Then I moved into a new apartment the same week I was helping organize a winter English course and doing some freelance work for a professor in the US. The next week my bathroom flooded in the middle of the night and I taught some free English classes for potential students to my university. By Saturday night I was finished with almost everything on my to-do list and I didn't wake up until 11am on Sunday morning. Oops.
Then Sunday night two friends came to the city from the countryside and a big group of us ate dinner together and shared stories and laughed a lot. And on Monday night I witnessed the cutest marriage proposal ever as my dear Mongolian brother surprised his love with a slideshow, sang to her, and got down on one knee. She said yes!
Leading up to the proposal, I was with the groom-to-be and another friend on a bus heading to the restaurant. We had a cake and a single rose. The bus was packed. It lurched, we all lurched. "Maybe the driver's drunk," my friend said. We lurched again. The bus didn't stop at our stop. "You should've yelled loudly," a man advised. The groom-to-be looked at me and laughed, "I'll remember this day forever." We got off at the next bus stop. The single rose I was carrying had broken in all the bus-lurching. The groom didn't care. We took a taxi to the restaurant. Some friends were already there arranging the chairs and scattering rose petals. I helped blow up some balloons. Some speculated that the bride-to-be must know what was going on. But she didn't. She was hanging out with a friend before getting on a bus to meet another friend at the restaurant. Little did she know that as soon as she got on the bus, her friend quickly changed her clothes, got in her car, and drove to the restaurant, beating her by 20 minutes.
This is the spirit of Mongolia. So many people helping to create a special moment. Laughing at an uncomfortable bus ride. Shrugging off a broken flower. Because this is a beautiful day, even when it's a little messy. Because sometimes the bathroom floods at 4am and I'm a single woman who has to figure it out for herself. Because sometimes we are too busy on our winter vacation, but we believe in everything we are doing. Because we can choose to see the mess or the beauty, the stress or the satisfaction, and there is so much power in that choice.
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| Some future university students who chose to study English during their winter break! |
It's ok. We are making memories, and for that I'm thankful.
