In America we prepare our homes for winter by having the gas or oil delivered, by raking the dead leaves from the yard, and putting in storm windows.  Here in Mongolia there are different tasks but the general idea is the same.

The first thing that you do is give your door a nice warm blanket cover.  Darkhuu and I made the cover from a large piece of felt, like the kind insulating our ger, and then we covered it with an old blanket.  She, our neighbor Mandakh, and I then nailed and tacked it to the door so that all the cracks and joints were covered, greatly cutting down the amount of wind that gets in.

Door blanket

Next we covered the outside bottom two feet of our ger with old cement sacks and clothes which were then covered by a good two feet of dirt.  The school director brought over two truck loads of dirt as well as 4 tenth graders to get the job done for us.

A made in Mongolia cement sack

Spreading dirt

Moving onto fire making, the next thing we and our neighbors did was collect bits of desert shrubbery as kindling.  While Brian and I did not actively help in this endeavor we did supply the gatherers with important things like candy bars and juice.

Some shrubberies

The other kindling that is used is dung.  Brian and I collect that ourselves from the desert around us.

Brian collecting dung

Lastly we had 6 tons of coal delivered directly to our door from one of the largest coal mines in the world.  Thanks to governmental subsidies the coal cost us less that $20.

The absolutely huge coal truck backing up into our yard.

Our 6 tons being dumped into our coal holding pen

Our ger is now nice and cozy.