When water was needed Kylai or one of the children would go to the ice pile, chunk off a few pieces and bring them in to melt. The Kazakh people of Western Mongolia are nomadic herders tending sheep, goats, horses and a few camels. Since the departure of the Russians in 1991 the Mongolians have been returning vigorously to their own customs and culture. It is a hard life and the Kazakh herders cannot afford to waste anything including time. From October to May Mongolia is cold, very cold.
Most people wear furs of one sort or another so there is a healthy market for good pelts.
Hunting for fur-bearing animals is a serious commercial activity for the Kazakh Mongolians and their strike hounds are eagles. They have been hunting with eagles for generations. The Western World was first exposed to hunting with birds, falconry, when the Crusaders invaded the Middle East in the Eleventh Century and with the travels of Marco Polo in the Thirteenth Century. Only females are taken as they are larger and more aggressive. The fledgling is tied to a rock or stump in a lonely place for a week or so visited once a day by the eagle master to feed and water her.