Hello Khovd!

Khovd is a very nice town and reminds us of home.  There are mountains and green trees and some grass.  It is a very clean town and crews are working now to improve the roads, install fences, and plant and water flowers. The roads are in good shape and there is hardly any litter on the ground.  Our apartment is on the 4th floor of a 5-story building, so we are getting some exercise everyday! The apartment is in OK shape.  We have no hot water in the kitchen, but then that is pretty normal for here.  We do have a nice hot water heater in the bathroom which automatically fills up and heats so we don't have to worry about that like we did in Murun. Yes, that's LaNice standing out on our balcony! And, yes, the building is bright blue.  Mongolians really like color.  The building next to us is mustard yellow and the one next to it is olive green.  There are also bright orange, pink, red and every shade of green buildings! Haven't seen a purple one here yet!

 This is the view from our balcony.  The decorative fencing on both sides of the road have been going in since we got here.  They are very nice and we assume flowers will be planted there when they are completed.  The mountains are beautiful.  And note, the typical Mongolian beautiful blue sky!

A local business just planted some flowers. 

Morning Sunrise                                             A few of my favorite sunsets

We have beautiful sunsets.  The sun rises at about 5:00 a.m. and wakes us up.  That's OK because we have a tutor session twice a week at 6:00 am and language learning once a week at 6:30.  So we are generally up and ready for them.

This a a pretty typical Khovd street.  There are trees. This also shows the variety of fences that surround individual properties. 

We noticed that much of the brick is made here from the sand and dirt found in the surrounding countryside.  We have seen many walls and houses that have not held up well over the years using this type of brick.  But they continue to make and use them in their home and fence construction.

 We were told this is a Muslim mosque and it is not too far from our house.

 This is our church.  It is really big and we use both floors.  There are plenty of classrooms, a library, a kitchen, two bathrooms, and a large assembly room upstairs with a large chapel on the ground floor.  It is a rented building.

 We hope to find out about and attend events at one of these colorful theaters.

The theater another colorful building

 This is the Sports Complex which we think is similar to Wrestling Palaces in other towns.

 We were out looking around today and found this lot that had nine satellite dishes on it!  Alan thinks they are used for cable TV, but we wouldn't know because our TV doesn't work--not even for language and exercise DVDs.  We need to get a remote and try again!

  This is the Technical College located right on the town square. There are several other college buildings in town as well.  We see lots of young people in the streets.

Graduation day at the Khovd Univeristy

And this is the kindergarten located next to the Technical College.  There are so many kindergartens in this town.  There are lots of little kids and they are usually very friendly.

 This is one of the monuments in the town square. Ard-Ayush (1859-1939), was a common man from Hovd whose struggles against the Manchu rulers turned him into a revolutionary hero.

Besides the traditional statues they are constructing a traditional Mongolian boot and water pitcher.

    

  

 We have seen animals in the streets here, but this is the first time we had seen donkeys!  Actually, these are the first donkeys we have seen in Mongolia anywhere!

Kids here love playing basketball and rain didn't stop this game. 

The university across the street from our apartment building installed a new interlocking tile court

We love the BLUE skies!

We are sure we will enjoy Khovd.  It's smaller than Choibalsan and the food selection we have found to be different from either Murun or Choibalsan.  Another adventure in culinary adaptation!