I've been somewhat absent here, but I am justified. I've been away.
Two weekends ago we (Chunzi and I) took a journey north to the far-flung region of Inner Mongolia. It is one of China's Autonomous Regions, like Tibet in the southwest and Uighur in the west, for example. Obviously, it sits right against the border of (outer) Mongolia. It's known for the ever-expanding Gobi Desert and the prairies, or grasslands. It was the latter that we wanted to check out.
We flew into the city of Hailar (Hi lahr), which is actually just a district of the larger prefecture of Hulunbuir. Like the rest of China, by far the largest ethnic group (even way up there) is Han. The Mongols come in seco[...]