Red Hero

17th September - early morning on the train to Mongolia.

Those little things that you take for granted on the Moscow train have slipped away - no quilted toilet roll, no complementary foot massages, they don't even have sky sports. This redefinition of 'basic' seems to be driving our party to vodka. Again.

17th September - later in Ulaanbaatar

We have arrived in Mongolia in the middle of the celebrations of 70 years of state education. The kids are out in force in the main square, dressed in various costumes from traditional warrior to fluorescent satin outfits. I was disappointed to learn that the children in formal suits were not undersized butlers or hoodlums but in fact just children in suits.

Despite the fact that the city has been around for several hundred years, one gets the distinct feeling that if they wanted to, the population of Ulaanbaatar could up sticks and get back to a nomadic lifestyle on the plains in no time at all. Nothing seems particularly permanent and ger tents can be seen next to brand new office buildings.

The people are refreshingly friendly after Russia. Although mobile phones are available, many people sit around on the pavement and hire out their satellite phones to passers by. The country also seems to be keen on its weight, judging by the number of people sitting on the pavement offering the services of their bathroom scales.

We ate at a top end Mongolian restaurant this evening and the food was fantastic; seldom do I feel the need to photograph my dinner (although I had to try it first...). However, to put this into perspective, the meal and a couple of beers came to about 15 USD which is between a 7th and 10th of the average monthly wage in the city - the equivalent of eating in Nobu in London.