Things have been really busy over here. We've been in Ulaanbaatar for the past few days seeing our friend Rachel off as she's done with her PC service. It'll be hard to see her go, especially for Kim. We've spent the last couple weeks helping her pack and she and Kim have been doing fun stuff like making purses out of their badly translated t-shirts. We'll say goodbye with a great dinner at our favorite Italian restaurant here in UB and then we'll head back to Erdenet tomorrow.

Aside from that I've been thrust slightly prematurely into teaching a Bible study at the church we go to in town. I was supposed to start doing it August 19th and co-teach it with my friend Johnny when he gets back from Ireland but, as with all things in Mongolia, it doesn't happen according to plan and in a way that is very 'trial by fire'. The unexpectedness aside, it's been going fantastically. The first class was on "What is the Bible" and the second was "Why Can We Trust It". The next few will be overviews of the Old and New Testaments. The Mongolians have been patient with this suprisingly dry and humorless American and it's invaluable for me to go over this material myself and to learn to teach it in simple terms because of the language barrier. (That was actually a fun lesson I learned. Remind me to write about that later.)

All that to say, this is more of a regular update email than the continuation to the Bono, Bell, Obama post I'd hoped for. I know what I want to say, it's just a matter of getting the time to get it down.

So, in the mean time I made a little map with Google Earth so you could have somewhat of an idea of what our city is like. Please note the barren snowscape from the winter picture.

For those of you interested in these type of things, as I am, here are some Mongolian population statistics that help paint even more of a picture of the country. The ones I found the most striking were the population age numbers and the abortion statistics.

Population total: 2.7 million (+ 32,000 people or 1.2% from 2006)
Population living in cities: 61%
Population living in rural areas: 39%
Population of Ulaanbaatar: 1,034,800 (39%)
Population living in aimag centers: 22.2%

Rural to Urban Migration
Population living in rural areas in 2000: 42.8%
Population living in rural areas in 2007: 39%

Male Population: 48.7%
Female Population: 51.3%

Population under 15 years of age: 28.9%
Population under 23 years of age: 50%
Population between 15-64 years of age: 67%
Population 65 and over: 4.1%

Population Growth Rates
1990: 2.7%
2000: 1.4%
2003-2005: 1.17%
2007: 1.55%

Crude Birth Rate (per 1000 people)
1990: 35.3
2003: 18.0
2007: 21.7

Pregnancy

Total Fertility Rate (Number of Children a Woman Would Have)
1990: 4.3
2004-2006: 1.9
2007: 2.3

Maternal Mortality Rates (per 100,000 live births)
Country Average in 2005/2006/2007: 93 / 69.7 / 89
UB City Average in 2005/2006/2007: 73.3 / 71.8 / 73.7
Aimag Average in 2005/2006/2007: 105.7 / 68.2 / 102

Number of Maternal Deaths (per 100,000 live births)
1993: 243
1995: 214
1998: 160
2007: 84

Of the 84 Maternal Deaths in 2007:
32% were due to pregnancy complications
22% were due to birth complications
14% post-delivery complications
32% due to other health problems
27.3% of post delivery complications were related with bleeding within 4 hours
18% were aged 35 and older
82% were aged 20-34

Number of Pregnant Women Covered by Prenatal Care: 84%

AIDS / STIs

Over half of individuals infected with STIs are unemployed, homeless, and have low income.
Alcoholism and violence against women is increasing and putting them at risk for STIs and AIDS.
Total Number of reported AIDS cases: 40 (Reporting Vastly Incomplete)

Total Number of Reported Cases of STIs in 2007: 12,229 (30% of all communicable diseases)
Trichomoniasis: 36% or 16.7 per 10,000 poplulation
Gonorrhea: 37% or 17.4 per 10,000 population
Syphilis: 27% 12.7 per 10,000 population

In 2007, out of 56,810 health screenings conducted on pregnant women:
855 (1.5%) had syphilis
442 (0.8%) had gonorrhea
785 (1.4%) had trichomoniasis

In 2007 69% of pregnant women were tested:
2.5% tested positive for syphilis (detection rate was higher in Orkhon and UB)
57.5% had had x-ray examinations
100 active tuberculosis cases were detected (85% were from UB)

Abortion (reporting incomplete)
2007 Statistics:
284 per 1000 live births (28% abortion rate)
20.2 abortions per 1000 women of reproductive age
4.1% are late term abortions
6.2 % of total abortions were among women under 20 years of age
68.7% of total abortions were among women between 20-34 years of age
25% of total abortions were among women 35 years and older
16% of total abortions were among women who were students

World Health Organization Stats
Life Expectancy at Birth: 65 (2006 Report)
Gross National Income per capita: $2020 (2004 Report)
Per Capita Total Expenditure on Health: $140 (2003 Report)
Male Literacy rate: 98%
Female Literacy rate: 97.5%

More to come....

Nick