In Memory of the Ancestors: the “Zulyn Ger” Opens in Kalmykia

The “Zulyn Ger” (“Lamp House”) has been erected in the Ketchenerovsky District, in the Amta-Burgusta tract, at the foot of the Bashmin Tolga kurgan, on the site where in the early 20th century the higher Buddhist spiritual academy Tsannid Chörä was located.

Residents of the Ketchenerovsky District, representatives of the Buddhist centers of Kalmykia, and natives of these places living outside the district took part in the opening of the religious structure. Relatives of the lamas and gelongs who served at the Chörä Khurul also came to the ceremonial event. One of them, Erdni Batnasunov, brought a portrait of his relative Samtn Khulkhachiev. “Samtn Khulkhachiev, known among the people as Samtn Emch, studied here, at the Chörä Khurul, and when the khurul was moved to the area of the village of Iki-Chonos, he stayed in Ketchenery, where he received people. According to the recollections of the older generation, he helped very many people, healing them of various illnesses. Sometimes he did not manage to see all the patients in a day, and then people stayed the night in order to reach him,” Erdni shared his family history.