The Mongolians have taken New York City by storm. The Festival of Mongolia kicked off the weekend of May 19th and will officially run through July, with some exhibits open until late fall. Two years in the planning, the festival aims to cast a place and people best known for their fearless 13th-century ruler Genghis Khan in a warmer, friendlier light. Mongolian history, art and culture are dominating the city’s cultural calendar from Gobi Desert fossils at the Museum of Natural History to real-live snow leopards at the Bronx Zoo, and from a full-scale nomadic village in Central Park’s East Meadow to a political primer at Columbia University,

Aziz Rahman, one of the event’s organizers and president of the New York-based Indo-Mongolian Society, said that Americans have a "stilted view of people who came out of Asia," one tinged by images of "trauma and destruction." He says that Genghis Khan gets a bad rap in the West because of stereotypes passed on through pop culture, such as the Star Trek film "Wrath of Khan." In contrast, he says that Alexander the Great, another bloody conqueror, is more often associated with the West’s "benign" Hellenistic culture. To counteract such images, the festival is providing a wide palate of Mongolian offerings.

Park goers were treated to a traditional "Naadam" where Mongolian wrestlers, archers, singers, dancers and musicians performed on stage. On the East Side, the Metropolitan Museum of Art is showing "Riding Across Central Asia," a collection of Mongolian horse images from 12th-to-14th-century Iran. Across town, on the West Side, visitors can check out the "Fighting Dinosaurs" display at the Museum of Natural History, whose highlight, among historically significant fossils from the Gobi Desert, is the bones of two beasts locked in a death grip. In Central Park Zoo, Mongolian Wildlife Photography is on display, and uptown at the Bronx Zoo, the Wildlife Conservation Society is teaching about its efforts to preserve the snow leopard.

Though Mongolia may seem remote to most Westerners, some of its practices have cultural analogues. Palgi Gyamcho, who sits on the board of directors of the Mongol-American Cultural Association, points to the popularity of the organic farming movement in America.   He says that Western culture, which is steeped in materialism, is learning what the Mongols have long understood: "it is necessary to maintain a balance with the ecosystem." Next year will celebrate the United Nations "Year of Dialogue Among Civilizations." With this festival, Mongolia is getting off to a running start.

Bea Hogan, former Peace Corps Volunteer in Uzbekistan, recent graduate of the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University. Her writings appear in RFE/RL’s Weekly Magazine and the United Nations Chronicle.