STEP (Feb 12-13)

(this was written a little while ago, so this is a little…outdated?)Last week Tuesday through Thursday we were traveling doing STEP (Sponsorship Tracking and Enhancement Program) surveys among families that have registered children. This is done once a year to check up on the sponsored children, updating the documented information so that they can consider how to better serve the community. A total of 25 of us went on the trip, comprised of a community based organization’s staff and World Vision staff.
Tuesday morning we were scheduled to leave at 7am but we left at quarter till 8 as everyone scurried to get last minute things ready for the trip. Since it was supposed to be colder in these other “soums” (the country is broken down into aimags [provinces], soums, then baghs) I was equipped with much thicker, warmer clothing. It turned out that it actually warmer than in Undurkhaan. Oh well.
At one point in our journey we went through a place called “Moron.”
Sometime around 11 we arrived in Umnudelger, after a quick lunch we began surveying people, going from ger to ger. I went with Saikhna and a local “volunteer mother” who guided us through the 40 something interviews. Each home we went to without fail gave us a cup of milk-tea and candy. I think by the end of the day I had gone through something like 20 cups of tea.
I felt useless and helpless because really there wasn’t a whole lot I could do as we went from house to house. I could only observe and try to learn more about the people and the culture from the interactions and hospitality. Other than that I would ask questions and they would give me insights into each family along the way. On the second day one of the staff joked that it was my job to just eat for those two days.
We were able to complete our surveys ahead of schedule, filling out around 1000 in a matter of hours. We moved on to Binder and arrived there in the evening. As it turned out the hotel wasn’t big enough to hold all the staff so the 7 guys went to another “hotel” which was actually a 1 room cabin with a lot of beds. We had dinner and watched some movie on the tiny tv and joked that the Coca Cola we had was beer and the Orange Fanta was Whiskey. Dinner was noodles, meat, and pickled veggies.
In the morning we ate what we had the night before for breakfast. I had wondered why no one was finishing off their plate or bowl. I had finished off mine, deciding not to go with the cues I had observed. The interesting thing was that we were brought green tea and that was used as soup for the noodles. Wasn’t too bad actually. The guys found a small tractor outside and were goofing around on it which made for some fun photo-taking.
This day was very similar to the previous except that I tagged along with Solongo, “Soko”, as we conducted our interviews. We also had a lot less surveys to do. The volunteer mother that guided us through the maze of gers had us over for lunch which consisted of buuz of course. She showed me her son’s artwork that had won him some awards and was put on display at school. I also had the privilege of eating some of her vegetables that she had pickled herself. She had received training on how to grow vegetables and was developing ideas of her own based on what she had learned.
Right before we left we had a ceremony for the deep water well that WV had built. Most of the people in the community had to walk long distances to get freshwater before, but this one cut the distance in half. Since there wasn’t a long piece of ribbon I guess we improvised and tied a series of them together to make the ceremony official.
I also have a confession. One of our interviewees was at school, so we had to drop by there. We stopped in during chess class and they asked me if I wanted to play. So I was pitted against a cute little 7 year old girl who was so serious and quiet the whole match. Yeah, she beat me. I could say I let her win, but no, I was destroyed by her. There, it’s out, happy now?