Travelling with no plans

The story goes like this. My plan for Mongolia was to meet a friend named Z in Ulaanbaatar (UB). I had dropped her off at the bus station a week before and we talked about me trying to come and she said to just call her when I come. So I decided to take the same bus she took the week before because it's so much faster than the train and cheaper too. So I ride for 6 hours to the china border. I arrive in Erlian (border city) and take a taxi to the train station cause I'm guessing the next step should be to take a train into UB. So we get to the train station and I ask the taxi driver if it's open because it looks closed. The driver says, no because there are no trains today. I say, no trains anywhere? He says, yes. He says how long are you going to live in Erlian. I say I'm not living in Erlian, I want to go to UB today. I ask if there is a bus that goes there and he says no. I say, what do I do? He just looks at me with a blank look. Then he seems to remember there is a car that goes into Mongolia so he takes me to it. We pull up to these jeep looking cars and he helps me negotiate a price with this Mongolian guy who doesn't speak Chinese or English. I'm the first one in the jeep so I'm sitting in the front then a lady comes up and I figure out she can speak some English so I ask her how much she got charged and she said 50 also so at this point I know I'm not getting ripped off at least. We sit there for a while and I wonder where exactly this jeep is taking us. I don’t really want to ask this lady cause I want to look like I know what I’m doing. But then finally I ask "where will this car take us?" She says, I don't know. I think to myself, why in the world are we both in this car? So we sit there a little while longer and then 8 more people finally get in the car (all crammed in the back with bike tires and stuff). We get to what is obviously the border area and we wait in line with lots of other cars and jeeps. We give money and take departure slips from this lady who walks up to the jeep then we and the other cars start to drive through the gate. We get through the gate and go along a road for just a short bit then pull up to a building and stop. As soon as we stop everyone in the jeep bolts out and sprints to this building as fast as they can. I'm still sitting in the front seat because I don't know what's happening. Then the driver motions for me to come too. So I grab my most valuable bag and jog a little up to the building. It turns out that this is the exit point for China and they just didn't want to be the last in line. So of course, I was the last in line. We get through that part and run to get back in the jeep and get to the Mongolia check in point and that place was not as intense. We get checked into Mongolia and then we get back in the jeep. This old lady in the back started speaking some Chinese to me and said that I could go with the lady who could speak English to UB. “She's going to UB so you can go together.” So that's cool, I got someone to help me now even though she looked real intimidating and not very friendly. So then the jeep pulls up into a parking lot and the lady I need to follow starts getting out with her stuff and another lady and the driver motions for me to go too. So we start running through kind of square area and I figure out this is the train station. And apparently the reason we were rushing before was because the driver new we needed to catch a train. Then one of the ladies runs ahead and starts going to different train doors and it's obvious that she's trying to see which door will let us on so by the fourth door, they let us get on and we get in and sit down. So the train takes off barely a few minutes after we get on it. Now at this point, I don't know where this train is going, how long it's going to take or even how much it costs. In China when you take a train you have a ticket that you’ve bought ahead of time. We sat on that train for 3 hours before I knew which seat was mine, how long I was gonna be on it, and how much it even costs. In that three hours I made friends with a pretty classy lookin Mongolian lady who was traveling with this stinkin precious little kid. We became friends and had a conversation all through a “lonely planet” book. She would point to questions in the phrase book like “how are you” or “where are you from” then I would hold my fingers or just speak English and sometimes she could figure it out.
So finally a lady came by selling tickets to those of us who didn't have one. Then I asked how long to UB ( I just assumed this train could take us there) and one of my travel buddies told me we would get there at 10am the next morning. So now I know this is a 16 hour train ride. It was a sleeper but it's different from Chinese trains so I didn't really know which bed was mine or if the ticket I bought was for a bed. Then the people I had made friends with played charades with me for a while to explain the situation to me. I tried to go eat in the eating car on the train but I didn't have any Mongolian money yet so they acted like they didn't want to take RMB. They ended up taking it. The food was really good too.
I forgot to say, once we got into to Mongolia and on this train my cell phone didn't work. I was told it would work in Mongolia and now I know that was clearly a lie. So then I start thinking of the implications of this. If my china SIM card doesn't work here then Z's doesn't either and I don't have another number for her in Mongolia. So I think, well I'll just get to UB and buy a SIM card and then I can call China to see if anyone has a Mongolia number for her yet. Now it’s time to go to sleep on the train and there is no bedding like on Chinese trains and I don’t have a blanket with me like all these Mongolian people do. Not to mention that we are riding through the Gobi desert and it’s cold at night. Needless to say, it was not a comfortable sleep that night. So we arrive in UB and this girl advertising her hotel comes up to me speaking English in the area where you get off the train. I didn't need her hotel but I asked her where I could change money and buy a SIM card and so she gave me her little flier that had a map on it. So I start walking to where she told me to walk. I notice there are some restaurants along the street and I am hungry so I decide to stop in and taste some authentic Mongolian food. So I get in there and use my "LONELY PLANET" book that I borrowed from KK to order some food. Then when I got it, it was actually something I'd had before that my outer Mongolian friend cooked for me. It was still good though. About half way through the meal I remember that I was on my way to change my money so I don't have any Mongolian money to pay for this meal… So I just keep eating since there's nothing I can do now. I finish and then go hold up my RMB to the waitress and she clearly doesn't want that. They call the boss and are saying stuff and I'm saying stuff and none of us are understanding anything. So finally they get their calculator out I’m assuming to do a conversion or something and they too end up taking my RMB. So now I'm really resolved to find a place to change my money. So I walk quite a few blocks down the main street in town and I'm not seeing any banks or atm's or anything. There is stuff but not money stuff. So then I'm coming up on some larger buildings and they look like apartment buildings actually. I cross through a large intersection and then I hear some scream my name (with an accent of course). I think to myself, "who knows me in Mongolia, not to mention my English name?" So I look over and this girl who is a student at my med school is running to me and saying "oh my gosh, what are you doing here. We've been waiting for you, we've been so worried, this is my house, were you coming to my house, T is waiting for you at the train station, oh my gosh my car is coming, we are going to look for you, oh my gosh I can't believe this, you are here....." So after all that I'm very confused. T is a friend who I had planned to see later in the trip but I didn't understand why he was in UB when he lives very far from there and why they were waiting for me because they don't know Z at all. So it turns out that when I talked to T and told him I may come to Mongolia, I told him not to come to UB because I would stay with a friend there for a few days and then come up to his city. Since his Chinese is so bad (he’s just now studying Chinese), he didn't understand that apparently. So he came down the day before and was waiting for me with his little brother and this girl. It's actually a good thing too because as it turns out Z had left her house in UB and her whole family was out in the country side. I randomly met up with a mutual friend of ours on the street (that's common in Mongolia I guess) and she told me that Z was gone but that she did expect me to show up sometime. So this girl Z expected me to come to Mongolia as we discussed but then left town anyway. Hmmmmm? Make a much longer story short, we had a great time and I’m so thankful T totally misunderstood me. The countryside out there was absolutely gorgeous. I can tell you all about it face to face because this is already long enough. Check out the pics to the right of the screen “Outer Mongolia”