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(See also TAT #3 and TAT #8).
Some Clothing Suggestions
Winter in Russia and Mongolia is cold – you can expect lows of -40°C in Siberia and Mongolia in January and February, and even in Moscow and St Petersburg it can regularly get down to -10°C or -15°C. A warm parka-style long jacket is ideal – optimally with a hood. Bring a hat (a knitted one will do fine) and a scarf and gloves too. You will need this stuff in winter!
Summer is the opposite. Russian summers are warmer than in the UK: expect temperatures of 30°C plus in Moscow and St Petersburg, and higher in Siberia and Mongolia. Bring T-shirts, jogging pants (ideal for wearing on board the train). Keep a long-sleeve shirt or blouse in your day-pack, in case you visit religious buildings where exposed shoulders, forearms, etc. could cause offence. Ladies should keep a headscarf in their handbag, as you’re supposed to cover your head in churches, mosques and temples.
On the trains it’s always warm, even in winter. T-shirts and shorts or jogging pants are ideal for slopping-around in. There can be flash showers in summer, so bring a waterproof! Russians generally dress quite smartly, and sportswear (except on board the train, where it’s ideal) is often frowned upon in public.
We’re getting to the end of the beginning. What was intended as only an introduction to Tips and Tales has turned into its own mini-series – but there was so much good “general” stuff to relate! I’ve been lining up a pile of interview material from veterans of the Trans-Siberian trip, which will feature as we get into the trip itself. For the time being, we’re still in the thick of the whole politeness minefield, built upon centuries of tradition throughout the countries and cultures along the Trans-Siberian Railway. Nowhere is it so true, it seems to me, that a little politeness goes a long way.
Do’s and Don’ts (continued)
OK, so what else should we know about manners in Mongolia, Neil?
“There’s this Buddhist thing: you walk around everything clockwise. If you go to a Buddhist temple, before you go in, you are supposed to walk around the temple once clockwise as sign of respect. The very devout will make three circuits. It’s either one or three. You can do seven if you like, but you’d have to be very, very serious!”
Any advance on seven? Nope. That’s quite a commitment when you haven’t even entered the building yet! And here’s another funny thing: opposites. Just as we value the colour white as positive, good, pure etc., for the Chinese it has strong associations with death and mourning. Similarly, while in the West the “Left-Hand Path” is linked with evil and black magic – as, historically, is left-handedness itself – in Buddhism the left is naturally defaulted to in many situations. Neil explains:
“It’s become a social expectation across the whole of life. Wherever there’s a chance to go left or right, you always go left. If there are two staircases, for example, you always take the left one. There’s no arrow pointing you that way, and they won’t be upset if you don’t do it, but that’s what they’re going to do. They can be surprised that you would do it the other way. But, of course, they realise that you are infidels! In temples they might be offended, because during the Communist era the Communists were in the habit of leading visitors around in the other direction, as a deliberate desecration and insult to the religion. That still happens in Communist China: guides always take tour groups around the wrong way deliberately. The groups don’t realise it’s being done, except for those who’ve read it in the Lonely Planet.”
There’s a whole history of Buddhist persecution in China across the centuries, the last major purge being launched as part of Mao’s 1966 Cultural Revolution: an attack upon the essence of Chinese history, culture and tradition. Overt restrictions still applied into the 1980s, and morphed into the monitored, uneasy domestic “peace” we can find there today. Tibet is of course a much more extreme scenario, with the Dalai Lama recently (March 2010) stating that China was trying to annihilate Buddhism within the region. Incidentally, and in massively simplistic terms, “Chinese Buddhism” centres on personal enlightenment, whereas “Tibetan Buddhism” concerns the enlightenment of all sentient beings. There you have it.
But we were talking about Mongolia. On the face of it, there seem to be a million ways to mess up, a million unspoken protocols to get wrong. In reality, however, it’s not so bad:
“We tell people about the old Mongolian traditions, but these are mostly no longer observed. They’re from the days when everyone lived in yurts in the countryside. Again, if you are showed into a yurt, you always go to the left-hand side as you pass in through the door. The right is the side of the lady of the house and you are only allowed there if she invites you. If you are in your outdoor clothes, the left is where you should take them off. They shouldn’t be worn into the right.
“These are mostly quaint old customs that the Mongolians have a laugh about themselves. Oh, and you’re not supposed to roll up your sleeves, because it suggests that you’re going to have a fist fight with your host! If you do it, they’ll have a laugh with you about that.”
And a fist fight?
Next time: Tips and Tales (Part 10).
Do’s and Don’t ad nauseam.
[Photo by The Wandering Angel]
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I think it’s about time we got into this: how not to cause an international incident. Or, at its simplest level, understanding enough of the culture and its idiosyncrasies to avoid finding yourself bewilderedly wondering why that did or did not happen. I remember once as a stranger; spontaneously complementing a Chinese girl on her choice of perfume, and feeling puzzled when she recoiled in a combination of embarrassment and annoyance, as if I’d said something bad about her mother! Way too personal an approach apparently. There are potential pitfalls, but some leeway too – after all, we’re just ignorant foreigners, right? With all this in mind, I have to ask Neil: “So is there a core Russian traveller’s kit then?” His reply is actually quite unexpected:
