Today is another lovely day – blue skies and sunshine. Our guide, Andrei, picks us up for our second day trip which involves an hour’s drive to see Ivolginsky Datsan which is the centre of Buddhism in Russia. This Lamestary is considerably bigger and more impressive than yesterday’s and is also still in the process of construction. The complex includes a number of beautifully decorated temples, a school and numerous log houses where the Lamas live with their families. Our tour must be made in a clockwise direction in accordance with Buddhist tradition. Afterwards we head for an Old Believers village for lunch and to look round the local church and museum. We get back to Ulan Ude about 4 pm and spend the rest of the afternoon wandering around the city. Ulan Ude is a pleasant if unremarkable city with the usual pedestrianised shopping precinct which seem to be common in Russian cities. After dinner at the homestay we try to get cash, but for some reason none of the ATMs will give us any, so we have only £2.50 to see us through the train trip to Ulan Baataar tomorrow – at least we have bought some provisions for the journey!
The Datsan’s temples are typically Buddhist with the tiered roofs with rising corners and are brightly decorated in vivid colours. Inside the central temples the altar takes up the far wall and every available space is lined with 100’s of incarnations of Buddha’s in all shapes and sizes. At right angles to the altar are facing rows of seating for the Lamas. As we walk clockwise around the inside we must ensure that we are always facing the altar which involves walking backwards along the third wall. There are least four temples on the complex – two are in use, one is just finished and due to open in November and the main temple which is still under construction. In the central temple there is an amazingly intricate mandala made from coloured sand. The detail in the design is incredibly fine and had taken two months to create.
There are many prayer wheels of varying sizes in the grounds which everyone spins as they go by and.the bushes are covered in 100s of faded prayer flags. It is quite surprising how many houses there are in the complex – all the traditional log construction. The only brick built building is the school where students come to study for 12 years. At the end of our tour there are the inevitable souvenir stalls here selling Mongolian clothing and Buddhist trinkets.
The Old Believers village is full of brightly coloured log houses – unusual for Siberia where houses are grey weathered wood with only the fretwork around the windows painted – usually blue or green. We are shown round the small church and museum by the local priest The latter is very similar to the agricultural one in the Siberian village outside Yekaterinburg.
Old Believers are a sect of the Orthodox Church who fled to Siberia to escape persecution after the reformation of the Orthodox Church. They are comparable to the Amish in that they eschew all modern luxuries. We have lunch in a restaurant here, but as usual the message that there are two vegetarians in the group has not been communicated ahead. We are given what must be a spur of the moment substitute of very sweet rice pudding accompanied by a salad of tomatoes and cucumber followed by mashed potato – a strange combination!
Om mani padme hum