The Golden Abode

We're a bit overdue for a blog post, but I wanted to make sure we got all the photos we wanted for this post before writing. Though photos inside the temple are not allowed, we've walked around and photographed the outside multiple times, and we're hoping to negotiate an indoor photo session before the end of our trip. Ted plans to write a book about his research here, and it sure would be nice to have photos of the amazing interior of this building, including the giant gold Buddha statue. 

Elista is built in a sloping valley, so from most places in the city you can either see the temple on the horizon or nestled into the heart of the city from afar. It was constructed in 2005 as part of the post-Soviet Buddhist revival here in Kalmykia.

The Dalai Lama blessed the construction site in 2004 and gave the temple its official name - The Golden Abode. The Kalmyk word for temple is khurul [hoo-rool], which is the name this temple goes by around town. There is a smaller, earlier temple built on the outskirts of the city, which we will blog about at a later time, but this larger temple is much more accessible as we can get here on foot or by marshrutka.

"Site blessed by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama"

The temple grounds are pretty bare right now, as Spring has yet to bring the rose bushes and tulip bulbs out of dormancy. However, there are plenty of colorful prayer flags strung up to give a pop of color, in addition to the bright red prayer wheels and colorfully painted pagodas. 

As you approach the temple, you will see a wrought-iron fence built around the perimeter, topped with 108 miniature stupas [STOO-pa], containers for holy relics. 108 is a significant number in the Buddhist faith, and we have been told several stories about locals and their relatives who had some good fortune after visiting the temple 108 times, or praying 108 times, etc. 

The decorated stupas have relics inside of them.
The undecorated stupas are empty, and I assume they will be filled as more holy relics appear.

It's difficult to see, but there is a little Buddha statue inside the cavity framed in red. 

On each side of the perimeter fence there is a large, ornate gate, though only the front and back gates are kept open. As you can see in the photos, the fence and gates are always heavily strung with prayer flags flapping in the seemingly constant wind here. 

ceiling of gated entrance

The grounds of the khurul are meant to resemble a mandala, and the common practice is to walk clockwise around the perimeter, paying respects to the 17 Pandit statues (teachers of Buddhism) and turning the prayer wheels.

One of the seventeen Pandits

Looking out toward the city with the temple at my back

Every time we visit the temple, we see people bowing to the Pandits and spinning the prayer wheels. The temple is not just for show; it gets a lot of use and is treated as an everyday part of life by many. There is a little bell attached to the larger prayer wheels, which you can hear in the videos if you turn your volume up. 

Prayer wheel detail

The temple sits atop a 7 meter artificial hill. On the tier level with the temple, there are smaller prayer wheels. The temple sides face the four cardinal directions, with the main entrance facing the south. 

West-facing temple face with prayer wheels

Also on the temple grounds, and included in the Kalmyk version of Buddhism, is the White Elder statue. The White Elder is the traditional protector of the steppe and the Kalmyk people, from the time they were nomads. He is usually depicted with a steppe animal by his side - here it is the saiga, or steppe antelope, which looks like a very strange cross between an antelope and an elephant.

People leave offerings of bortsigi
(Kalmyk fried bread), fruit, and candy.

I am looking forward to spring/summer when the fountains are all flowing and the flowers have all bloomed. All of the photos for this post were taken on a few sunny days, but there have been plenty of cold, misty, windy visits to the temple as well as we travel to the temple about twice a week.

Until next time! Do svidanya!

A Feast for the Eyes

Despite the flat brown pallet of the surrounding steppe - or more likely because of it - Elista is a city bursting with color and pattern. Even if you transplanted a bunch of Americans here and everyone was speaking English, it would still feel foreign to me.

Over the past month, I have enjoyed exploring on foot and photographing the details of the architecture and infrastructure. Two things that are more prominent here than in America are (1) colorful buildings, inside and out; and (2) intricate patterns in everyday objects such as street lamps and sidewalk pavers.

While you may see an occasional American home painted in a funky color, many public and private buildings in Elista are painted in pretty pastels and even bold primary colors. I wish there were a more eloquent way to present this, but the rest of this post is basically going to be a long scroll through many photos of Kalmyk/Russian architecture. A feast for the eyes!

Smaller shops close to downtown

Even when the exterior is more subdued, the interiors can still be quite colorful and interesting.

The hallways of the university

White House: a popular spot to have a "business lunch"
(We have to make a joke about Trump every time we go there...)

Upstairs hallway in a local Kalmyk restaurant (I think there might be business offices on this hallway.)

Stairway detail, looking up

It's not always the colors but sometimes the textures and patterns that really strike me as I'm walking around - textures on the buildings and even on the ground. Many sidewalks are paved in a variety of shapes and colors, even sidewalks in mundane places like convenience stores and bus stops.

It's never boring walking around here, as long as I've got my camera. Ted might be getting tired of waiting for me to stop and take a photo 10-20 times whenever we're on our way somewhere, but if he is he hasn't complained!

Something that adds to the foreignness: There doesn't appear to be strict zoning,
so you'll see residential and commercial buildings intermixed, even close to the city center. 

When we return to the U.S., I plan to have several of these architectural photos printed in large format to hang in our house. There's an almost vintage feel to some of them, but this is modern day Elista!

Chess City

On a travel blog that I read before our trip, the city of Elista was described as a place where "two hours was an hour too long." There's not much to do here tourism-wise: a visit to the main temple, a quick loop around downtown, and maybe making the trek out to the deportation memorial.

On this roster of attractions, a (the?) highlight of any visit to Elista--whether short or long (read: one hour or two)--has to be Chess City. How to describe it? Imagine a shoddily-built condo complex placed in the middle of the steppe. Or, according to the Atlas Obscura entry, a "Russian City...Built for Chess Fanatics According to Alien Specifications."

The Museum-Restaurant-Chess Tournament Complex at Chess City

View of the condos - and the empty steppe beyond - from the Chess City complex

Another view of Chess City condos

There's a lot to unpack here. First, Chess City isn't a separate city; it is an enclave of Elista and includes, or has included: a hotel, residences, the Mongolian consulate (which was busier when Russians needed visas for Mongolia), and a museum-restaurant-chess tournament complex.

Inside the museum/event center

Second, it was built for the 1998 World Chess Championships, but wasn't completed on time (as I understand it). The top players were housed with local residents since the facility wasn't finished. (The construction of Chess City was itself controversial, as it occurred during Russia's post-Soviet economic low point in the mid- to late 1990s). It has hosted several major international tournaments since 1998, including the 2006 Women's World Chess Championships.

And third, the former head of Kalmykia (Kirsan Ilyumzhinov) indeed claims to have been abducted by aliens. He has also been the president of FIDE (the International Chess Federation) since 1995.

We visited Chess City during our first week here and spent a couple of hours there in total (we've needed at least four hours to see Elista's sights). Some of the highlights:

Marriage!

The car of a wedding party

Ignore me. This was a stealth picture of the wedding party photo shoot in the background -
the bride kept her powder blue down jacket on for all the photos.

The Wall of Champions:

The Chess Champions of Kalmykia

Chess sets given as gifts to Ilyumzhinov (this was a world leaders board with interesting geopolitical overtones):

King =  G.W. Bush; Queen = C. Rice; Bishop = A. Merkel; Knight = J. Chirac; Rook = J. Koizumi; Pawn = John Howard

King = V. Putin; Queen = B. Bhutto; Bishop = F. Castro; Knight = H. Chavez; Rook = M. Ahmadinejad; Pawn = M. Gaddafi. 

And clothing in the Kalmyk museum:

Menswear

The dress on the right is for a married woman, indicated by the belt.
Difficult to see, the dress on the left is for an unmarried woman,
indicated by the two tassels that hang to either side of the neck/torso and the lack of a belt. 

Book your plane tickets now!