Book Review – I Golfed Through Mongolia by Andre Tolme
Website design By BotEap.comWhile walking through a bookstore recently, I saw a book with bright red lettering on the cover that looked like a postcard. The title said I Golfed Across Mongolia, and I was very intrigued by the book. Written by Andre Tolme, the book is 262 pages long and easy to read. It is divided into eighteen chapters with fairly long words and well-spaced lines on each page.
Website design By BotEap.comAndre Tolme was a typical, well-paid civil engineer living in New Hampshire with a keen interest in golf, which he tried to play every weekend. He also had a great interest in travel, having visited over fifty countries in his lifetime. After traveling to Mongolia and seeing how the landscape invited golf, he decided to do something crazy; he would quit his job for a year and try to play golf across the country of Mongolia.
Website design By BotEap.comMost golf fans wish they could play golf every day, but work and family usually don’t allow us to play as often. Tolme felt the same way and asked his boss for a leave of absence so he could go on his golf expedition. His boss kindly allowed him to take a break from work and return to work when the expedition was over if he so wished. Tolme went shopping where he bought the essentials, such as hiking shoes, approximately 500 golf balls, a sturdy tent and a GPS system, and set off for Mongolia.
Website design By BotEap.comOverall, the expedition would take approximately three months according to Tolme’s calculations and would cover more than 1,200 miles. He calculated that he could hit between 120 and 140 shots every day with just a 3-iron and walk 20 kilometers and reach his goal in 90 days. After a slow start, he began to meet his daily quota, sometimes even exceeding his expected number of shots and miles.
Website design By BotEap.comHowever, after a few days, he began to experience serious problems. The main problem was the huge blisters that formed on his feet. As you can imagine, walking 1,200 miles will have a negative effect on his feet. Tolme’s ampoules were so bad that he was forced to open them himself and salt them according to his friend’s instructions. His sore feet were a problem throughout the trip, but he dealt with the pain and kept going. In addition, he found that lifting his 40- to 60-pound pack 140 times a day was extremely tiring. His back began to ache so badly that he began to think of other ways that he could pass his backpack from one throw to another without lifting it himself.
Website design By BotEap.comTolme’s solution came in the form of a car. He had considered horses, camels, vehicles and other people, but his best solution was a small cart. Between shots, he would simply place his club on the cart and push it about 200 yards to where the ball stopped rolling. However, he almost immediately discovered that pushing the cart was even worse than continually lifting his heavy bag. The cart got caught in clumps of grass and was set at an awkward angle, making going up and down hills awkward. Therefore, he gave the car to a stranger in a different city and began to depend on humans.
Website design By BotEap.comAndre Tolme hired two caddies on his travels through Mongolia. He found local men through people he knew who were happy to use his jeeps to take him several hundred miles at a time. A man named Khatanbaatar was especially helpful. This local Mongolian man gave Andre tips on which direction he should hit his golf ball, served as a communicator for other Mongolians, helped him find food and water, and protected him when wind storms and ugly-looking locals hit. questionable. Tolme’s journey through Mongolia would have been nearly impossible were it not for the help of men like Khatanbaatar.
Website design By BotEap.comTolme finally meets his goal after 12,170 shots in a town called Khovd. When a man he met on his travels asked him how he felt and met him in Khovd, Tolme told him that he was simply “tired”. The trip has been physically and mentally taxing for Tolme and he was very happy to have done it. When asked why he even embarked on the journey in the first place, he said: “To raise awareness.” This is a very vague answer, but that’s how Tolme intended it. After completing his trip through Mongolia, he realized that he didn’t need a solid reason to start the trip. He knew that people now know where Mongolia is because of the publicity he provided, how decent people are from him, and that you can really learn a lot about the world and about yourself by completely changing the pace of life.
Website design By BotEap.comAlthough this book is simple and silly at times, it is a very entertaining story about a country and a people that many of us don’t understand. Mongolia is a country that has basic people who will offer you food and water even if they don’t have much themselves. The land is bare with periodic rivers and deserts and largely uninhabited. Tolme constantly tells his readers how a random Mongol would approach him or invite him into his tent and give him his best pieces of meat and water. The hospitality he received is refreshing and the perspective he received on humanity and how to get away from life from time to time is what I will remember most from reading I Golfed Across Mongolia. I rate this book 3.5 out of 5.