There’s a saying: “When life gets too safe and comfortable, put yourself in a one-liter engine car that’s wholly unfit to drive 10,000 miles, and then drive 10,000 miles across barren land and steamy deserts and through corrupt border patrol until you get to Mongolia.” Or maybe I got that from theadventurists.com, the organizers of Mongol Rally, an annual rat-race-like event from Europe to Mongolia whose mantra “If nothing goes wrong, then everything has gone wrong” has been inspiring thrill seekers from around the world for the past few years.
Glorified Suicidists, Lauren and Mike from Abandon the Cube
Veteran Shanghai laowais Mike and Lauren, whose travel blog Abandon the Cube documents their journey from Shanghai to America (Westward) by land as well as their many other adventures, have decided that the Mongol Rally is the perfect next step in their quest to get as far away from the cubicle as possible. Not only is the Mongol Rally going to be one of the wildest rides ever (quite literally), but it’s for charity, too! I wanted a few things clarified, so I sent Lauren and Mike some questions. Here’s what they had to say.
Ween: This is great. But how does it relate to the Shanghai World Expo 2010?
Abandon the Cube: It doesn’t, it’s simply a charity drive from London to Ulaanbataar where we donate the car to auction once we finally get it to Mongolia. The money goes to help folks in need, and we raise money for Mercy Corps – Mongolia in addition. I wish we had some feature at the Expo, but alas, we’ll be too dirty to even be presentable by the time we reach China. I am really looking forward to returning to Shanghai for a week or so in September to check out how much the city has changed since we left in May of 2009. Is it really a better city, with better life?
W: Why a car? Why not horses?
ATC: Mongolia seems to have a steady supply of horses already, what they don’t have are car manufacturing plants. We bring in cars so they can get from A to B without having to stop to feed the steed.
W: I won’t ask the most obvious question of “do you have a death wish?”, but do you have a high-possibility-of-death wish?
This could be Mike of ATC in the future. With Lauren (and possibly ayi) in the car offering moral support.
ATC: Ha. Although The Adventurists (the organization that created and administers the Mongol Rally) has a fun attitude about this adventure, they do claim it can be extremely dangerous. That said, we simply don’t agree. The joke will be on us, naturally, if we all end up dead mid way across the Steppe. We did have a bit of trouble in Kazakhstan last year with corrupt police but I’m hoping we won’t have a repeat of that this year.
W: Will your attire through the desert parts be at all inspired by the costumes of the Abu Dhabi scenes from the recently released Sex and the City 2 movie?
ATC: Although I’m sure your readers would much prefer to see us scantily clad (Mike does have sexy legs) I simply don’t think I could wear a push-up bra bouncing around for 10,000 miles in a tiny, un-air-conditioned car. Also, we haven’t yet seen Sex in the City 2, but we did see Robin Hood, and our attire might be more akin to the costumes in that by the time we reach Mongolia.
W: Will your ayi ride shotgun or will you make her sit in the back?
ATC: Excellent idea…and we do have an empty seat. Perhaps I’ll da dianhua her. I wonder what she’d charge to keep the car clean and cook us dinner over the fire each evening. We’d be the envy of the entire rally for sure.
W: If I give you money, will you put a picture of my face on the side of your car? If so, where do I go to donate to your death march?
This team must have done something right, since something went wrong.
ATC: We would love to have a giant Ween face on our car! That would be amazing and would probably help the auctioneer sell the car once we get it to Mongolia. You can donate via our website: www.abandonthecube.com – if you have specific requests in exchange for a donation just let us know and as long as they don’t include giant phalli painted on the hood or anything we’d be happy to comply.
W: If your car breaks down, but nobody sees it, who will you blame it on when the police finally get there?
ATC: Murphy. His law seems to be the rule of law when traveling. But, that’s part of the fun and luckily for us we have several rolls of duct tape that we’re hoping solve all of our car related problems. If not, we’ll be hooking the car up to a few camels for a slow, trans-continental haul.
W: Does Sherpa’s deliver to Mongolia?
ATC: Sadly, it doesn’t. And although we love visiting Mongolia, the last time we were there we dined on dog, donkey and goat yogurt (all of which are slightly beyond disgusting on the ‘taste’ continuum.) By the way, Sherpas is one of the most fascinating, amazing (and lazy) aspects of expat life in Shanghai…. And I miss it.
W: Besides “Living on a Prayer” by Bon Jovi, what will some of your other road-trip playlist songs be?
ATC: We did a blog about that a couple of months ago where we asked for song suggestions and folks sent in some pretty fun ideas. Ranging from “On the road again,” to “Did it My Way” and a few other good hits. I like “Living on a Prayer,” great idea! Maybe we’ll play that at the rally launch. Seems like a good (and accurate) anthem! Any other song ideas? We have 10,000 miles to cover after all, so the ol’ iPod will be tapped out by the end.
There you have it, folks. A true altruistic adventure if I ever heard one. If you have other important questions like mine, take a look at Abandon the Cube to learn more about the rally, the route, the preparations, how you can support their team (AND car-less Mongolian children), and read all the travel tips Mike and Lauren have collected for anyone wanting to travel to places to which people normally don’t want to travel. Stay tuned for news from the “road”.
[You can also email ATC: mike (at) abandonthecube.com or Lauren (at) abandonthecube.com.]
[All pictures taken from ATC.com or TheAdventurists.com.]
Related posts:
What about some Whitesnake? Here I go again on my oooowwnn!
You have to play “Slow Ride” as well.
Thanks for the song suggestions! I was also thinking about ‘Bat out of Hell’ meatloaf, and of course (uh duh!) Freebird.
Mongolian do not eat dogs nor donkey??? I never seen a donkey in Mongolia so not sure what do you mean? Please correct your facts. I do not think you ever been to Mongolia, perhaps you are mistaking something here.
Absolutely the best article written on this yet! Thanks for the support and we are looking forward to seeing you guys again soon. Whitesnake all the way! And @saruul, thanks for taking a stand on that issue as the article pertains to a rally for charity.