Analyze the Mongol Empire Essay

Wenda Qian MGMT 470 02/26/2013 Mongolia Mongolia is landlocked country between China and Russia; it is located in north Asia, and the current population is 2. 87 million. Ulan Bator is the capital and the largest city; there are about 45% of the population lives in there. Mongolia’s political system is a parliamentary republic, multi-party system including 16 parties; and it is a member of the United Nation. I decide to interview a Mongolian, because as a Chinese, I have never been familiar with this neighbor.
My interviewee is called Anka, she is my good friend, a financial major student, we know each other for three years, and I often play basketball with her brother. Anka was sent to a Chinese school when she was 6, she learned Chinese for almost 12 years, so her Chinese is perfect. In Mongolia, Chinese school is very expensive. Her father think learning Chinese is useful to do businesses; in order to enhance the communication and business between Mongolia and China, they can come to China without a visa. The interview took place in the library. Before the interview, I made some research about Mongolia’s history.
In 1203 AD, Mongolia was founded by nomadic tribal groupings under the leadership of Genghis Khan; the meaning of name is “universal king”. Mongolian was very good at fighting wars; China was briefly ruled by Mongolia in Yuan dynasty. From 1691 to 1911, Mongolia was controlled by the Manchu, China was also, thus Mongolia was a province of the Qin dynasty at that time. After the Manchu fall in 1911, the Russian Government forced the new Chinese Republican Government to accept Mongolian autonomy under continued Chinese control. At long last the Mongolian People’s Republic was proclaimed on November 25, 1924.

The relationship between Tibet and Mongolia are old and deep, Tibetan Buddhism became a major religion among Mongolian people, but religion was prohibited in 1930, a lot of monks were arrested. Until 1990, freedom of religion again came back to Mongolia. Democratic Revolution also occurred in early 1990, it ended the 70-years domination of socialism. For the culture, I start with language and religion; there are 21 ethnic groups in Mongolia, but they speak the same language, just a little different pronunciations, but they are all able to understand each other.
In China, there is a province called In-Mongolia, but the Mongolian ethnic group of China can’t communicate with Mongolian, the language is mostly different. There are 95% of the populations in Mongolia follow Buddhism, most of them are old people, the other 5% follow Christianity which is a new religion appear in Mongolia for recent 5-6 years, and young people are the majority. For marriage customs, currently Mongolian people follow the western style with wedding dress; the traditional marriage custom is Mongolia cheongsam in green and yellow.
In Mongolia, the legal marriage age is 18 for both male and female, most choose to marry at 19 years old. Young people have marriage freedom now, they can choose their lover, it is not decided by father as before, and male’s parents are required to go to female’s home to propose marriage, female doesn’t change the family name after marriage. During the wedding, both man and woman have to hold a blue silk with sliver cup fill with wine on the right hand, every friend and relative sip the wine from the sliver cup.
Many Mongolian families have 2-3 kids, and the women go to work, very few stay at home to be a housewife. The exactly same as China, Mongolia also has a spring festival; it is the one of two big traditional holidays in Mongolia, people wear white cheongsam in spring festival, and the color means “lucky”. The last day before the spring festival, people have to eat foods from the morning to the night, they can’t be hungry at that day, and the foods include dumpling, horse meat and milk tea. From the Lunar New Year’s day to the third day, Mongolian put a very big meat on the table, family and visitor can eat it.
The other traditional holiday is naadam (July 11-13), people watch wrestling, horse racing and archery contests on TV, and eat meat pie. Mongolian people like to eat meat much more than vegetable. For economic, Mongolia’s main exports partner is China, the trades include mineral products, natural or cultured stones, jewelry, textiles, animal origin products, hides and skins. Mongolia’s main import partners are Russia and China, the trades include mineral products, machinery, equipment, electric appliances, recorders, TV sets and spare parts, vehicles, food products and base metals.
The Mongolian government put more and more attentions on education; the educational system is 4 years for primary school, 5 years for middle school and 3 years for high school. Because Mongolia uses compulsory educational system, when the children meet the school age, the government will force their parents to send the children to school. After graduating from high school, students have to take a college entrance examination, it would judge their ability to go to college, it is the same educational system in China. The Mongolian government focus on infrastructure, but the road condition is not good.
However, along with economic growth, the other infrastructure such as railways and airports develop fast, in general, they are getting better. The business opportunities are immense in Mongolia, this country develops quickly, and they have young and well-educated people, but they also face many challenges. Mongolia is a landlocked country; the transportation is expensive, and the environment issue such as air pollution. With globalization of world economy, Asia plays a bigger role than before; Mongolia is a part of it. However, this country is still very young, even though it has a very long history.
They need to know how to attract more foreign investments and tourists. Based on these points, Mongolia will obtain more success. Interview 1. What is the most different you think between Mongolia and America? Food, chicken and pork are very expensive in Mongolia, but they are much cheaper in America. And it is really hard to find Mongolian foods in America. (Chicken and pork are not expensive in China, I think the biggest difference is culture and value, food is also an important factor) 2. So, what is your favorite Mongolian food? Horse meat, camel meat and dumpling. I didn’t know horse and camel can be kinds of food before, I was shocked when she told me that, but I will like to try them if it is possible) 3. What is the most common sport in Mongolia? Nowadays, I think basketball and soccer are very popular now. (I agree, basketball is also common in China) 4. Is electronic products popular in Mongolia? Yes, especially iPod products, many people buy them, HP computer is also popular. Compare Japanese electronic product, Mongolian people prefers American electronic products. (In China, Japanese, Korean and American products are all popular, I don’t think these products have too many ifference) 5. What are the roles of the women in Mongolia when it comes to business? Women go to work now, and they gain more freedom and rights than before. (It is the same in China) 6. Does Mongolian yurt still exist now? Yes, shepherds still live in the Mongolian yurt. People like to live in the apartment now, and the walls are thick, thus the noisy won’t affect the neighbor. (Yurt was the old house for Mongolian people in the past, now they have better choices) 7. Is college entrance examination difficult in Mongolia? Yes, the math is very hard, but there still are 35%-40% of students can go to college. Math is my nightmare; there is also college entrance examination in China, only few can go to college, now there are more and more) 8. Do you think doing business between Russia and Mongolia is similar with doing business between China and Mongolia? In the past, we did a lot of businesses with Russia; we trade clothes, foods and animal fur, because the wolves are few in Russia, so the furs are very expensive. Currently, it is prohibited to sell furs, but still happens in the black market. Nowadays, we have many deals with China; it is similar with doing business with Russia. Along with globalization, more and more communications will appear) 9. Is car getting common in Mongolia? Japanese and Korean cars are popular in Mongolia, because they are comfortable, the seats are soft. Car traffic becomes a new problem recently, too many families have cars, and the roads are not wide enough, so the government makes a new policy to control the situation. The last one or two number of license plates decide when the car can or cannot enter to the city, for example, the last number of the license plates on my father‘s car was 3, so my father cannot drive on Tuesday and Saturday. I think China has this problem, too. The Mongolian government shows us a great way to Restrict on vehicle) 10. How do you learn both Chinese and English at the same time? I learned Chinese since primary school, meanwhile I learn English from a Chinese English teacher. However, the generation before me learned Russian, because Russian was important at that time. My grandpa can understand the material from the Russia channel. (I learned English since middle school; I think kids are good at learning a new language) 11. If you can go to another country you like, which one would you like to go to?
I will go to Japan, because the technology is developed in there. (I agree, Japan is a good place for travel, and foods are very delicious) 12. What are some problems that your society suffers from? The Mongolian government, it is chaos. For example, they steal tax income from the citizen, and they never admit the behavior. (I think this is also happened in my country, maybe China is even worse, government always spends money on useless projects, and people do not know how and where they spend the money) 13. What do you think about your race .. What are you proud of .. not proud of ..?
I am proud to be a descendant of Genghis Khan. What I am not proud to be is that the low population and the development of Mongolia is slower than the other Asian countries. (For me, I am proud to be a Chinese, even my country has so many problems, but I believe Mongolia and China will become better and better) Reference 1. Mongolia Exports. (n. d. ). TRADING ECONOMICS | 300. 000 INDICATORS FROM 196 COUNTRIES. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://www. tradingeconomics. com/mongolia/exports  2. Mongolia Imports. (n. d. ). TRADING ECONOMICS | 300. 000 INDICATORS FROM 196 COUNTRIES.
Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://www. tradingeconomics. com/mongolia/imports  3. Education in Mongolia – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. (n. d. ). Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Education_in_Mongolia  4. History of Mongolia. (n. d. ). History of Nations. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://www. historyofnations. net/asia/mongolia. html  5. INFRASTRUCTURE IN MONGOLIA: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES. (n. d. ). Monoglia. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://www. associm. com/newsletters/pdf/INFRASTRUCTURE_final. df  6. Jiang, S. (n. d. ). Problems in Mongolia. mongolia. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://mongoliaparadise. tripod. com/problems. html  7. Mongolia History . (n. d. ). Mongolia Travel, Mongolia Travel Agency, Hotels, Travel to Mongolia. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://www. discovermongolia. mn/country/history. html  8. topic. (n. d. ). 1990 Democratic Revolution in Mongolia – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/1990_Democratic_Revolution_in_Mongolia