Being a Woman in Mining - Part I

Something interesting happened to me the other day and it got me thinking.  A friend from home gave me a great compliment, and frankly I don’t know if I’m deserving of it.  I was telling her what it’s like being a woman here at site and how certain things tend to bother me at times. I was telling her that one of the biggest things that upset me is how the Mongolian women get treated by their own men and at times by the expats.  Sure I’m a woman working in a male dominated industry, and I’m the minority, and to a certain degree I’ve always felt that since I am part of the minority, I should conform to my environment, at least to a certain extent.  I’m a believer of ‘why should the majority have to change for one person, or a small group of people.’  This mentality is correct if the majority is in the right.  But if history has taught me anything, this is not always the case.  I’ve been asked by several female friends from home to write an entry on what it is like being a woman at site and for some advice. I have avoided this topic, because some of my true feelings on this matter have been kept to myself, and can be easily misinterpreted and are somewhat controversial.  I will write this entry in two parts; part one will be my thoughts and advice on being a female expat on an international assignment, and second part will be about the women of Mongolia and what I have learned from them. 

The compliment my friend gave me was, ‘Good for me and all the other ladies in the office that you're out there, paving the way.  It'll be tough on all of us, but hey, you're making it easier for the next woman that works with all the people you work with, and some woman made it easier (by some degree!) by coming before us.’  I don’t know if I’m paving the way for anyone; I don’t know if I am being a good example for mining woman at all and you can all judge if I am, after I explain my approach.  But I do agree with me friend on that there were woman who did this before me and they certainly deserve some if not all the credit.  No doubt in my mind, that women who worked at site twenty years ago had to go through a great deal more then what I have to go through, which is really very minimal in comparison.  When I finished school in 2006 and started working as an Engineer in the office; when I mentioned that I was interested in going to site, I had two opposite opinions from my senior co-workers, some of them were thrilled that a young engineer is willing to go to site and encouraged this, then there were the others that said I’d probably not be able to go, telling me it’s very rare for women to be sent to site. Really? Is it really that rare? Or is it that there simply has never been a great deal of women in the mining industry, so it is simply considered rare because we never had the numbers.  It’s probably a bit of both but I thank the females who came before me, for allowing me to be even given this opportunity. 

Now don’t get me wrong, this industry is not for the faint at heart. It’s mentally and physically demanding. The days are long, and the rotation are weeks/months apart.  If you are a soft person (meaning you like comfort), man or woman, maybe being a mining expat is not in the cards.  But for the women thinking of doing this line of work, there are a few things you should be aware of before you agree to take an assignment:

1. If you are a woman who is not prepared to turn in her high heels shoes and nice clothes for steel-toe boots and PPE,
2. Not prepared to overhear crude jokes without jokingly laughing them off,
3. Not prepared to be in the TRUE presence of men (meaning they don’t hold their tongue for the benefit of your ears)

Then you are probably not prepared to come to site.  If I can give advice to any woman thinking of coming to a CAMP site, especially international, make sure the three things I listed above do not bother you or you can at least live with them and to make sure you know your bottom line very clearly.  What I mean by ‘your bottom line,’ is make sure you know exactly when someone crosses your line of what is acceptable and what is not, make it clear when they went too far, and remember above all, to choose you battles wisely (and by the way, with some of the experiences I’ve gained here, the three things I listed above are not worth trying to correct, even if they hurt your feelings and you are in the right, don’t waste your breath, YOU don’t need to like it, but you will need to move on from them).  If you choose to come to site, and if you do choose to have these battles, then you will have few friends and if you can live with that decision, then good for you but at least be aware of this.  Just remember, no one wants to be around someone who makes everyone conform to their beliefs or worst yet, makes them walk on eggshells, this is not the attention you want to bring upon yourself when you are the new kid on the bloke.  But at the end of the day, the one making the decision is the one that has to live with it and only the individual can make those decisions.  If you are not sure what your line is, sit back for a while, don’t do or say anything to drastic, take in your new environment and it will be become clear to you.

The off jokes, the swearing, the demanding work environment, are some of the reasons I like working here.  I like working in an environment where I can say what I’m thinking and do not need to sugar coat it. I like it that I work with people that are ‘what you see is what you get,’ even if I don’t like what I see, at least I know what I’m going to get, there is honesty in that.  It has been brought to my attention that I have a worst trucker mouth then most of my male counterparts (this has been pointed out to me a couple times), which is the truth.  I know sarcasm can be the lowest form of humor but it’s still the humor I choose to use.  For the most part, I enjoy my new co-workers even if what they say or do, are things I don’t agree with at all times.  The ‘bottom line’ I have established for myself is somewhat grey.  Most of my closer friends here know it pretty well and once in a while they’ll cross it, mostly to get a rise out of me, and they succeed everytime. 

I hope people are not misinterpreting me and think I’m changing who I am to gain my co-workers respect. Honestly, changing who you are, will rarely gain you respect.  I’m merely compromising.  And you must compromise to fit into a formula that is already set or at least isolate the variables that can be changed.  Frankly, gaining peoples respect is not why I’m here; I’m here to learn, gain site experience and go home; this is my goal.  If I earn the respect of most of my co-workers then this is a bonus and something that can only help my career.  My end goal is what has helped me establish my bottom line.  What am I willing to let go or compromise to achieve what I came out here for; this is a question I encounter regularly.  I see this being no different than being in a relationship, what are you willing to accept about your spouse to remain happily married, cause your end goal is to remain happily married (well I hope it would be).  And just like everything, this goes both ways, I’m not the only one comprising.  Everyone has their deal breakers.  Personally, I would love it if men and women could work together as complete equals, without ridicule or judgment but let’s be realistic, we are not there yet. 

I’ll never know how the minds of men work, but through trial and error, I have learned what usually gets me the results I want.  When I was younger and played ice hockey on all boys’ teams, for many years, I was the only girl in the league; I stuck out like a sore thumb, just like I do here.  I learned that being a woman that gets along with men, will usually get me a lot further in achieving my goals then being a women trying to be a man.  It’s obvious I’m not a man, nor do I want to be one. I enjoy working with men, and when I was younger, I enjoyed playing hockey with them.  I didn’t want to be treated differently; I just wanted to be accepted as a teammate and a friend, as I do here. And if, I had to enter a fight to stick up for a teammate, then that is what I did, even though, I was guaranteed to lose the fight, since I had never won a fight in my entire life, but I would take a punch for them, as I expected they would for me.  And most of the time they did.  If you want to be accepted as an equal, you cannot allow anyone to give you ‘special’ treatment or anything that can be perceived as special treatment, if this happens, don’t accept it and take immediate action to correct it, it may help you in the short term but very rarely will it help you in the long term.  This is the approach I have taken here, and for the most part, it works for me, simply because this is essentially who I am.  In this industry or any industry that is primarily all men, having a woman on the team can change its dynamic.  This can be an opportunity to gain experience, knowledge and growth, in black and white terms instead of becoming the cancer that spreads a disease, be the cure.

Land of the Free

It’s been over seven months since I’ve moved to Mongolia. During this time, I’ve learned a great deal about the industry I work in, the country I’m living in and more importantly, I’ve learned a great deal about myself.  I’ve learn that I’m spoiled rotten, to put it in black and white terms, I am spoiled rotten simply because I was born in a first world country and until I moved here, I didn’t realize how privileged I am for it.  Basic rights, basic amenities I was given just because I was born.  Many people including myself think these are birthrights or entitlements and deep down I believe they should be basic human rights, but unfortunately for many people they are not entailed to these rights, these amenities.  Mongolia is a country like no other, on the surface you may think it’s a second/third world country like all the others, look a little deeper, you will see an ancient country that has been reborn and is beginning its infancy.

Someone once told me, the Gobi Desert is one of the most unforgiving places in the world, and after living here for seven months; I tend to agree with them.  The extreme weather changes, the dry climate and the fact that you can’t grow any food; makes the Gobi a very difficult place to live; yet people have found a way.  So you can understand my surprise to a fact that continues to blow my mind, is that people willfully chose to live here.  And for all of you, who are thinking these people are poor so they don’t have a choice, let me correct you and say they absolutely have a choice. Mongolia may be a poor country from a North America perspective, but the Mongolian people are free.  This is the freest country I’ve ever been too.  I am not defining Freedom, as the basic right to vote or the basic right to choice, both of which the Mongolian people have, what I’m talking about is much deeper than that. 

Some background information, Mongolia is a democracy, through peaceful protest via rallies and hunger strikes, the people of Mongolia established a democracy in Mongolia when the Mongolian People's Republic resigned in the nineties, this was done without bloodshed.  This peaceful revolution is why many believe the Mongolian people went back to their thousand-year-old traditions, and the rebirth of Genghis Khan as a National Hero. This may be the case, and it can certainly be argued, but from my personal belief is that after years and years of suppression from China then Russia, the Mongolian people are as loyal as ever to their country.  They are loyal because somehow a couple of the largest empires in the world have occupied them at some point in the last 100 years, yet they remain free, a democracy and their own country.  It wasn’t long ago that this country was under Russian control, less then 25 years ago, Mongolia was not free.  They had no god given rights that I take advantage of every single day of my life.  They did not know freedom, so I find it amazing watching a country in its infancy of freedom.  As the Russians left Mongolia and the Mongolian People's Republic rose to power, it was the countries youth that said ‘No,’ and they didn’t scream and start riots, they knew they were right, and when you are right, you don’t need to be violent, for a country that has seen so much violence throughout there history, choose to peacefully protest the suppression and through this protest began a voice which could not be silenced and by the mid nineties a democracy was created and a new constitution was written that protected the Mongolian peoples right to free speech, and freedom of religion. 

To go back to my original opinion that the Mongolian people are the freest in the world, I say this for several reasons.  At first, I wasn’t sure what to make of Mongolia and their people, there are certain things I’m not accustom too and probably never will be.  Mongolians are an extremely proud people and can easily be judge as arrogant, but again the longer I’ve been here, the less I see their pride as arrogance.  I’ve spoken to several locals about the history of their people and their country, and they are very humble in their expressions.  Many people were alive during the Russian control and they have not forgotten, they take their freedom in a literal sense, and express it daily.  For what can be interpreted as arrogance, is a form of expression.  Mongolians do what they want when they want, period.  And good luck to anyone who tries to get them to conform to the western ideals.

I’ve personally have not had problems working with the Mongolians but many of the expats here have.  The mentality is simply very different.  In general, the Mongolian people live everyday as if there is no tomorrow.  If they want to drink themselves into a coma because they are having a great time with their friends, it does not enter their thought process that they may have work the next day.  Everything is right now; tomorrow is a question mark.  This way of thinking is the biggest reason the expats and Mongolians clash.  What is perceived as irresponsible or lazy, is not what or how the Mongolians view it.  Us westerns are taught from a young age to conform to society, we are members of society and we must be good, hard working taxpayers.   I’ve heard the analogy that Westerners are chained to their desks, and to a certain degree, this is true.  Mongolians are living, walking contradictions to this analogy.  If you don’t believe me, go visit Ulaanbaatar and try to cross the street.  Just because the light is red, don’t think for a second that a car will stop; the driver will stop because they feel like it, not because the light is red and therefore most cars drive through red lights.  As I said, they take on the literal sense of the word freedom. The Mongolians come and go as they see fit.  They live where they want too, and if that is the Gobi Desert so be it!!!

I have a great deal of respect for Mongolia.  My time here has been hard but educational and very rewarding at times.  Going without hot water for weeks, going without good food for months and then learning there are people here who have never had a hot water shower in their entire life till they came to this project, simply puts me in my place.  I have met numerous people that live their entire childhood in a ger without electricity yet can work a computer better then me and speak multiple languages.   Mongolia is a country on the rise and it will be interesting to see where they are in twenty years J