongolian Cyrillic Alphabet. I find it absolutely fascinating. By-the-way the Mongolian Alphabet and the Russian Alphabet are identical except for two characters. So now I clearly know what the Russian Alphabet 'looks like' also.

As if I don't have anything else to do. This past week I gave four talks .. each 2-hours in length. All of these 2-hour meetings become quite intense.

I may have said in a prior Post that they take a 10-minute break at the top of the hour. At 6:56PM (4-minutes before 7PM) the other evening I was ready to take-a-break and I said to my translator ..

"Whew! Let's take a break!"

He looked me straight in the eyes and said ..

"We break at the top of the hour." 

I filled the 4-minutes by calling on a very startled new comer to say a word or two. It can take a Mongolian 4-minutes to say a word or two.

Let's see another meeting room in УЛААНБААТАР in МОНГОЛЫА.

Honest to goodness I can actually 'read' the above words in Mongolian!

I never tire of feeling great appreciation for the meeting rooms that we have in the U.S. I feel such deep humility for being here and for being a part of the fellowship here. 

In the basement of the apartment buildings there are small rooms.

We are not talking fancy here.

The word .. the concept .. fancy is not commonly used here.

We are talking 'real .. intense .. life' here.

Watch your head. 

No lobby. You are in-the-room as you enter the door.

To the left above you see another small room that you also can view below.

Do you see that the floor has been 'finished' using scraps (trash) from broken materials? 

How much more basic .. How much more intense can it get?

Notice the 'door opening' into the meeting room below.

Back to the meeting room.

In the right corner of the above photos you see Chinggis Khaan.

You want D' Man? .. You got D' MAN!

A few close-ups of items on the walls.

Steps / Preamble / Serenity Prayer / Traditions ..

Looking back at the entrance. 

Before the meeting began I said ..

"I need a restroom."

"No problem BUT watch your head and some of the pipes are very hot!"

Basic ..

Intense ..

I love it .. I can DO this ..

The meeting? 

Basic .. Intense .. 

"I am so blessed and so honored to be here this evening! Thank you so much for asking me to join you!"