In school we only learn a little bit about the history of Mongolia. I remember that the only thing I knew was that Ghengis Khan took over almost all of Asia and some of eastern Europe back in the 13th century. Come to find out, Mongolians actually pronounce his name closer to "Chinggis Haan", and they still think he's great to this day. After the death of "Chinggis", the empire broke apart and the Mongolians eventually ended up where they are today - in between Russia and China, with Russia to the north and China to the south. They were under Chinese rule until 1921 when they won their independence with the help of the Soviets. Soon after, a Communist regime was installed and they held power until the early 1990's. In July of 1990, the first democratic general election took place and now Mongolia is a parliamentary republic with a president and multi-party system.

The population of Mongolia is a little under 3 million, and the capital city of Mongolia is Ulaanbaatar. When I went to Mongolia I heard that half the population of the whole country lived in the capital city, but that seems like an exaggeration. I did meet a lot of people though that were moving to the capital from the countryside, and I even talked to a government official that explained how much of a problem it was that so many people were trying to live in the capital.