Darkan and Amarbayasgalant Khid

We took a trip north to Darkhan. This is a small city near the Russian border. It is on the trans-Mongolian and trans- Siberian rail line. The Russians founded the town in the 1960s. It was created to be a model urban cooperative of factory workers and miners. When the economy collapsed in the 1990s almost everyone lost their jobs. Now, there is a small coal min near by which employs the most people. Darkhan is also home to one of the tallest buildings in Mongolia at 16 floors.

We went to see the Amarbayasgalant Khid. This is considered one of the top three Buddhist monasteries in Mongolia. It is the most complete temples remaining. The Russians destroyed most of the temples and monasteries during the communist purges. When the communists came here in 1937 they only destroyed 10 of the 37 temples. Today 30 monks live here. Before 1937, more than 2000 monks lived here.

Amarbayasgalant Khid was built between 1727 and 1737 by the Manchu emperor Yongzheng. It is dedicated to the great Mongolian Buddhist, Zanabazar. His body was buried in the temple in 1779. This temple is Manchu style rather than Tibetan style.

To get to the temple we arranged a taxi at the bus station. Arranging taxi can be interesting because we need to work out all of the details with very little Mongolian language skills. We lucked out and met a woman who spoke English and arranged for her husband to drive us. First, we had to take her back to the maternity ward because she had just given birth. Why she was at the bus station with the newborn we don’t know. Then we had to stop by the taxi drivers home, pick up his son, some food and then his friend. His friend taught physics at the high school and spoke a little English. It was about a 150 km drive from Darkhan. It was fun. When we first got to the dirt road leading to Amarbayasgalant Khid we stopped at a yurt for mutton dumplings, airag and cheese. I am pretty sick of the cheese by now; I still had the stuff the taxi driver gave us in my pocket. When we hit the road, the driver let his son steer for a while. That was scary. It was a long bumpy road. We even drove through a river to get there.





This is where we stopped to get some cheese. The drivers son hopped out of the car. We werern't sure if we should get him, so we just watch to make sure he didn't get run over. It was okay.


Ellen and I at the temple.


Our taxi. Notice the mud from driving through the river.



the river road.



There were horses and sheep everywhere.



The road.


An ovoo on the way.


This was our road. It was beautiful.


The toilet at the temple.


The taxi drivers son. He was cute.


Inside the temple.



Outside the temple.


A view from the temple.


There were many young boys training to be monks.


Turning the prayer wheel.


Mongolian Buddhism is heavily influenced by Tibetan Buddhism. There were prayer wheels at all of the temples. When you turn them you release many prayers into the world.


A Buddha with the blue silk scarves.