The school should have internet service tomorrow, so that means I'll stop coming to this internet cafe, stop having to save all my class documents to flash drives, and stop having to worry about my information popping up for the next person who signs on. Unfortunately, it also means I'll stop having a reason to take a walk every day, but I suppose that's just a matter of motivation.
As I take the five minute walk to this internet cafe I spot the swastika spray painted on buildings all over the place. In Asia the swastika is a complicated symbol, depending on context. One of my students has a gold swastika that dangles from his cellphone on a red cord, but that doesn't mean he's a Nazi, it means he's a Buddhist. However, Buddhist ideology doesn't generally get spray painted onto buildings, so I have been wondering about the graffiti.
Invariably, the words Aries M.Y.H. are spray painted next to the swastika. I have asked my friends what Aries M.Y.H. means, but no one has been able to understand my questions. A few days ago I finally gave up on my friends and looked it up on the internet. M.Y.H. stands for Mongol Ulsiin Naxi, one of the three main ultra-nationalist groups in Mongolia. So, it appears that the the most common form of graffiti in Ulaanbaatar is in fact Nazi.
The scary thing is that it seems most people have no problem with it.
Granted, Nazi ideology has been adopted to suit Mongolian purposes, but hatred for foreigners, specifically the Chinese, seems to be growing.
I know I have very little to base that statement on. When I lived in Mongolia from 1994-1999 I was just a child. I was aware that Mongolians hated the Chinese, and quickly picked up the same hatred, but in my mind it was more like rival sports teams. It did not seem to me then that Mongolians were particularly likely to be violent towards Chinese immigrants, though I had no doubt that China was waiting for a chance to attack Mongolia.
I still have little doubt that China would like to attack and conquer Mongolia, but my opinion is now based on the fact that China wishes to extend it's international influence in general, and has no problem with continuing to control Tibet. The arrogance of a rising China is quite similar to America's arrogance during the same developmental period, and likely indicates the same willingness to take first, justify later (referring to Indian lands, the Mexican war, and the last gasps of the Spanish Empire).
Where was I.... Mongolian Nazis. Right.
Most of the students at the language school are from the upper crust of Mongolian society. A typical class includes doctors, teachers, business owners, and their family members. I'm going to assume that their views are more moderate than those of the average Mongolian, because they tend to work with (and therefore depend on) foreigners more, especially the business owners who make regular trips to China.
Even so, nationalist ideas emerge in conversation regularly. Are the Chinese inherently dumb or evil? Are they weak? How about Koreans? If a person celebrates the Chinese lunar new year instead of the Mongolian lunar new year (tsaagan sar), are they still Mongolian, or are they betraying their country?
Most of the people in my classes are of the (spoken) opinion that there are good and bad people in every country, and that people can chose which holidays to celebrate without being called traitors. Some, however, are not. Remember, also, that this is their stated opinion. Most people (including myself) discriminate more than they want to admit, even to themselves.
Also, keep in mind that all of the students at our language school are in the financial position to pay for language classes. Some of them even take the classes as a hobby. All of them have a steady source of income, or at least a family member with a steady source of income.
News articles say that most of the swastikas were spray painted during the summer. The only place where I have seen any attempt to remove one was from one of the government buildings. The attempt was unsuccessful.
It all makes me wonder, what is going to happen when the global slowdown spreads to Mongolia even more? Prices for metals and coal (Mongolia's main cash exports) are down, and aid inflow will soon be dropping. I fear that any riots, instability and targeting of Chinese immigrants could lead China to interfere for the sake of "security". In the current global climate, the international outcry would probably only amount to a soft whimper. America would glance over, invoke the commonly held American assumption that all Asian countries are the same, and go back to destabilizing the Middle East.
Great, isn't it?
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I share your concern over Mongolian nationalism. I was in Mongolia for a year (2007-2008), posted there from China. Since I have major issues with continuing smug anti-Japanese sentiment in China for things that happened 60 years ago, and the huge distortion of history by the Chinese to justify their continued control over the territories of the Qing Empire, it was refreshing to be in a place where the Chinese are on the receiving end of the hatred and the entire rationale of Chinese domination over Qing territories is completely rejected.
Nevertheless, I very quickly came to see how limiting Mongolian nationalism is, not just in their racist rejection of foreigners (which you identify with Nazism), but for the Mongolian cause as a whole. The Mongolians' attitudes to Inner Mongolians is quite complex -- a mixture of fraternal feelings for fellow Mongols and a violent rejection of turncoat Mongols who have turned Chinese. Mongols of Mongolia will even tell you that Mongols of Inner Mongolians are "not Mongolian". This is terribly limiting and condemns Mongolian culture to the narrow confines of Mongols within the Mongolian State. Mongolians like to talk about "Ikh Mongol" (Great Mongolia). I like to refer to their narrow ethnic perception of their own country as "Jijig Mongol" (Little Mongolia).
Mongolia will never be able to take back the lands that China and Russia have taken from it, but It is sad that their ethnic self-perception is unable to embrace, rather than exclude, a wider view of what a Mongol is. They are the exact opposite of the Chinese, who try to expand the definition of "Chinese" to ethnic groups like Tibetans, Uyghurs, and Mongols that really have no business being called Chinese. The Chinese have been trying to take back Taiwan for 60 years, insisting that it is an integral part of China and shouting down anyone who says differently. The Mongolians, on the other hand, are boxing their nation inside a very narrow limit that actively excludes large portions of their people and their history. The Chinese are a nation on the offensive. The Mongolians are a nation on the defensive. Both of these ways of viewing their nation, ethnicity, and history have their unpleasant aspects (imperial expansionist ideology vs narrow exclusive racism) -- but the Mongolian view is by far the more self-destructive of the two.
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