Our final visit of the evening took us to the house of our landlords who had us dress up in some formal deels they had. These happened to be their wedding deels which they explained they had only worn once because it was when they were both thin and so now all they could do with them was have us wear them. =) (they said they would wear them next year haha). It was a great day and this visit topped it off. The buuz were wonderful and this couple has a three year old son who is so cute and loves playing with us. This visit gave us hope for future Tsagaan Sars when we will know more Mongolian language and traditions and be able to go house to house easier taking gifts and wishing people a happy new year. One of the traditions is to give people “new” money. This entails getting a hold of new, uncirculated bills that look like they’ve never been handled and giving them out to friends. The older the person the larger the bill you give. A bill of 30 cents would go to a child while a bill $3 would go to a young adult, $7 to an older adult and $15 to a grandparent. Unfortunately, I went to the bank to get bills a little late and they were all bought out. We each received bills of $3 from our last visit so we’ll definitely have to make sure to purchase our reserve of nice bills ahead of time for next year. I went to five banks and all of them laughed at me and said they had no more “new” money. You really have to be on top of these things. Anyways, what a great first new year in Mongolia! Happy white moon everyone! Shine jieliin bayariin mend hurgai! Happy Tsagaan Sar!
