Genghis Blues, Mongolian Bling

Genghis Blues was one of the original movies that pointed NJ Kpopper in the direction of Mongolia many years ago.  One sentence summary: blind blues musician Paul Pena learned throat singing and traveled to Tuva to compete in the national competition there, with the help of friend Kongar-ol Ondar.

Mongolian Bling is a newer take on the Ulaanbaatar rap scene, giving some insight into the life of rappers Gennie, Gee and others.

NJ Kpopper is not here to recap and review, but to reflect on more personal thoughts. Genghis Blues stood out for me from the beginning as a magnificent and moving example of a personal quest, something highly individualistic blossoming in one person's mind that could then become externalized into the world through determined action.  I have thought about that movie often over the years, to the point that I had to acquire the decidedly non-HD DVD to watch it again.  

Tuva, of course, is somewhat removed from Mongolia or even Buryatia, but the call of the raw landscapes of Inner Asia have always acted upon me in a mysterious way.  So now the bear is going to stop resisting and give in to that call.

Mongolian Bling presents an antidote to any romantic idealizing of ancient nomadic lifestyles (so typical in Mongolian documentaries) by getting up close to urban life in the ger districts of Ulaanbaatar.  But the theme of dreaming still permeates this film, as some kind of underlying substrate to the human struggle and striving depicted.  We should all seek to exceed in dreaming in our own way.

Perhaps one day NJ Kpopper will produce a memoir called "My Mongolia" that is more about the imagined landscape of the mind and the moods that my version of Mongolia produces than about the actual lived experience there.  But it will require some on the ground research to merge reality and imagination into something bigger and larger, or at least longer lasting, than life.