| Mongolia | Week 3 2

GreetingsGreet the children with the Mongolian word for “Hello, or “San banool”; the correct for-mal response to this is “San San banool.” Or, say the more informal “Hi” used among close friends, “Sanool”; the response to this is “San Sanool.”

StoryLike kids everywhere, children in Mongolia enjoy good stories. The following Mongolian folk tale teaches the importance of having healthy relationships.

A mother had her five sons sit down next to her because they were arguing with one anoth-er. She gave each an arrow and told them to break it. The boys easily broke the arrows they were given.

The mother then gathered the five arrows and had each of the boys try to break the clus-ter. One by one they tried, but none could break it. The mother then said, “If you go sepa-rately, you will be defeated. But like the cluster of arrows, if you are together, you will not easily be defeated.”

Did you know that there is something similar to this story in the Bible?

Read Ecclesiastes 4:9–12 and ask the following questions of your stu-dents:

1. Explain some ways for how a second person can help another?2. How many cords does the Bible say are not easily broken?3. How can we be one of the “cords” for the missionaries?

VideoIf you have time, show a five-minute video (better for older youth) about the Grain of Wheat Student Center opened recently in Mongolia’s capital city, Ulaanbaatar. Download it from the Alliance Web site. http://www.cmalliance.org/video/play/354-door-of-hope

PrayerEncourage the children to pray for this student center. If you choose not to show the video, lead your class in prayer for some of the missionaries to Mongolia. Erik and Christina Wahlen and their children, Jack, Becca, and Ana are one such family. For their prayer requests, read their blog. http://www.reachmongolia.com

10min. Class

MONGOLIA

| Mongolia | Week 3 3

1hour Class

For this class, use the “Greetings,” “Folk Story,” and “Video” modules suggested for this week’s 10-min-ute class; add some, or all, of the additional activities listed below.

Mongolian Festivals (Photos)Teacher’s Note: Share with your students the following facts that are also captions to correspond with 15 photos for this week’s lesson. (Feel free to use the PowerPoint presentation or print the photos and mount them on cardstock.)

1. How many of you like holidays? Well, the Mongolian people have holidays too. One of the most important holidays is Tsaagan Sar. It is a three-day celebration, a type of New Year’s festival. Just like holidays everywhere, there is a lot of food.

2. During this festival, the people eat meat-filled dumplings called Buuz (bohz), roasted lamb, and salty milk tea. It is polite to visit the homes of friends and eat at least four to five Buuz at each home.

3. Airag is a specialty drink; it is fermented mare’s milk.

4. The centerpiece of the Tsaagan Sar feast is Boov.

5. Boov is a stack of fried bread covered with candy and cheese.

6. Because many Mongolians are herdsmen, they eat a lot of meat even when it’s not a holi-day.

7. Most of the people of Mongolia dress pretty much like you and I do. However, during festi-vals many people, both men and women, wear a traditional Mongolian outfit called a del. People living in the country may wear dels more often than those in the city, who wear them only on special occasions.

8. The Mongolian people who live in the country and herd animals use horses to help them with their work. Because of this, children learn to ride horses at a very young age.

9. By the time the children are six years old, they learn how to saddle a horse. Can you imag-ine saddling a horse at that age?

10. During the festival of Naadam, horse races are held to see whose horses are the fast-est and most skilled. Children ages 5–13 are chosen to race the horses, and they practice for months. These cross-country races are divided not by the children’s ages but by the ages of the horses and are between 10 and 17 miles long.

11. Similar to holidays in the United States that are based on Christianity, a number of Mon-golian holidays are based on Buddhist traditions. Across Mongolia you will see “ovoos,” heaps of rocks or wood with blue silk cloths tied on them.

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12. An ovoo is often found on the tops of mountains or hills and is used to worship the sky and mountains; Buddhists use them in their ceremonies too. They don’t know the God who made the mountains and sky, and that’s why we send missionaries to tell them about Him.

13. Do you remember the student center that we learned about in the video? Missionaries and Mongolian Christians are providing a place for students to meet and drink coffee and learn about Jesus.

14. The center has a room where the students can also go to study.

15. Plus, the center offers English language classes to build relationships with the students. This and a church service provide opportunities to tell the students about Jesus. Let’s re-member to pray that the missionaries will have many opportunities to tell the Mongolian people about Jesus.

SnacksHere’s a traditional Mongolian dish you may want to make for your students to sample.

Huushuur (fried meat pastries)(about 32 pastries)

You will want to make the pastries ahead of time and reheat them, if possible.

Filling ingredients (mix together into a firm paste)• 2 pounds ground beef (traditionally, mutton is used)• 3 ½ teaspoons salt• 1 onion, chopped• 2 cloves garlic, crushed

Pastry ingredients• 4 ½ cups flour• ½ teaspoon salt• Water to mix• Vegetable oil for frying

Directions:Mix the flour, salt, and water together and knead into a soft dough. Divide the dough into 32 small pieces and roll each into logs of about 1 inch in diameter. Cut the logs into 1½ inch lengths. Take each length of dough and squash it into a round circle. Roll it out until it is 3 to 4 inches wide and the dough is slightly flatter around the edges.

Put about 2 to 3 teaspoons of meat mixture onto one side of the dough round, leaving space around the edge. Fold the other side over, pinching the edge flat. Leave one corner of the dough round open and squeeze out the air, then seal the corner. Fold the corner over and pinch again; continue to work around the edge of the pastry, folding and pinching into a twist pattern.

Repeat the process with the rest of the filling and dough pieces.

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Heat enough vegetable oil in a wok or frying pan that is also large enough to deep-fry the pastries. Fry three or four pastries at a time for two minutes on each side until they are brown and the meat is cooked. Serve with tomato ketchup or soy sauce.

You can also check out this recipe for Buuz. http://www.mongolfood.info/en/recipes/buuz.html

Another recipe children may enjoy is Boortsog, which is more of a dessert pastry. http://www.mongolfood.info/en/recipes/boortsog.html

Word SearchUse the word-search puzzle provided for lesson three. Ask the children to find the words in the puzzle discussed today and in previous lessons. Have them tell you what they mean.

Prayer A creative option for prayer includes a cowboy hat and some music. You can find Mongolian music on Youtube. [Link: http://www.youtube.com ] or play some fun praise music. Have the stu-dents sit in a circle. Hand the cowboy hat to one of the kids to put on his or her head. Begin the music. As it plays, have the children pass the hat around the circle.

When the music stops, ask the child with the hat to pray a one sentence prayer for the missionaries or people of Mongolia. Continue until several children have prayed or you run out of time. You will find prayer request suggestions in the “Prayer” module for this week’s 10-minute lesson.