Mongolian Housing



This is the outhouse or jorlon at my host family's house.



There are all different kinds of houses in Mongolia.  I live in an apartment that has running hot and cold water and heat. But many people live in houses or tents, called gers, that don’t have running water or indoor plumbing. Those people fetch water in big jugs from a well or a water house. They pay a small fee for the water (maybe $.30). You have to fetch water several times a week.  Because you fetch your water, you learn to be careful with how much water you use. For example, you save the water you used to wash your hair so that you can use it to wash the floor. There’s no indoor plumbing so you use an outhouse to go to the bathroom. The outhouse is a little house in the backyard usually about the size of a small closet, and there’s a hole in the floor. You squat down to go to the bathroom. 

This is what a ger looks like from the outside.

Gers are round tents made out of thick felt. In a ger and in some houses, there’s a stove that is used to cook on and heat the ger or house. You make a fire in the stove with wood, coal, or dried cow manure, called dung. The stove keeps the ger very warm, but it’s hard work to keep the fire going in the winter. In a ger, there is a hole in the center of the ceiling so the stove pipe can go outside. In the winter, the hole is covered over with felt but in the summer the hole is open to let a cool breeze in.  Traditionally the women and children occupy the right hand side of the ger as you enter. This area consists of a small cupboard housing all the cooking utensils and bowls for eating and drinking. The left hand side of the ger is for guests and the top of the ger is for the man of the house or honored guests. The door of the ger is always placed so that it is facing south. This makes for a remarkably accurate time telling device. The sun then shines through the circular wooden structure at the top of the ger, shedding light on the walls and acting like a sun dial. The doors are painted in a range of bright colors and intricate patterns, contrasting with the monotone white covering of the felt. The furniture inside the ger is usually also painted in bright colors and motifs. Oranges and reds are always popular colors.



This is the inside of the ger. The stove is to the right; the door is to the left in the back.



Many Mongolians do not have clothes washing machines, and no one has a clothes dryer. Clothes are washed by hand, wrung out, and then hung to dry on a clothes line. I don’t have a washing machine so I hand wash my clothes. It is very hard work but at least I have running water so I don’t have to fetch the water to wash my clothes! The hard part is wringing the clothes to get as much water as possible out of them. If you don’t wring the clothes well, it takes a very long time for them to dry. To dry my clothes, I hang them on a drying rack inside and on a clothes line on my porch when it’s not winter. In the winter, the clothes freeze on the line and don’t dry.



This is the inside of the ger, opposite the door.



This is how I do my laundry by hand in my bathroom.

These are my clothes drying in my apartment. Too cold to put them outside today!

This is dirty laundry water after I finished a load. Pretty gross!