July the 11th through the 13th is the Mongolian festival called Naadam. This type of festival is not unique to Central Asian peoples, but we have nothing like it in the States. The closest thing I can compare it to is if you combined the 4th of July, the Olympics, and a county fair. Almost everything closes for three days and the streets are quiet.
The festival centers around "The Three Manly Sports of Naadam" which are wrestling, horse racing and archery. Each of these is written (or so I'm told) in the old Mongolian script on the mountain to the west of Zaisan memorial mountain. In this picture you can see this and the Soyombo, which can also be seen on the national flag of Mongolian.
This year I am hoping to take some photos of the religious activities that are part of the event. Some foreigners I've met think the Mongols are not a particularly religious people. But I believe they practice their religion in ways so unfamiliar to us we overlook how deeply religious they are. For example, one of the lead floats in the Naadam parade contains the Tsam masks. If I can get a shot of it, you (like any tourist) will just see a bunch of people wearing asian looking masks, but really they are recognizing a pantheon of gods (the newspaper calls them "burxad" which means gods, not masks) as part of their opening ceremonies. Since our practices are so different we can look right over the religious aspect and just see a colorful float or tradition.
Think of it this way. If you didn't know a thing about Christianity, what would a nativity float mean to you in the Christmas parade? The meaning is not as clear as you might think.
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