First short from the sitcom Batbileg's Family

A French designer, chicken suits, and Mongolia’s first sitcom

                “We need chicken suits,” Oliver says to Jesse, the French designer for Mongol Grand Media’s new Mongolian sitcom.

                “Chicken costumes?” Jesse asks. He looks at us suspiciously, as if we are putting him on. We had just requested a deel made out of camouflage material. He has reason to be suspicious.

                “Yea. Two. We need two.”

                So goes a normal conversation at MGM’s newly founded studio in the heart of Ulaanbaatar. Over the course of the year, Oliver Claycamp and I have been working on a sitcom, but not just any sitcom, we have been tediously scripting out Mongolia’s very first sitcom. The sitcom will be filmed in a single camera mockumentary style, and if all goes according to plan, filming should start at the beginning of December. Until that time, I will be documenting for my blog and the UB Post the more interesting happenings at the office, ranging from issues of translations to discussions on theme music for the show. It’s a truly international effort, and something that has a good chance of spreading further than Mongolia’s landlocked borders.

               Translation. Translation and finding those who can do it quickly has become somewhat of the lifeblood of our office. The show’s director will be a Korean man who speaks Mongolian, the actors will all be Mongolian, the foreign actors (including myself—more on this later) will speak Mongolian in the show, the producers speak Mongolian, English and Korean, Oliver speaks Mongolian, I’m studying Mongolian, the Frenchman speaks English, and thus any discussion is usually translated at least once depending on who’s in the room. The script is also translated multiple times, from English to Mongolian then finally to Korean for the director, who while fluent in Mongolian, has trouble reading Cyrillic. We also plan to translate the script into Chinese at a later time.

                A normal day for me: I greet Joon Wook Kim, the Korean director, who tells me something in Korean-accented Mongolian, which I invariably don’t understand, which he then tells to Oliver or Key for translation(the executive producer), who then relay the message to me, after which I reply, and the translation loop continues until the conversation is over. As frustrating as this sounds, it’s actually quite smooth and there has yet to be any real translation problems. Everyone knows the immensity of our task, and the goal of quality and good programming seem to trump any issues of interpretation.

                That brings me to another thing: jokes that are lost in translation. Luckily, Oliver’s wife Zola has become somewhat of our guru on jokes.  Not only does she translate the scripts, she also enhances our jokes and gives us a truly local spin on the various dilemmas we cook up. I’ve even left out good portions of scenes for the pieces I write just to get her take on it. Her script translations and influence are vital to our finished product.

 American humor can be sarcastic, it can be slapstick and it can be based entirely on wordplay. It runs the smorgasbord of English communication and has huge regional variations. For writer’s writing to a foreign audience, some of these types of jokes don’t work and have to be changed to make sense. While it’s always sad seeing a joke go, the bigger picture is what’s really important here, and it’s the bigger picture that continues to propel this project further.

There’s always something happening at the studio, at least after the auditions start. From a rapping Mongolian child to a gorgeous model singing a popular English song, people have poured into the studio to audition for roles. Some characters have been cast, including the characters Ariunzul, a twenty-something woman dating a foreigner, Batbileg, her father, and Javzmaa, her stepmother, and Tumor, the obligatory crazy uncle.  The search continues for Monkhzul, the sixteen year old daughter obsessed with Korean culture, and Batta, the youngest actor in the show who plays a clever child always on the cusp of getting himself or someone else into trouble.

Then there’s Rick. In the show, Rick is an American man dating a Mongolian woman (Ariunzul). Originally, Rick was supposed to be played by another foreigner. Then, a month or so ago, I got a call from Oliver.

“The guy playing Rick is out,” he said. He was at the studio and our producers were probably huddled around him, or at least in my mind they were.

“Maybe we can get my friend Dan,” I suggested.

“They’re saying maybe you can do it,” Oliver said.

“Me?”

“Yea.”

“No way, I’ll talk to Dan.”

“Ok, think about it.”

It’s hard to describe how strange it is to write dialogue for a character for a few months then get the offer to play that character. It definitely makes you question future ideas involving that character, especially now that you have the choice whether to be the actor or not. But I thought about it, and decided to take the role. After all, time was running out and the show was nearing production. Plus, I had a general sense of what was going on at all times due to my role as the show’s co-writer. A month ago I became Rick and a month from now I will play Rick on television. Still strange to write and even stranger to say.

Dan, the friend I mentioned earlier, will also have a role in the show. He will play Steve, Rick’s friend whom he occasionally calls. So picture this: Rick is having some dilemma and to get advice he calls Steve, who is always doing something wacky (which is very easy to do in a city as diverse as UB). They will speak only Mongolian to one another, bad Mongolian I might add, and the subtitles will be in English. The sense of irony is powerful here:  two Americans speaking Mongolian to one another while they could be speaking English. Dan, an Afghanistan war veteran and documentary filmmaker, will also help with filming, post production, and everything in between. The staff diversity of the show continues to expand as we near production.

The coming week will see many things, including the recording of a theme song, which I wrote and someone else will perform, and more auditions to find our final two main characters. A ten minute mini-episode will be written and should be filmed soon and an advertisement campaign will move into its final stages of preparation. Mongolian’s first sitcom, which has yet to be named but will likely be Batbileg’s Family, is on its way to television history. As the snow settles and the temperature plummets, the cast, crew, and producers at MGM are going into overdrive in preparation for our winter debut.

Halloween time!

Halloween in Mongolia is always interesting. 

British Man Becomes a Mongolian Shaman

Paul Diamond, a wandering shaman friend of mine recently became a shaman in the Mongolian tradition. More details to follow, or not, as the pictures tell the story. Photos by Dan Peters

The center of a ger

The center of a ger

By Cooper Baltis

 Published September 4th in the UB Post

Life in a Mongolian ger revolves around a wrought iron stove. It’s the original central heating that doubles as a device in which everything is cooked, boiled, steamed, fried, simmered, and cleaned. It is invariably rusty, stained from daily usage and inlayed with endless knot regalia. It is crucial and strikingly useful. It is the center of the ger and the single most used item in the countryside.

Mongolian women spend most of their day around the stove. They begin their mornings by boiling water. Once the water is boiled, milk and tea is added to the boiling pot. A large ladle hanging from a chord near the stove is used to mix the milk and water together. A pinch of salt is mixed into the pot and an old saucepan is used to strain the milk tea into a pot. The nozzle of the tea pot is used to transfer the milk tea into a large thermos. The thermos is generally a bright color, the front of which is decorated by a floral pattern.

The thermos of milk tea is brought to a small table close to the back of the ger. It is set on the table next to a plastic bowl filled with bootsog, a fried pastry cut into small squares. The man of the ger enters and sits down on a stool next to the table. He greets his wife and daughters with a nod. His hands are muddy and slightly bloody from pulling a large thorn out of the hooves of one of his sheep. He reaches for the milk tea and pours it into a bowl. He finishes the tea quickly. Ochre finger prints remain on the white bowl. He takes one bootsog, puts it in the front pocket of his shirt, and leaves the ger.

The oldest daughter takes the pot used to boil the milk tea outside the ger. She uses an old rag to clean the milky residue off the side of the pot. She finishes and scoops water out of a plastic container into the pot. The pot is brought back into the ger and set on the stove. The middle daughter adds small chunks of wood into the stove. She blows air inside the stove using a hollow rod and listens for the crackling sound of the embers. While all this happens, the mother sits on her bed, combing the hair of the youngest daughter.

The water begins to boil on the stove. The oldest daughter pours most of the hot water into a metal wash bin. With the help of her sister, she carries the wash bin outside. The middle sister returns to the ger and grabs a sack of clothing out of a plastic bucket.

The mother sets her youngest daughter on the bed and picks up two small orange stools. She turns one of the stools upside down near the stove. She takes the pot full of water off the stove and balances it between the legs of the overturned stool. The mother sits on the other stool and starts using the hot water to wash dishes. The youngest daughter wanders outside to find her sisters.

She finds her sisters sitting around the wash bin on their heels. Soap suds splash out of the bin. The oldest sister scrubs a pair of jeans with her bare knuckles. The middle sister reaches for the youngest and tickles her. The youngest protests and runs back into the ger.

The youngest daughter pays little attention to the small handheld iron her mother has now set on top of the stove. The youngest runs to the bed and pulls a pack of playing cards out from beneath the mattress. As she plays, the middle daughter enters the ger and hands her mother a collared t-shirt. Using a large wooden cutting board, the mother begins to iron the collar of shirt with the freshly heated iron that had been sitting on the stove. As she runs the iron across the shirt, steam rises into the ger.

After the collar is ironed, more wood is added to the stove. The oldest daughter takes a cart to the nearby river to retrieve water. The middle daughter and the mother begin cutting slices of kneaded flour into noodles. They sit around the cutting board next to the stove. The youngest daughter waddles by with a candy wrapper hanging out of her mouth.

Oil is rubbed onto the noodles and they are cast into a large pot on top of the stove. As the noodles boil, the middle daughter quickly cuts a few slivers off a hunk of meat of a carcass they had been storing outside in their shed. She cuts quickly, precisely, dicing the meat into little square-shaped pieces. The meat is added to the pot and oily bubbles appear on top of the water.

The oldest daughter returns with a barrel of water just in time for lunch. A boy with a cast on his arm from a nearby ger helps her lift the barrel and place it next to the front door. They eat the soup and the boy leaves as quickly as he came. The oldest daughter adds water to the pot and more wood to the stove. As the water boils, she uses butter knife to scrape dirt from under her nails. She drops the bowls used for lunch into the water.

The dishes are clean and a lull settles over the ger. The youngest and middle daughters doze off. The mother and oldest daughter retrieve a large hunk of fat and begin slicing it into manageable chunks. A different pot is brought in from outside. The bottom of the pot is charred from years of usage. The middle daughter wakes up and starts sweeping the ger. While the fat boils on the stove, the oldest daughter kneads a large hunk of dough. With little pinches, the mother separates the dough into a pile on the cutting board. She drops the dough into the boiling fat on the stove. She comes back after each piece of dough has turned a golden brown. Using a strainer, she retrieves the piping hot pieces and deposits them into a large bucket. The middle daughter picks out a fresh bootsog and tosses it into her mouth.

The afternoon progresses in short waves of activity and rest. More flour is kneaded and torn into tiny circles. Diced meat is added to the circles and the corners are brought together in a pinch. The dumplings are arranged on the cutting board until the flour and meat is finished. Outside the ger, the father and his oldest daughter corral the cows and sheep.

A steaming pan is placed into the large pot on the stove.  A splash of water is added and the mother combs the hair of her youngest daughter until the water is boiling. She sets the dumpling  onto the steaming tray and once they are steamed, she places them into a large bowl.

The father and his oldest daughter enter the ger. Their pants are dirty with milk stains and animal droppings. They take off their boots and huddled around the dumplings. The middle daughter pours tea for her father, mother, and sister. She holds her youngest sister in her lap as they eat.

As night settles, the dumplings are devoured and more milk tea is boiled on the stove. The outside temperature starts to plummet. The father brings in a stack of wood and deposits it next to the stove. The family changes into their sleeping clothes and prepares for bed. The oldest daughter relaxes on the bed across from their parents. The middle daughter sleeps on the floor. The mother rises in the middle of the night and sticks a few large pieces of wood into the stove.

The ger is warm and the family rests. 

Tyler interview

published July 31, 2012 in the UB Post

Tyler Davis-Mayo, a Sarah Lawrence College graduate, originally came to Mongolia to continue his study of Shamanism, a path which started in Nepal. The UB Post sat down with Mayo recently to discuss his path to Shamanism and any Shamanic activities he has participated in since arriving in Ulaanbaatar.

When did your path to Shamanism begin?

It’s hard to say exactly when it began, but there are a few turning points that stand out, the most notable of which was a long psychological illness. Many Shamans are called through an illness, either physical or psychological or both, and this is sometimes identified by another shaman as a calling. As shamanism in the Western World has been pushed underground and become less prominent, the calling is rarely identified as such. I was guided by the spirits through a kind of intuitive call and response to where I am now.

What do you mean by intuitive call and response?

The spirit world, or most worlds that are not physical, do not have as strong of a duality as the physical world does. In the physical world, we can kind of map cause and effect to a certain degree. In the realms of spirit, it doesn’t quite work the same way. In fact, being unsure, not knowing, doubting, in some way is the access to these realms. You’re never “sure” in the way that you’re sure that if you have a fire in front of you you’ll be hot; you can’t be certain  in the same way that a spirit or a deity is communicating with you because it’s exactly in this space of unknowing that these sort of entities live.  It takes a lot of intuition and trust as well as trial and error to understand this space.

Tell us about what happened to you in Nepal.

I was never sure why I was so drawn to Nepal. As I was living there, it became clear that the Goddess Kali had called me there and brought me there. Through listening to her, in this kind of intuitive way, I was led to meet a few Nepali Shamans and through them I also met a good English friend who was also a practicing shaman. We met in the same shaman’s house on the same day asking the same questions. He also has a strong relationship with Kali so we figured it wasn’t just chance. Together, we took the initiation into the Nepali shamanic tradition.

Tell us about teaching Shamanism at the Krishnamurti School, Brockwood Park, in England over the past year.

I wasn’t teaching Shamanism, I was teaching about what Shamanism is. I think Shamanism is something that people are drawn to by another force and it takes a lot of questioning of one’s self to see if it’s the right path for them. But it’s important in the Western World to revitalize this way of seeing the world and interacting with the world in our cultures. One of the ways in which I began the class was by explaining that from my experience, Shamanism exists in a space that has an emphasis on the relationship to what we normally see as separate objects. Whereas our culture, modern culture, puts an emphasis on the individual and their conflict with the environment, emphasizing the perception of seperate objects such as the cup on the table, shamanism puts an emphasis on the relationship between the cup and the table. So the cup is on the table, and in their relationship is a type of reality.  This way of perceiving things reveals the interconnectedness of our world. That is something that we have lost in modern society and it’s part of why we have such violence between each other as humans and lack of respect for nature.

Tell us about your first visit to a Mongolian shaman.

My first visit with a Mongolian shaman was very strong. From what I’ve seen now, it seems to be true that most Mongolian Shamans, including this one, can bring through the spirit of ancestors quite powerfully. You can feel the energy of the room change even before the spirit was completely brought through. In Shamanism, it’s necessary to manipulate the space where the ritual takes place. The shaman definitely had created a sacred space. When the spirit was brought through you could also feel the heat radiating off the shaman and the shift in energy.

One thing that was interesting to me is the emphasis on ancestor spirits. While this is common in many forms of shamanism, it’s not always emphasized as much as it is in Mongolia. This particular spirit (which the shaman channeled) was very wise and was willing to pose hard questions to the person they were healing, which is in my opinion an essential part of the healing process. This allows the person being healed to look at their own problems and affect their own healing. Also, the spirits are a lot of fun as long as you’re respectful. They can joke with you a bit and invite you into a very friendly atmosphere. The Shamans themselves are also very friendly. At the beginning of this first visit, the shaman invited me to a big shamanic ritual the following weekend where three Shamans were taking on new spirits. This kind of invitation was very sacred and gracious of him – and the timing was also quite serendipitous.

What was your purpose in visiting the shaman?

I’m still at an early stage in learning to be a shaman and I’m sure I’ll always be learning. I visited because I needed some help from the spirit in clearing some blockages that I became aware of in my own practice not too long ago. In traveling to Mongolia it became clear that one of the reasons I’m here is to engage myself with the Shamans and spirits here and obtain their help in my ongoing learning and development.

What happened at the Shaman initiation?

There were seven Mongolian Shamans in all, three of which were taking on new spirits and about thirty to forty friends and family members. The Shamans set up the ritual space by creating a circle of protection and power around the whole camp. In the main ritual ger, they all set up their alters and opened up the spirit world, or as they called it, the Heavens, which serves to create a direct link between the physical realm and the realm of spirits.

There were various other rituals, many Shamans calling in their own spirits. The rituals to call in the new spirits were quite strong and the main teacher as well as the other Shamans had to be careful as it can be dangerous when first calling on the new spirit. They did this in a well-practiced manner, even as it went on almost all night. In one of the last rituals, five shaman set up around an oboo, which had a string tied to the top of it and had been brought down to the center of the ritual ger, connecting the Heavens to the earth. These five Shamans brought their spirits all at the same time, which was extremely powerful.

Did they tell you which tradition they were practicing?

Yes, their tradition was the Buriyat tradition which has a big emphasis on the costumes the Shamans wear. It’s quite elaborate and while most forms of shamanism have some forms of attire, the Buriyat tradition seems to be one of the most elaborate, and it’s essential to their shamanic practice.

Did you take your spirit?

The Mongolian Shamans were very open and gracious, and asked me if I wanted to bring through my spirit, which I did. It was a big opening for me.  My spirit doesn’t always come through so strong since I’m still learning. In this space, with all the energy there, my spirit came through very strongly and there was an interesting healing and communication between my spirit and the Mongolian Shamans. I was very grateful for that opportunity.

How did the Mongolians respond once you took your spirit?

Well I think it was unusual for them to see this type of spirit come through because at least in the Buriyat tradition, the Shaman’s face is covered when the spirit comes through. When my spirit comes through, there’s no face covering. My spirit, who is a female spirit, likes to look around and move more than the spirits in the Buriyat tradition.  Also, my spirit is a deity, whereas Buriyat Shamans are ancestor spirits, so there is a different energy coming through, which I feel is a little different from what they’re used to. So the space was unfamiliar to them, But it seemed that the Shamans and the Mongolians there appreciated the experience and were grateful for the spirit to come through.

This might be an obvious question, but did anything weird happen at the Mongolian Shaman gathering?

Weird things always happen in Shaman gatherings. One funny thing that happened was about midnight, in between rituals, a van showed up with a small movie crew. They filmed a short scene that appeared to be in a film taking place sometime in Mongolia’s past with the actors in traditional Mongolian clothes. It seemed quite random, but it had obviously been set up beforehand. We found out later that it was for a hip-hop music video.  Another interesting thing was the hawks that were swooping down quite close to the ritual ger during key moments. The shamans explained that in their beliefs, this was the spirits coming down to watch the proceedings and to accept offerings.

What are traditional Mongolian offerings?

Vodka of course, as well as different types of food and sweets. In larger rituals like this, animals are sacrificed. Things like food and alcohol and fire are common offerings in most Shamanic rituals.

You said that the first Shaman you visited removed a blockage. How did he go about doing this?

After the first time that he brought the spirit through and agreed to remove the block, we were told to return in five days. We were to bring with us many offerings and tools for the ceremony such as vodka, katag, silk, black and red string and a white sheet. When the spirit was called through, he directed the ceremony and the translators, or the spirit’s helpers, who in this case were the Shaman’s sister and a family friend, carried out the remainder of the ritual. First I offered katag, silk, vodka and tea to the spirit. Then, he directed the vodka to be arranged on a tray and for me to be covered with the white sheet and the red and black string to be wrapped around me.  I’m not sure exactly what was going on, of course, because the spirits have their own language that they operate with in the ceremony and of course everything was in Mongolian. What I felt at this point was the blanket and the string were isolating the blockage.

The spirit asked me to sing my power song and drummed along to it. Then he had some red and black string tied around my right angle and told me to focus my awareness there, as if my spirit was present there. He drummed again and at this point, he was bringing my spirit through the block. In doing so, the energy of the spirit moving through the block dissipates it, and that dissipation and movement through the block is the removal of the block. The spirit said he would leave and come back; the spirit left the space and the Shaman returned (through him) and after a few minutes the Shaman drummed in the spirit again. The spirit said that the ceremony had been successful.

Did you feel anything when he was removing the blockage?

There were a couple times when a very strong energy was moving through my body. When they removed the sheet and the string, I could feel myself opening up, as if there were more space in my body.

What are your next plans while in Mongolia?

Next I’m traveling to Khovd. There is a woman considered to be a Green Tara living there. I work with Green Tara’s spirit, and before I knew about this particular woman, I felt she was drawing me to Mongolia. When I found out about this Green Tara, I felt it was obvious that I should go and visit her.

What have you learned thus far from Mongolian Shamans?

Well the learning is still going on and in that state, things are very much in flux. I’m seeing something about the complexity about the Shamanic world, the difference between ancestor spirits and deities. Something is starting to become clear about the interaction between the deities and the ancestors and also about the roots of Shamanism and how this tradition emerged in Mongolia. Also the Shamans have been extremely proficient in what they do, and have imparted a lot of wisdom about how to move forward and create a closer relationship with my spirit, and the realms of spirit at large.

Anything else you’d like say?

I’d like to thank the UB Post’s Cooper and Khash for making contact and translating, which isn’t easy. I’d also like to thank Oliver Claycamp for putting us in contact with a very good shaman. Also, I want to express my gratitude to the Shaman’s and their translators for their openness and willingness to bring me into their space and teach me about their tradition. And of course, the deepest reverence for the spirits, for their healing and guidance. 

Sheer violence and hollow revelations: the legacy of the Mad Baron

Published July 28 in the UB Post 

It’s no stretch to say that the Mongolia we see today, the world’s fastest growing economy, has had a powerful and interesting past. With its colorful cast of historical figures and conquerors, none are more puzzling than psychopathic warlord Freiherr Roman Nikolai Maximilian von Ungern-Sternberg, or, as many called him, the “Mad Baron.”

The self-proclaimed last Khan of Mongolia, the Baron played an important role in deciding the twentieth century fate of Mongolia. Without the Baron’s interventions, antagonization, sheer violence, and hollow revelations, twentieth century might never have matured in the way it did.

Worshiped by many as a demon and by others as a living God, the Baron was born to a Baltic-Russian aristocratic family in Graz, Austria sometime in the mid-1880s. Adding to his tyrannical enigma, the Baron’s birthdate is difficult to pin down because of two reports that separate his birth by over a year. More puzzling is his last name, Sternberg, a traditional Jewish last name that means “star mounted,” especially when prefaced with Ungern, which means “unwilling.” Unwillingly star-mounted. Not a great fan of his own name, especially when taken into account with his anti-Semitism, the Baron would later have his name translated as “Great Star Mountain” during his reign in Mongolia.

His sadistic tendencies, which would later show up in the ways he punished his enemies and those around him, were seldom reported while the Baron was a child. He grew up during a trying time in Eastern Europe but had a more privileged childhood than most. The Baron claimed his lineage could be traced all the way back to Attila the Hun and that his family had always been “warlike and given to mysticism and asceticism.” He was fond of detailing his family lineage and their carnage, including his great uncle Baron Wilhelm Ungern, who had been known as “brother of Satan” due to his alchemical inclinations and general insanity.

Various descriptions of the Baron only add to his intrigue. Some described him as tall, others as short; some said he had green eyes, others blue. He’s been depicted as a raving lunatic and as a pseudo-philosopher of history and esoteric concepts. One of the few existing pictures of him depicts him in a shiny Mongolian deel adorned with the Russian Order of St. George lapel. Perhaps the best description of him comes from Ferdinand Ossendowski’s  Beasts, Men and Gods as a man with “a small head on wide shoulders; blonde hair in disorder; a reddish bristling moustache; a skinny, exhausted face, like those on the old Byzantine icons. Then everything else faded from view save a big, protruding forehead overhanging steely sharp eyes. These eyes were fixed upon me like those of an animal from a cave.”

The Baron’s philosophy was also baffling. “I have spent all my life in war or in the study and learning of Buddhism,” he once said, when asked about his religious preference. Practicing what he deemed “Military Buddhism,” the Baron took it upon himself to kill or punish as many as he could to help speed up their Buddhist rebirths. His admiration for Buddhism grew with his disgust for the Bolshevik revolution happening in Russia. The Baron claimed that Military Buddhism protected the processes of humanity by steering it towards evolution; this as opposed to revolution, which only led humanity “to bestiality” and same sword different leader mentalities.

His path of carnage began after the Baron volunteered as a soldier in the Russo-Japanese War, a war fought entirely on the collapsing Chinese Empire. By the time he had arrived at the front, the war had all but dissipated, leaving the Baron to gain his first appreciation of the Central Asian landscape. He continued his military service after his first taste of Asia by serving as an officer in East Siberia. While in Siberia, he became obsessed with the nomadic culture of passing Mongolians. In 1913, he was transferred to a small Russian consulate in Khovd, a small western city in Mongolia. At the start of the First World War, he joined the Austrian Front. As the war concluded and the Boleshevik Revolution began, he backed the Romanovs and earned the “Mad Baron” moniker which would stick with him in various forms until his death.

Believing himself to be a reincarnation of Chinggis Khan, the Baron rode with a horde of renegade soldiers to Mongolia on October 1, 1920. His goal was to establish a pan-Asiatic state founded on Buddhism, or more appropriately, Military Buddhism. He made plans to free the Bogd Khan, the emperor of Mongolia who had been imprisoned by the Manchu.  After three days of drunken horsemen galloping the streets shooting, raping, pillaging, and killing indiscriminately, the Baron successfully sieged Ulaanbaatar in February of 1921. Two weeks later, he freed the Bodg Khan, and was given the high title darkhan khoshoi chin wang. He began promoting order and cleanliness in Urga, forcing the citizens to clean the town, thread lights along the streets from the newly built electricity plant, build bridges, and set up schools and hospitals. He also protected trade by publicly hanging Russian and Mongolians guilty of stealing from Chinese merchants.

The violent nature of the Baron bloomed during his short reign over the now semi-sovereign nation of Mongolia. A fan of alcohol himself, he savagely tortured any soldiers found drunk or hung over by forcing them to camp naked on frozen rivers. Everyone was a suspect to the baron, who favored lashings by stick until flesh separated from the bone. He pooled many of his torture methods from Buddhist concepts of hell, such as burning in fire pots. His collection of soldiers, a group of about six thousand composed mostly of Cossacks and Mongolians, would flee like mice when the Baron stumbled around his encampments looking for someone to discipline.

As his rule continued, the Baron grew increasingly eccentric, and took to riding around shirtless and growing out his beard. He surrounded himself with shamans and fortune tellers, and grew increasingly bold on the battlefield. There are eye witness accounts of him taking tea breaks and smoking cigarettes during the heat of battle. Other accounts see him galloping blindly into seas of bullets with little or no armor. People around him started to grow frightened of the Baron, especially as his close circle began to question his stability and vision. Meanwhile, D. Sukhbaatar, the future Mongolian revolutionary leader, was bringing his Bolshevik-backed forces from Russian to Mongolia.

Several fights ensued in the summer of 1921, eventually leaving the Baron to retreat towards Tuva to prepare for an escape to Tibet. His soldiers—outnumbered, outgunned and frightened by their leader—mutinied and planned to kill the Baron and his inner circle. Days later, after an unsuccessful assassination attempt, the Baron was captured by a Soviet detachment. En route to his trial in Moscow, The Times reported in September 13, 1921 that the Baron was being publicly exhibited as a monster. He denied all charges levied against him, defending himself to the end by saying that all those who died because of him died because they were “too red.”  He was executed by a firing squad on September 15, 1921.

“My name is surrounded with such hate and fear that no one can judge what is the truth and what is false, what is history and what myth,” the Baron said in 1921. A special sort of crazy, the Baron lived according to his own truth but unfortunately for others, they too fell prey to his brutal madness. He was a sad man, filled with carnage, blood lust and burdens. “I am not a simply a man, I am a leader of great forces and have in my head so much care, sorrow and woes!” he once said to travel writer Ossendowski. While the change to Communism may very well had happened with or without the Baron, he played an important part in sparking the national grasp for Communism through his outlandish ideologies and wild abandon.  By inspiring fear in those who met him, the Baron created an opening and some would argue, necessity, for outside forces to swoop into Mongolia.