Learning the Language

This morning we began our Mongolian language class. We are being taught by two Mongolian ladies who work for our organization here in UB. The classes are being held at the office which is just fine for us because we live less than a block from the office. We began our day with anticipation and butterflies (in our stomach of course). It has been said that Mongolian is one of the top most difficult languages for an English speaker to learn. There are sounds that are unnatural to us. There are combinations of letters that sound impossible to make. However, we have a couple of wonderful teachers. It is their first time teaching Mongolian, but we did remind them that this is our first time learning Mongolian. We will just help each other through this process. We started out this morning by learning a portion of letters in the Mongolian alphabet. Mongolian uses the Cyrillic alphabet which has a few letters similar to the Latin alphabet; however, few of them have the same sound. The H actually has an N sound while the P has an R sound. There are also some letters that just look weird.
We also worked on introductions, how to ask someones name, some verbs, and how to count from 1 to 10. Our heads hurt after the class, but we learned several new words and phrases that we did not know going into class. We have a long road ahead of us. Our class will continue every week day from 9 am to noon until January. However, we are hopeful of the possibilities! Understanding the language will allow us to interact with the people around us. We will be able to build meaningful relationships with the people of the community. We will be able to feel like a useful member of our new home. We will be able to share our story of hope and joy!
This afternoon we were able to put some of our language into use at the local market. This morning we learned the Mongolian names for several animals and how to order meat. Up until now we had not been brave enough to purchase meat, but today we marched into the meat section and bought lamb using only Mongolian. It may not have been a lot, but it was a small victory. It proved that we can learn Mongolian and that we can communicate effectively!