Core Of Culture Field Operative Nathan Whitmont researches traditional horse trading and training in Mongolia.
I couldn't believe how fast the little sedan was going.  Each passing minute the land was drying up, the valley widening, the mountains in the distance shrinking, flattening, turning to plains.  And still we raced south.  An hour passed.  The sun sank and the mountains were turning to low blue rims when, on the flat horizon, two tiny white dots appeared.  As we approached they grew into gers, the felt tents most Mongols call home.  We were greeted by several children and a tough, attractive young woman, and taken inside for milk tea.  In the Mongolian countryside sharing tea, or, when it's in season, fermented mare's milk, is an important ceremony that marks every meeting and parting, and seals every transaction.  The tea is strong and very salty.

Ichbaatar, the horse trader, wasn't at home so we drove to his relative's place a few miles away where again we were greeted and served the salty tea.  After a while we returned to Ichbaatar's, had tea, and waited.  

When the old horse trader arrived we all had tea, then went outside and stood in the empty desert.  A teen ager jumped on the only horse around and raced off into the heat waves.  Ichbaatar eyed me suspiciously.  He looked about 40 but was probably 30, and he looked tougher than nails.  His skin was weathered, his eyes were narrowed, he said little and he stood still.  He stared off into the heat waves.  Horses began to emerge.  Behind them rose a dust cloud.  Forty or fifty head raced across the dry steppe, chased by two riders, the teenager and his younger brother who must have been the herd tender.  The two boys brought the herd up and kept it in place by racing circles around it, impressively forming a two man human fence.  Ichbaatar got a rope and pulled out the rattiest, half starved, scarred-up horse I ever saw.  I scoffed and waved it away.  He took out another with oozing sores on its withers and I shooed that one off as well.  The third horse he brought wasn't half bad.  It had quite a lot of saddle sores but at least they were healed.  Its feet looked all right.  It wasn't real happy about letting me examine them - I was two feet taller than Ichbaatar and bright blazing white; the poor horse probably thought I was an alien - but eventually he gave in.  I finally decided the horse might make the list.  I turned around and the herd was gone and Ichbaatar was holding the horse with the oozing sores.

I didn't speak any more than ten words of Mongolian but there are certain signs understood universally and eventually the kids were bringing the herd back in.  As they did I noticed a sleek young paint out front, kicking and jumping and making sure to stay in the lead.   Now that's my kind of horse, I thought and was amazed when Ichbataar led him out.  The look on the horse's face clearly stated he thought Ichbaatar was an alien;  I was something 20 times worse.  It took me ten minutes just to get near him.  He never did let me pick up his feet.  I took my saddle from the trunk and Ichbataar got nervous for the first time and shook his head.  His youngest brother (who had brought me from the city) spoke a bit of English and he said: "No, too dangerous."

I stood in the middle of the Mongolian steppe with my saddle in my hand and 100 pounds of gear in the younger brother's trunk, hundreds of miles from the city, the only structures as far as I could see the two felt tents, and the only people apparent in that wasteland the old horse trader and his family.  Suddenly I realized that without their help I was stranded, and that was obvious in any language.  But there was still no way I was heading out onto the steppe with a horse that could be ridden.  I stepped up and threw on my saddle.  Ichbaatar relented but insisted on doing it himself; he actually pushed me aside.  With all his family watching, if he needed to be in charge that was fine, as long as he did it right.  I watched from a few paces away then checked his work before I mounted.  Stepping into the narrow stirrup I gently climbed on the wild horse.  

Nothing happened.  Every muscle in the little animal's body vibrated with tension but we just sat there.  I nudged him with no reaction.  I gave a little kick and he took half a step then locked up again.  After a while we turned a few circles and that was good enough.  The horse had spirit - I'd seen that.  After a few days he'd loosen up.  I dismounted and unsaddled and once again, when I turned around, the herd was gone.  This time Ichbaatar held the horse with the healed saddle sores.  We met eyes for several moments.  I was in Mongolia, I had two horses, one of them seemed to have some heart and the other one's guts weren't falling out, I didn't really feel Ichbaatar was scratching my back - I had brought half his family to visit and was going to buy two horses for no doubt several times what they were worth, it seemed he could give me a little more scratch - and there was no doubt I was fighting an uphill battle.  Saddle Sore and Dangerous would be my (first) two steeds.  Ichbaatar and I shook hands on it then went inside to seal the deal with milk tea.

The men decided amongst themselves that I should be taken to see the UNICEF Genghis Khan memorial, which I was all about, so the lawyer's father and the youngest brother and I crowded into the sedan with about six kids and set off across the dry steppe.  It turned out there was a small town, just a few permanent buildings huddled on a rise agains the wind.  We drove past it, even further south, towards the Kherlon River, which made a huge bend to the west and turned north and was the river up which I eventually would ride.  We could almost see it's banks when the monument appeared, a tall marble obelisk with a plaque.  The whole family stood beneath it for snap shots.  I looked around and reflected on the massive armies that had staged on those very plains while creating the largest empire the world has known.  Then we drove home, stopping twice along the way for milk tea.

That night the whole family butchered two sheep.  The men did the killing and butchering, the women sorted the entrails and organs, the children fetched water and cleaned pans, the dogs drank the blood and ate the scraps; there was as single member of the household that didn't participate.  We huddled in the lee side of Ichbaatar's tent as the wind howled and the sun set.  The rest of the sheep lay not thirty yards away, backs against the wind, totally oblivious to our slaughter.  A crescent moon appeared in the clear sky and I wondered if I'd ever been a part of something so incredible.

Ichbaatar's wife and oldest daughter tore much of the meat into strips and hung it to dry in the tent and Ichbaatar's youngest brother threw one whole skinned sheep in the car trunk to stay refrigerated.  Inside the women cooked, the men smoked, and Ichbaatar, after examining all my tack and finding my bridle insufficient, took out a hand treadled sewing machine and fixed it.  By candle light we ate stringy, fatty stewed meat and dry bread, then the youngest brother brought out a bottle of vodka.   Ichbaatar's wife and children huddled out of the way while the men drank.  Conversation was quite between the three brothers.  I thought about the warnings of drunk wedding parties as the men who had been friendly enough that afternoon took more and more shots.  I felt the barren emptiness all around us and looked at Ichbaatar's hard as steel eyes.  It was uncomfortable not knowing what the men said.  There was only one bed and after a while it was offered to me as blankets were laid out on the floor.  The lawyer's father was in his late middle ages and it didn't seem right him sleeping on the floor and me in a bed so I refused repeatedly.  Finally he took the bed and I slept on the floor but the family seemed offended.

Opening my eyes in the morning my first site was Ichbaatar's pretty wife watching me the same way her husband had the previous day, with a look that said "what the fuck are you doing here?"  Or maybe it simply said you can't ride across the steppe alone.  When my eyes opened she held them for several moments, in Mongolia woman are independent, they are not expected to avert their eyes or bow their heads to men, then she went back to her work.  I went outside and found the youngest brother nervous.  The horses were gone.

We warmed up the sedan and all the men got in, Ichbaatar tense, gripping a pair of old military binoculars and a rifle.  The field glasses made sense but I wondered what the gun was for.  We drove around the steppe, glassing from atop little hillocks, checking shallow washes.  The youngest brother drove.  No one except the old man spoke.  He occasionally said something to Ichbaatar who only nodded.  The whole thing was making me uncomfortable as I'd already given them the cash.  Maybe I should have slept with my new stock lashed to my ankle.  I could see where it might all be a set up.  Then we spotted them.  We came up on them in a dry wash and they all looked at us with faces that said "O hey - you looking for us?" and "Jeez, what do you guys look so worked up about?"

The whole family watched as I packed up.  Everything I had was going to fit on the back on one scrawny Mongolian pony and yet it seemed like I had loads more than them.  I gave the kids pens.  Ichbaatar's wife was out with the sheep so I gave his oldest daughter a bag of dried fruit.  Ichbaatar saddled the horses and we hung my loads on Dangerous.  I knew Ichbaatar would insist on lashing the loads down.  I had a 100 feet of nylon rope to use as a picket line and I also had a lash rope.  I left the picket line out and kept the lash rope in my hand.  Sure enough, without pausing Ichbaatar picked up the picket line and started tying.  It took him several minutes to weave up a tangled mess.  Then I stepped in threw a box hitch and had the whole thing cinched down tight and pretty in about twenty seconds.  I smiled at Ichbaatar.  His expression only changed a fraction, but he seemed to be thinking maybe I wasn't a total lost cause.