Archive for the ‘About Mongolia’ Category
Foreign Workers Quotas: Limiting Expats in Mongolia
The Government of Mongolia imposes foreign worker quotas on businesses operating in Mongolia, both foreign-invested and Mongolian-owned companies. The quota ranges from 5% to 80%, depending on the sector, the amount of investment and the total number of employees a company has. For all foreign-invested companies the default business activity is “foreign trade,” which carries with it a quota of 5%, meaning a company must employee 20 Mongolian employees for every expat it employees. Quotas go up from there depending on the sector – for example any company with a mining or exploration license has a quota of 10% while a company that extracts oil or natural gas can employee up to 80% of its workforce as expats. Read the rest of this entry »
Visas in Mongolia: Tough Times on the Steppe
Visas – those little bits of paper in our passports that allow us to enter and leave the country. If you happened to be lucky enough to be born in the US, Europe, Australia or other countries considered the “West” then you can probably travel fairly freely without the worry of getting a visa. Of course when it comes to employment we all need visas in order to live and work in a foreign country.
While it would seem to make sense that Mongolia would make it relatively easy for people to apply for and be approved for visas, this is not necessarily always the case. Mongolia, especially during the summer season, actively seeks to increase the number of tourists that visit the country each year. In a country that has a viable tourist season of only three to four months, one would think applying for a tourist visa would be made as easy as possible. Read the rest of this entry »
Things in Mongolia to Avoid Like the Plague
Well, the Actual Plague, For One
As the title implies, you will probably want to actually avoid the plague in Mongolia. While Mongolia has definitely not reached this level…
…the fact of the matter is that the plague is present in the country. Read the rest of this entry »
Chinggis Khan, Mongolian Leader, Died Today in 1227
August 18, 2009
Chinggis Khan died this day in history, in the year 1227. The cause of his death remains a mystery, with some claiming he succumbed to injuries sustained after falling from his horse due to fatigue and injury from battle, while others claim he was killed in battle by the Tanguts and still others say he was killed by a Tangut princess taken during a battle. Chinggis’ place of burial remains a mystery as it is said anybody who crossed the path of the burial procession was killed. It is alleged to be near his birthplace in Khentii Aimag, in the east of Mongolia. His successor to lead the Mongolian empire was Ugudei. Read the rest of this entry »
Perseid Meteor Shower to Light Up East Asian Skies
August 12, 2009
The annual Perseid meteor shower will be at its peak tonight, during the wee hours of August 13. According to the Sky and Telescope publication the showers will be at their peak at 1800 GMT (2 am Mongolian time), with dozens of meteors falling through the atmosphere.
The meteor shower is a result of the Earth making its annual passage through space debris left behind by the comet Swift-Tuttle from our close encounter with it in 1992. The most intense meteor showers occurred during the early 1990s just after the passing of the comet, with hundreds of meteors an hour visible.
The meteor shower gets its name from the constellation Perseus. As the debris rains down it looks as if it’s originating from the constellation.
Source: World News Australia, www.sbs.com.au/news.Naadam in Mongolia
June 30, 2009
If busloads of tourists abound, then it’s probably summer in Mongolia. Along with wonderfully long days and superb weather, summertime in Mongolia also brings with it the Naadam celebration. Naadam, or the Three Games of Men, is a three-day national Mongolian holiday that takes place each 11th, 12th, and 13th of July. Originally intended for men, the games have gone coed now feature women in both horse races and archery, although the wrestling remains the sole domain of the men.
For those familiar with the festival it generally conjures thought of scantily-clad Mongolian men wrestling, children deftly navigating their steeds bareback across the steppe, and archers accurately aiming for targets well over 50 meters away.