crazy taxi, paragliding, like Israelis

So I have got three things- and unfortunately no pictures yet-

Last weekend I was on my way back from the capital city, I decided to take the taxi because I missed the bus. We drove for a while, took a different turn than normal and ended up in a ger district. He stopped at a xashaa (a fence around a ger) and left all 5 of us in the car. We sat there for 15 minutes then he returned. Just so you know this is a pretty normal procedure in Mongolia- a taxi driver might stop in the middle of nowhere to visit a friend for a half hour- you just have to wait. After the driver came back, I thought "finally we are on our way." We drove for about 5 minutes on a dirt road back towards the "highway"...but right before we got there the driver pulled to a stop. I looked ahead and saw a giant ice pond (melted with ice on the outsides). You see, normally we had to go through a tunnel under the train tracks to get to the main road- but this time it was full of water from the snow melt. My first thought was "ahh man, looks like we've got to go back the other way." But then, all of a sudden, the driver floored it and we plopped right down in the pond (I call it a pond, because it was big enough to have a small whale living in it:))I couldn't believe what the driver did- We started driving through the water- the water was coming over the hood and the engine was steaming! Next thing I noticed was water was coming in through the door- I couldn't help but chuckle at this point, even though the driver had his "serious face" on...I pulled my legs up- and was in fetal position. luckily the water reached only the bottom of my seat. We started going through the tunnel, and then...clunk clunk...clunk clunk...the car came to a halt. At this moment I thought "great I'm going to be stuck in the middle of ice water in a one-way tunnel- and I might die" (just kidding... but seriously) A few minutes later to my surprise the car started back up again... and we were on our way like Titanic through the deep...water was still coming over the hood...and we came out of the tunnel... but then, the driver had to figure out how to get out of the puddle- because there was about a 1-2 foot drop from the ice edge to the water level... He saw the lowest point and went for it...next thing you know we are high-centered half way into the ocean and half-way on the land- We are like a beached whale! ha- the door was opened and everyone jumped for land... we made it- it was the same feeling I bet the immigrants used to have when they made it to Lady Liberty! Anyways...to finish the story- car came over, towed us out, we used a bucket to empty the car, rode the next 3 hours with a wet floor- my feet were cold and my socks were wet- When I asked the driver why he drove into the puddle he said that the baby in the car was like a god. I repeat, his reason for entering the puddle was due to a baby in the front passenger seat. -Gotta love shamanism- In America two things would be different- baby wouldn't be in the front seat and the reason to NOT drive into the ice pond might be that there IS a baby on board...well why would you drive into an ice pond anyways... well got a kick out of the story...hope you did too.

The other two things...I will make it real short since I already wrote a good page.
-Apparently, according to my co-worker, Mongolians have the same IQ as Israelis. Yep, that's what he said. Don't really know what to do with that.
-I went paragliding last weekend. It was awesome.