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Are You Alone?

I could feel the woman staring at me and I turned towards her smiling. She was older than I had first thought, though it is hard to tell everyone has thick, deeply creased skin. She smiled at the children who were riding my bicycle back and forth on the trail, and then looked back at me. Mongolian women’s eyes were even harder to look at than the men, because in addition to being stripped of all pretenses as if they never learned to hide like we had, and cored to their essence which was pure and intense, I had this suspicion they saw even more than the men. I knew by the way that the woman was looking at me, then, she was trying to understand me. She grabbed my hand. Her skin was dry and warm. Then she looked at me, smiled and tilted her head in a curious manner. She pointed at me, then raised one hand and one finger in the air, pantomiming the question almost everyone I had encountered on my trip seemed to ask. Oddly, the frequency of the question was amusing when it could be answered in silence. I looked past the woman, to the children who were cruising on my bicycle, attempting to do what looked like some kind of group pop a wheely, to the huge candlelit blue sky arcing above us. Yes, I laughed, feeling the peace spreading inside me. I’m alone

Smell Y’ah Later!


Even though I am a small woman, I have never been attracted to small men, and so countries where the men, though often strikingly beautiful from an aesthetic perspective, had more delicate bones than even I did, didn’t quite tempt me. In Mongolia, I couldn’t help but watch them, their bodies toughened from hard living and tumbling with their horses all day, with more than just a small degree of appreciation. Sometimes it could get downright distracting.

It didn’t help matters any that Mongolian men were outrageously flirtatious. My new friend that had arrived by motorcycle ambled towards me, and jokingly elbowed me in the side, My breath caught in my chest. I was grateful my cheeks were wind burned enough that the man would not notice me blushing. Fortunately for me, he bent down lower, pushing me into his armpit and I picked up his scent. He smelled funny, the way most Mongolians smelled funny to me, a sour scent I attributed to years spent working around horses and a diet that consisted almost exclusively of Tolvin, a Mongol staple, which is essentially anything you can make with flour and mutton and the occasional carrot. I thought that the “vodka problem”, a direct translation from Mongolian, that some Mongolians seemed to have may have also contributed. On more than one occasion, the scent had saved me, kept me from acting like a complete and utter spaz because otherwise the men were pretty damned hot.

And with a ear to ear grin a woman emerging from the place where the Mongolian hotty had parked the motorcycle. She raced up towards me, laughing and placed a water bottle in my hand. Sain Bainuu/Hello,how are you I said in Mongolian, smiling and took the first sip. Then I reached into my pocket, pulled out some bells, and handed them to the old woman. Bells I had purchased from the market in Ulaanbaatar, the capital city. The bells are used as buttons on the Mongolian traditional coat called deel in the Mongolian language. A brilliant coat that serves as blanket, tent, pocket and travel bag when need be. Mongolians travel for days with nothing more then the belongings transported within their coat, one coat for summer and a warmer version for winter. The Mongolian people I have met are the most practical travelers I have met since beginning this cycling journey almost 7000 peddle miles and 9 countries ago. Not surprising given there nomadic roots.

Shake It Up Baby!


The hum of a distant motorbike startled me out of my meditative daze. I have not seen another person in over a week, and have become accustomed to the long lulling silence, punctuated only by the sound of my bicycle cutting though the wind. I wiped the sweat from my forehead with my shirt sleeve and formulated a plan. I had been pedaling for hours and didn’t think I could manage the degree of animation I would need to play the cat and mouse chase game motorcyclists sometime play with me on the road, so I made my way over to the side of the trail where I had noticed an ovum.

I lay my bicycle down and walked a few steps into the desert, to check out the ovum, an oval shaped shrine piled high with rocks, swatches of bright colored silk, hard candy and old Mongolian money. Ovums can be Buddhist or shamanic in nature and they mark sacred spots. They are erected yearly and always added to therefore there are lots of Ovums to be honored throughout Mongolia. I fought the urge to run around the shrine three times. This was a habit I had picked up along the way, another event that marked the days on my spiritual obstacle course, and was generally followed up with a bite of a Snickers bar and the chugging of a half liter of water. I am pretty sure that ovum running is not a registered Olympic sport anywhere but it is practiced throughout Mongolia.

I suspected the Mongols on the motorcycle would be greatly amused and understanding if they caught me at my little game. I imagined tales would be told about me over bowls of vodka—how the crazy foreign girl on a bicycle with the crispy red cheeks and electrocuted hair ran around their shrine like her feet were on fire in her strange imported rubber cycling sandals. I resisted the urge to three-peat the running in circles event. Instead I walked over to my pannier/bikebag and pulled a Snickers bar and pulled out some of the jingly bells I had bought in Laos. I walked back to the ovum and buried the bells in a dark crevice between two rocks. I heard the motorcycle slow behind me, and then stop. Smoothly, I turned, and, with a huge smile plastered on my face, greeted my newest friends.

With an ear to ear grin and a big ole nod a man jumped off his motorbike, then he took my hand and pumped my arm furiously. Hand shaking is not native to Mongolian culture but has been learned from the Russians. Many Mongolians shake hands hello, after a shared laugh and while saying good-bye as well. It is quite the work out. I had tensed my arm a second to late and so I just stared at him, the golden glow of his skin and his weather scarred cheeks. Hesitantly, I looked at his eyes. They were, as I suspected, distinctly Mongolian eyes; brown and raw souled, so unguarded and honest it made it difficult to stare at them for too long. I looked at the dirt streaking his clothes and face, and smiled inside. It was such a relief to be around people as oh natural as I am. The Mongolian sense of practicality and necessity jived with mine; the polar opposite to the ultra clean little Chinese men, just over 1000 km behind who scurried off to wash their hands every time they touched my bicycle.

Are You Lost? 5/9/09

As the ferry boat crosses the channel in the northern Atlantic and enters Irish waters the brisk late winter air salts my unshowered body and whitens Pandemic my magic bicycle’s green paint.I didn’t stop peddling for the last week long enough to shower.My perfectly good reading neck would still prefer to be reading about cycle touring instead of grinning over Pandemic, the magic bicycle’s handle bars.My Achilles tendons have joined my neck in the protest to the new activity.In fact, my Achilles tendons are now creaking like an attic floor when walking which is probably why I hardly walked at all in Wales and stayed on the bicycle.The coast of Wales sped by me as I propelled myself to the ferry station to hop on the boat for Ireland.

The anticipation of what lies ahead mounts like a child waiting to open their presents on Christmas morning. Ireland is known for its big hearted people, Celtic music, world renowned sense of humor , hilly curvy roads and Guinness stout. I can’t wait to disembark the boat and unwrap the fresh fun that will surely lie ahead. The ferry officer sees the dolphin sized smile on my face and smiles with me. I am standing over Pandemic on the top of the ferry ramp waiting for the ramp to be secured like a race horse at the gate waiting for the starting bell.

Are you lost? Yes, I spend most of my day lost. I was sitting at a gas station examining my first map. I purchased the map due to the fact that after disembarking the ferry in my excitement to be in Ireland I tried to cycle keeping the ocean on my left. This technique hadn’t really been working lately but I was too excited about making it to Ireland to care at the moment. And after making a 70km(46miles) circle that landed me 20 km(13miles) north of the ferry stop in the city of Wexford I realized it was time to go find a map.

Are you lost?I look up from my new map and see, standing in the sunlight that had just peeked around a rain cloud, a very tall man with a huge Irish grin on his face.I could hardly answer because the energy and look on his face already had me laughing.When he heard my North American accent he asked me where I was from.I said I was Canadian but had moved to Alaska 9 years ago.Alaska?How’s that he asked.Well it’s cold, dark but not a dark dark.The man quickly answered so that’s a pale dark then.Yeah, I mumbled it’s a pale dark, I could hardly mumble because I was grinning too hard and holding back an explosion of laughter.I knew I was up for a serious torture of humor as this fellow stood there with the full intention of teasing me. He had walked across the parking lot of the gas station just to have a laugh.What do you think of the rain, he asked?The Irish seem to love talking about the weather especially the rain.Well I like the rain it makes my hair curly, I answered.My hair had been doing new salty windblown things lately which I did like.As the words exited my mouth I knew I was stepping deeper into this teasing.He answered well if you are not careful you will start looking like Michael Jackson before the change, if you know what I mean?

After the comedy show this man sat down with me and picked out some local places I should visit. He picked the site of a church which was known for a famous angel and a rock path which according to the legend the devil had visited. So I made the obvious observation that he was sending me to see the angels and the devil and we had another laugh.

Now that I have the details and the direction all sorted out I peddled west to find the devil, an angel and the North Atlantic Ocean. I had purchased new shoes in Wexford to attempt to turn down the volume of my creaking Achilles tendons. I had peddled out of the bike shop over the bridge up the coast of Wales hoped the ferry to Ireland while wearing sport sandals and socks. So Pandemic the magic bicycle and I peddled off in new shoes still chuckling from the torture of the hour of laughing.