Thursday, June 17, 2010

More on Ulaanbaatar 2010

To continue with my discursion on my Mongolian excursion, we had a reservation on a luxury room in our hotel in Ulaanbaatar. Our previous stay at this place had been ordinary accommodation and I had to become fly-killer extraordinaire so numerous were the insect irritants (I downed about 20-30). Despite us being late on arrival from the airport, we still had to wait ten minutes as they hadn’t finished (started?) cleaning the room. “A series of disappointments,” I exclaimed to Altaa, following hard on the heels of our luggage being left behind in Beijing and not being collected at the airport by her brother. When we were finally admitted entrance I swiftly got changed into a new top which, thankfully in this instance, had not been able to fit into a suitcase and so I had carried it in a bag with me.
The hotel abode was free of wee beasties but it was luxury befitting a two-star motel (as I would rate it). It was cheap and fairly centrally located, however and we were only to be resident for one night. There was (what looked like) a leather three-piece suite, a generously stocked mini-bar – not that we partook – and a pleasant painting of some mountainous landscape. Then there were the basics: sturdy yet decent beds (we were given two singles), wardrobe, table, wall-mounted fan, flimsy curtains.
It is always the least (though, occasionally, the most) satisfactory aspects that register most keenly, in all honesty. The bathroom/toilet area was fine, leaving aside the fact that the cistern disconcertingly overflowed every time if was flushed, oozing and twice squirting out and arcing a slime-like trail towards the drain in the centre of the floor. The torn of peeling wallpaper was probably all to the good considering how uninspired it was. Thanks goodness, for the Mongolian custom of wearing sandals inside, with two pairs available. The giant TV appeared more promising and I switched on, to see if there was any BCC News or, for matter, anything English-language. There were only two channels, both in Mongolian and fuzzy at that. All the other numbers on the remote control brought up static. Like the pastries that you think have jam right the way through yet have only the merest daubing on top; or the glamorous, high-rise office block in the city centre that was having the finishing flourishes applied to it the last time I was here and almost two years on is still having the final touches, for the foundations are prone to subsidence and far from being Mongolia’s Swiss Re ‘Gherkin’ threatens to become the country’s Leaning Tower of Pisa (as it remains completely empty), plenty of the culture understands the form of what is required, but is much less sure of the substance to back it up. Not fort he first time, there are many little things of this nature which I have encountered on my travels here. Which is not so say everything here is the same – we stayed in a far superior hotel, a bit more out of the way though marginally cheaper at the end of our stay in Mongolia. It is a young country in consumerist terms and with China’s growth rippling out, it will fast learn from its mistakes. Furthermore, westerners can be just a prone. In Frankfurt Airport is the walkway to nowhere - a bridge in the departures lounge ends in a row of plate glass windows where a door has not been installed. I observed it straight away as I progressed through the transit corridor to the waiting zone and saw others on the other side who didn’t and who became baffled by this non-sequitur of architectural design. Maybe it’s a conceptual joke (these Germans, ey?).
Exploring Ulaanbaatar at night again with Altaa’s brother Sukhee, along its busiest thoroughfare, Peace Avenue, it struck my good self as it did before how Mongolians, no matter if they have straitened circumstances, make the effort to dress well, especially the women, whereas in more affluent Britain that is not often the case. When last here in August 2008, Dave the eponymous proprietor of Dave’s Place said he was selling up within weeks. He was true to his word but sadly no bar replaced this English pub, which is a shame for in the summer it has wonderful vistas over Sükhbaatar Square, the central point of the city. All that’s left is a sign coming away from the wall that proclaims it’s open every night until 12. No more. It wasn’t the be all and end all of Ulaanbaatar’s charms but it was a useful and enjoyable spot for expats to gather. The memories are good but there are no new ones to be created, as it reverts to a padlocked annexe of the Culture Palace.
Many of the new builds around the city are so vertiginous as to easily overshadow the communist-era architecture, even that built in the 1980s. The five-star, five-storey Ulaanbaatar Hotel, host of any international leader who braves a voyage out this way, now looks positively dainty. There are no worries about lines of sight as in London. Cash has the last word, legally or illegally. The investors behind the sinking superstructure of a skyscraper might want to do their groundwork more thoroughly next time.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home