Before I knew much about Mongolia, I assumed that they would speak Mandarin, as a remnant of China's history in Mongolia. But, also based on that history (The Qing Dynasty ruled Mongolia for over 200 years), Mongolians don't really like the Chinese much, and they don't speak Mandarin.
The official language of Mongolia is Mongolian! I know, it's hard to believe. Mongolian is a member of the Altaic language family (the most common Altaic language is Turkish). I have heard rumors that there are plans to change the written language from Cyrillic to Latin (again--they used the Latin alphabet very briefly in the 1940s), but I couldn't find anything official to support that.
Since Mongolians don't speak Mandarin, do they speak any other languages? It depends. Educated people do speak a second language. I found a very interesting conversation on LinkdIn about the prevalence of Russian versus English . This is completely anecdotal, based on the conversation's participants' experiences, but it seems like what language is spoken depends on the age of the speaker. Many people speak Russian as a second language, especially if they were educated (Mongolia was a socialist state with close ties to the Soviet Union for 70 years). But it is mostly the older generations who speak Russian. Younger generations are less interested in Russian and more interested in English (I have an acquaintance who taught English in Ulaan Baator). From all the official information I've read, English is never mentioned as a second language, but it seems like it is becoming more popular--the global language indeed.
Do you want to learn a basic greeting and how to introduce yourself in Mongolian? Of course you do! Luckily I have another handy YouTube video that tells you how:
Coming up next time, I'll talk about the religions of this former Socialist state.
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