Local MP Andrew Bayly and his youngest son George recently spent time living with the Dukha people of Mongolia. In this, the second of two articles, George recalls their experience of living and travelling with the Dukha family around their grazing lands.
We finally arrived in the Khövsgöl region where our Dukha family were located after five days of travelling overland in 4WD vehicles. Mongolia was once controlled by Russia, so we saw several signs of the past, such as statues of Lenin in the towns and cities. Many people we came across proudly displayed their medals, which is a hangover from the past when Russia awarded these to civilians for anything and everything.
Our drivers were incredible and handled the terrain with skill. We would frequently be driving off-road through thick forests and over frozen rivers.
We were welcomed on the first day with a meal of precious reindeer meat. The Dukha rarely kill a reindeer for meat – historically, they would hunt wild animals from the forest, but nowadays rely on goats and sheep as their main source of meat.
Reindeer are primarily raised for their milk which has a very high fat content and can be left for months in a plastic container without needing to be chilled. It is turned into yoghurt and small chewy biscuits which I can assure you are not particularly appetising.
For a Mongolian, the best meal you can ever have is boiled meat, perhaps with noodles, and this is served as a soup for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Dad and I eventually got to the stage where we had to gently suggest that other gastronomic options might be more palatable.
The reindeer also provide transportation. Because the terrain is very mountainous and covered with forest, reindeer are not used for pulling sledges, but for riding and as pack animals. The Dukha ride them to their daily grazing site and to visit their relatives and friends; they also travel for trade and to collect firewood. They will even ride them to hunt.
We were woken on the first morning to help saddle the reindeer – a process that took many hours, with the Dukha boys trying to weigh our possessions so they could be attached off the side of the reindeer and balanced.
It took us a day to ride to our Dukha family’s main encampment. The camp sat at 1800 m elevation. An area of around 1000 acres was enclosed by mountains and a fence comprising felled trees, still covered in leaves, which had been cut, dragged and placed atop one another. Inside this enclosure were the 200 reindeer that the family owned.
At the camp, we got to experience the difficulty with which the Dukha carry out even menial tasks – like collecting and chopping firewood every day just to keep the fire going so they can make tea and cook, or taking a hatchet to the frozen river nearby so they can access fresh water. One of the regular daily tasks was rounding up any reindeer that had escaped overnight and herding them back into the enclosure.
Every day we would ride the reindeer between 20 and 30 km, either to visit people, check out an area as potential grazing, or see a particular sight. Reindeer have an amazing ability to travel through snow. They have oversized, crescent-shaped hooves, very similar to that of a camel, which enables them to walk on snow without necessarily sinking into it. If you watch a group of reindeer, they will all step in the tracks made by the leading reindeer.
However, there does come a point when they will sink into deep snow. We limited our weight to 80 kg per animal, but we had occasions where the reindeer were buried right up to their bodies in the snow. At that point, the only option was to get off, lead the reindeer, and find a flat area where you could get back on. It amazed us how hardy the animals were and so sure-footed. [PHOTO]
We enjoyed some memorable trips. On one occasion we stayed at a separate camp for two evenings so we could see more of the Forbidden Land, an area set aside for Mongolian kings and queens for their personal use, but also an area that generates 2 per cent of the world’s freshwater. On another night we got caught out in the dark and had to sleep out in the snow without any shelter, just the fire. When we woke up, we were all covered in a few centimetres of snow.
On these occasions, we shared some wonderful moments around the bonfire with our Dukha host, Magsar, and his family: like playing cards with them, during which I lost three packets of cigarettes to Magsar.
Our hardest trip was to the tallest peaks nearby to see over the border to Russia and to hunt wild boar. There was a blizzard blowing and it was bitterly cold. We had to ride up a near 35-degree slope, and this was when our reindeer demonstrated just how powerful they are, climbing a steep slope in waist-deep snow with an adult rider and their packs on their back.
On the return journey down the hill, we had to walk our reindeer as it’s not advisable to ride a reindeer down a steep slope. This meant we had a long walk of several hours through deep snow.
We got to meet other Dukha people during these trips, including an older couple who had moved into a permanent cabin, built deep in the forest, after handing over the management of their herd to their children. It was confronting to see the wear and tear that their lifestyle had taken upon their bodies. However, this was far outweighed by their warm welcome and brilliant smiles, and their joy at the chance of having visitors.
The Dukha are people of incredible determination, able to survive in a brutal environment. They are some of the most generous and kind-hearted people we have ever encountered. But their future is bleak.
In 2016, the President of Mongolia visited the Dukha and offered to pay each adult US$70 a month in return for taking away their right to hunt over 70 per cent of the Forbidden Land.
This payment initially helped the Dukha, as at the time there were only 150 still living (the World Health Organisation estimates a viable population to be 1500). Now, however, they are in a situation where they are reliant on a payment from the government which doesn’t cover their basic living costs, they have lost their right to hunt, and, even worse, they still do not enjoy access to basic health or dentistry services.
We watched Magsar tie a piece of a string around a painful tooth with a weight on the end, which he then dropped to yank the tooth out. His youngest son had a hole in one of his molars, and even though we gave his some painkillers, one morning he treated it by pouring battery acid into it to kill the nerve ending.
In addition, climate change means they cannot farm as many reindeer as they once did. The only reason they continue their traditional life is due to strong family networks, which they now have to bolster by finding partners in local herding families who are not of Dukha descent.
The only realistic prospect is tourism. It is dreadful to think that this small but dynamic group may need to remain stationary so that international tourists can come and ‘witness’ them during the summer months.
I am so happy that we managed to spend time with these people in their natural environment, living as they have done for hundreds of years. I have many wonderful memories: the time we spent with our Dukha family; the cups of tea shared in their tepees; our cameraman Amra, whose English proficiency increased in proportion with his consumption of vodka (the Mongolian drink of choice); and our two translators, who helped us learn more about these cultures.
My most treasured memory though will be the time I shared with my dad, away from all the distractions of our everyday lives.
George Bayly has a passion for history and is studying for his Commerce Degree at the University of Auckland. He is 21 years old and the third of local MP Andrew Bayly’s three sons. Andrew and George travelled to Mongolia at their own expense.