Friday 2nd Febuary will be one week since we arrived in Mongolia. I don't know where the time has gone.We have been staying at the Bayangol Hotel close to the city centre. We are lucky as we are in a deluxe suit that has two rooms, one where we sleep and one is a lounge room. There are a couple of different restaurants which most of the food selection is nice. We have just started to venture out to try some of the restaurants in the town. See attached link to view hotel http://www.bayangolhotel.mn/ the site also has information about Ulaanbaatar you may find interesting.
Over the past week we have been kept busy being shown around. Apart of the induction was we visited the company's office and where introduced to the staff members there. One afternoon we were shown around the town by some wonderful ladies from the spousal group that had given up their time to help us settle in.
The last two days we have been house hunting. We are lucky as there is a department at the company set up to handle this type of task for us, all we have to do is be ready to go to the viewings when they are arranged.
There is really only two types of housing available in town, apartments (flats) and houses (town houses). The apartments are where most people live as the concept of housing isn't as high as apartment living so there are not as many houses on the market for us to view.
One Wednesday we viewed three houses, two of which were in the same housing location and out of the city centre and one which was in the city in a great location but one problem was the rent was too high for the budget we are allowed and the owner wouldn't come down to met our price. Bummer...............
I was surprised that we where shown the house in the first place being so far out of our budget. Most business people wouldn't come down as much as the housing department wanted them too. "Oh that's right I am not in Australia any more, I am in Mongolia, ah the "M" factor starts".
Thursday we viewed four apartments and all were not suitable due to one reason or another. I really had to re state what I am looking for to get the message across to the person who had arranged the viewings.
Tomorrow is a new day, fingers crossed.
I have a wish list for housing and don't really want to live in an apartment but I know that what I want and what I get is two different things so I am not totally closed to the idea of apartment living. When we were in Indonesia we found that what we first wanted seemed to change once we knew what was on the market, "Oh how I wish for the housing complex we lived in back in Balikpapan right here in Mongolia!".
Paige is taking most things in her stride. Sometimes she takes a while to get sorted when we are going out but I think that is more to do with her age then the changes in her environment. I think she likes me saying "I will count to three" testing me all the time. She seems to be coping with the weather, its been about -24 and yesterday was a bit warmer -6 (heat wave) even Paige said "Mummy I don't need my coat its not cold".
Well until next time, everyone needs to cross their fingers to give us some luck in finding a house. I hope you will all subscribe to my blog as I am not going to email out the newsletter anymore.
Bernadette
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