Ulan Bator Wrestler Has Had No Match in Ten Years and Laces Up Anyway
At minus 18 on a Monday morning, Tsogt-Erdene Bold trains on a patch of packed snow behind his apartment block. The bus stop has become his audience.
Minus 18, 7:40 a.m., and Tsogt-Erdene Bold is lacing his boots on the bottom step behind the block. The laces are waxed. The leather shines like a conker.
He walks to a patch of snow packed hard by a winter of footsteps, bends his knees and slaps his thighs. Nobody is there to wrestle. He takes hold of the air at shoulder height and turns it over.
At the bus stop, five people in down coats watch. One woman has a thermos of milk tea and passes the lid along. The number 14 arrives, and two of them let it go.
He stops at eight, wipes the boots with his sleeve and nods at the snow. Someone claps. He nods back, as if the air had put up a fight.