The day we signed for an apartment

Some of these posts could have quite a few alternate titles, it's hard to decide which one gets the cake.

Wednesday we have morning classes instead of afternoon ones. Yet today we only had one instead of two, so that gave us a little chance to do some homework in the morning before going out to class. It's a bit cooler today, but our language school is always warm inside, so it pays not to wear too much clothing. We are starting to get a hang of numbers, and we learnt some other words today; also we reviewed sounds and alphabet. Our teacher says that we will have to learn cursive, which is a shame since it is quite confusing.

After class we went to have lunch in Jukov cafe; originally we were meant to be going to the coffee house, but we ended up downstairs in this cafe. Really it's not a cafe since there is no coffee for sale. The menu was entirely unintelligible to us, so we ordered mostly at random. Many Mongolians came in for lunch, eating mostly small things - soup and soft bread and buuz. Our meal came and it was fairly large mince-steaks with egg on top and rice and salad. Oops. Edible (some would call it tasty I suppose), and a large filling meal. Paying involved the usual rigmarole of trying to find change. It's a problem in a country where the largest bill represents about $20, and everyone is keen to avoid using them (except banks and ATMs).

In the afternoon Seumas went to sign the contract for our new apartment. It's in the same building as the one we are currently staying in. It costs 320000T a month, about A$233. That makes it like 17% of our Sydney rental. So if the market is getting tight over there, consider moving here. We get a key on Friday, start our agreement on Sunday, but it will take a while before we move in - we need to get the kitchen done, and buy some key items: stove, refrigerator, washing machine, flooring.

Wednesday night is team meeting night. There are 6 adults (3 couples) currently in our team, and we meet weekly for fellowship, prayer, and to listen to teaching. We all currently live in the same block, and the apartment we meet in is in the next stairwell over. So it's down 5 flights and up 5 flights and there we are. At least that saves us rugging up against the cold. The temperature has dropped today quite a bit. We had a good time at team meeting, hearing from the Word and praying together.

On our way back home (short trip that it is), it has started snowing, which is a nice touch.

The menu from the cafe at which we ate.