DMV: Mongolia (part 1)

from Sept 19, 2017

This would be part 2 of my quest for a drivers license here in Mongolia. The first part if you remember was my visit to the hospital for "tests". That was about a month ago? Finally, Mashka was able to get through to someone who told her what to do to get my license. Today I was to go to the Bayanzurkh Police Section 2 where you get a license. Mashka was on holiday so Monkhuush, our Head Barista escorted me.

While we rode in a taxi, I asked him if he knew what was going to happen today. He said no, he didn't, and then smiled. We arrived, went inside, and walked up to the second floor and entered a large room, bigger than all of UBean. Along opposite walls were a row of computers. In the center were some scatter tables and chairs. Across the room in the left hand corner was a desk with an officer in uniform. There were three other people in the room, all on computers. Monkhuush and I stood there for about 5 minutes. I asked him what we were waiting for. He said the driving instructor.

Then a man, taller than me entered with a file folder with several papers inside it. He walked up to us, opened the folder and I recognized my name and the picture of me that looks like a terrorist mug shot. He asked for a "bal" a pen. He didn't have one and neither did Monkhuush or I. Nor did the officer at the desk or anyone in the room. Nor did any of the officers that walked in and out of the room while we were there. My driving instructor left and didn't return.

Monkhuush then told me to go to the officer at the desk, you have to take a test he said. He was motioning for me to come. I walked up, he looked at my file that my driving instructor must have left with him. He pointed to a computer that's screen was on, gave me my file and motioned to me to "shoo". On a yellow piece of paper on top of the file was a clearly marked username and password. Both started with USA with a series of numbers after.

The computer screen had a small window in the center that had two fill-in fields with a clickable button underneath it. It was in Mongolian, but I was able to recognize the layout of username/password-enter. I entered everything and hit enter. I was thinking that because they knew I was American, the test would be in English. After clicking enter, a page came up with everything in Mongolian. "Well shit" I thought, I turned to say something to Monkhuush, but he was no where in the room. I can read some Mongolian, but most of the words I did not recognize. I didn't know if it was okay or not, but I started to fish out my cell phone to use google translate. I started to think of my Saudi friends who all had to suffer through a DMV test in English with no help.

Just then, a short stocky man in plain clothes sat down next to me. He grabbed the mouse and started clicking through windows until we got to a screen that looked like a test. There was a long sentence ending in a question mark with four clickable options underneath. Nice guy was just helping me get to the test. I was about to say, "bayerlalaa" when he started clicking on answers and scrolling down the test. We got to question nine and he skipped it and went on to question 10. This gave me enough time to glean what the question as about. It was asking about what the penalty would be for violating some law. The answers were in months and tugs. Two seemed incredibly long and expensive and one seemed extremely low and cheap. One was 3 months and 60,000 tugs. By now, my new best friend was back on 9 and reading the question while running his finger along the words. I told him "goruv", #3. He asked me "goruv?" I nodded and he paused, read and said "teem". He clicked on #3, scrolled to the bottom and hit enter. He then stood up, and left the room without a word. I never saw him again. I turned and looked over my shoulder. The officer at the desk motioned me to come over.

He took my folder and looked at my paperwork and then at me with what I would describe as disgust. He put a sheet of paper in the printer and clicked on his keyboard. Another officer walked up, picked up my folder, thumbed through the papers and snorted. Yet another officer in a different uniform that looked superior to the others walked up and gave me the nod. I said, "sain bain oh". He responded "sain,sainbainoo" "blahblahblahblahblahblah". I held up my hand and said "minni mongol hel jahen meden, be oyaten" (My knowledge of the Mongolian language is small, I am a student). By now, my driving instructor arrived with the One Bal to Rule Them All. He pointed to several places for me to sign and then walked away. Suddenly Monkhuush was there. He said, you passed, your driving test is on Friday, let's go.

As we left the building and were walking to the curb, he asked how the test went. I told him I entered the username and password, I knew one of the answers but that was all I did. He said "teemo?" (Really?) I told him some guy sat next to mean and took the test. He grabbed my arm and started laughing hard, looking over his shoulder at the police department. Monkhuush said, he did a good job.