So, About the Hotel Wrestling Match

CM - By popular demand, I'll address the cryptic reference to a hotel wrestling match mentioned here.

I'll set the scene:

I had been out interviewing people about the local milk market (kind of a big deal as there was never a dedicated milk market in Bayanhongor before. The milk there is not pasteurized, and people had been simply buying untested milk off the street from dirty carts). I finished my work for the day, wrote up my notes, and returned to my hotel. Parenthetically, I was lucky enough to have a shower in my hotel room. It was attached to the sink, and there was no shower to speak of – there was a drain on the floor and you just stood there, wedged between the toilet (with no lid on the tank) and sink, letting the lukewarm water trickle over you. It was new for me.

Sorry, I digress. So, I had finished my day and sat down to my aforementioned meal of eggs and rice with milk tea to drink. As I ate, a couple of guys came in. They had already been drinking, maybe a lot. They invited me to sit with them. I saw no harm in it, as I was just eating alone. This turned out to be a mistake, however, I am still a bit confused as to why.

As it turned out, these young gentlemen were auditors for a national bank, in town to audit a local branch. One spoke some English (more than 99% of the other people I met there) and the other had two phrases he shouted repeatedly and laughed the frothy laugh of too many shots and not enough food (the phrases were “WHERE ARE YOU FROM!” and “WHAT ARE YOU DOING!” – neither phrased as a question). We made small talk and had a few beers, then the guys ordered khuushur – a traditional Mongolian fried meat dumpling. As we ate the khuushur, one guy went to the bathroom (very near) and threw up all over the place. The toilet, while set into the floor, is plenty big enough to hit, even when piss drunk. Shrugging of the failure of marksmanship, the guy came back to the table. The second guy (the “WHERE ARE YOU FROM!” guy) had, by this time, rested his head on the side of the table and was spitting on the floor. He started throwing up, making no attempt to move (the waitress, maybe the best English speaker in the town, said “I am not cleaning that up”). While this is happening, pukeman 1 starts telling me that he likes to know women carnally, but in a bit more crude English. OK.

I took this as my cue to call it a night and put some distance between my digestively challenged acquaintances and me. I tried to pay my bill, but they had already paid it. As I was about to leave, I saw that the waitress was really not looking happy about the two young professionals. I decided to help pukeman 1 get pukeman 2 out of there. When we tried to rouse him, he just sat there moaning. Then, he shot up out of his seat and looked almost good-as-new. Odd.

So, here is where things get stranger than normal. I said I was going to bed. They said, no, I should come up to their room. This did not sound like a good idea to me. I said I needed to get something, and attempted to ditch them. They were surprisingly fast for their level of intoxication. They kept telling me, “Just come up to our room for 15 minutes.” This was beginning to feel a little homoerotic. Not that there is anything wrong with that. My lifestyle choices, however, have taken me a different direction. As there were two of them and one of me, I didn’t want this to become violent, so I played it all as a joke.

As we stood in the hallway near my room, them blocking my way, the bigger guy (pukeman 2, aka “WHERE ARE YOU FROM!’ guy) challenged me to a wrestling match (as translated by pukeman 1). I decided, (a) he was going to start this match whether I agreed or not, (b) this may give me a chance to show them that I am a man not to be trifled with (I sure hope I am not, anyway), and (c) I had better watch out for pukeman 1. Mongolian wrestling is a bit different than US wrestling. Your goal is to get your opponent to touch anything other than their feet or hand to the ground. You can also grab clothes. So, I grabbed this guy and put him in the fireman’s carry (just what it sounds like) without touching my knee to the ground. When I followed through and threw him on the ground, he hit a door. Nobody came out. Probably good for them.

Despite this act of overt masculinity, they still wouldn’t let me go to my room. They wanted me to come to their room. This was getting ridiculous, and I was getting angry. I barreled through them, and was trying to get my key in the door while they tried to stop me, still asking me to come with them, but still in an odd, friendly way. As this was happening, my phone began to ring inside my room. I said, “that’s my wife; I have to get that.” This apparently resonated with pukeman 1, who translated for pukeman 2, and they let me get in. I immediately threw the door shut and locked it before I got the phone. They stayed outside for a few minutes, kicked the door, then left.

Really strange... especially as the guys always seemed friendly, but were definitely pretty creepy. I don’t know what they were after. They weren’t poor, so I doubt it was money. I am a pretty good-looking man, so maybe with the urging of alcohol they thought they could get me to change teams – or maybe my Spartan good looks and chiseled physique got them to change teams. Maybe they were as confused as I was in the morning. Luckily, I didn’t see them in the morning to ask.