Mongolia – Staying in the Ger

 

Typical ger in a ger camp (entrance)

When you want to travel in Mongolia, outside Ulaanbaatar, then you most probably stay in ger camps as there are hardly any hotels. And in even more remote areas you will have to pitch your tent.

Gerhard Wilhelm Robert Kirsch (1925-2020) at about 91 years

Ger is a word with associations for Germans as GER is used in international sports to mark German athletes or teams. Ger is a germanic word for spear, which has survived in names like my father's given name – Gerhard. But in Mongolia ger (гэр) means something most people in the west would call yurt. There are yurts in use all over Central Asia, they differ even in structural aspects, but these differences are likely to be missed by tourists.

Ger for tourists - clearly furnished

Ger in a ger - a model

The biggest yurt is in Turkmenistan, where some strange, oversized buildings or structures may be seen, which have as the main purpose to make the country appear in the Guinness Book of Records. In Ashgabat you may look at a flagpole [1] or the world's largest indoor Ferris wheel [2]. The world's largest yurt may be seen 10 km west of Mary in Turkmenistan [3].

Gers of nomads out in the open landscape

The tradional ger is also different to the ones used as traveller's accommodation. I'll have a much closer look to the ones used by modern nomadic herders, when I'll write about this topic. The ger usually has interior posts supporting the crown to support the roof; this is one of the differences to other kind of yurts. The round form is structured by a latticework of wood to which poles for the roof are attached, ending at the crown. The outside is covered with felt and maybe the roof is covered with canvas. There's also a doorframe and a door, which traditionally points to the south [4]. The north has the family shrine, the west is for males/husband and east for females/wife. In the middle there is a stove, also in the tourist version as even early or late during the season it might get cold. Most people use wood nowadays.

Interior of a ger - details

How is staying in a ger? Much quieter than staying in a hotel as you are far from noisy surroundings. Using public toilets, sinks and showers isn't for everyone. I liked staying at ger camps!

There are also gers in Ulaanbaatar

Links and Annotations:
[1] https://rheumatologe.blogspot.com/search/label/Turkmenistan The flagpole had to yield honor to appear in the Guinness Book of Records to a flagpole in Baku, Azerbaijan.
[2] https://rheumatologe.blogspot.com/2014/10/turkmenistan.html  
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yurt As mentioned under [2] I couldn't see this yurt like structure as travelling to the north with other insights to Turkmenistan. The Wikipedia article has chador for yurt, but chador (2.) means tent, and yurt is yurt (1.) in Farsi, too. Interestingly Hungarians use yurta as a scientific term, but would use sátor for all kinds of tent-like dwellings. I'd like to know the etymologies of the Indo-European chador and the Finno-Ugric sátor.
[4] https://www.theyurtproject.nl/en/is-het-een-ger-or-yurt/   

(1.) یورت
(2.) چادر
.