Sights in Southern Buryatiya & Chita
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Historical Museum
The Historical Museum charges per single-room floor. The best is Buddiyskoe Iskustvo (3rd floor), displaying thangka, Buddhas and icons salvaged from Buryatiya's monasteries before their Soviet destruction. Note-sheets in English fail to explain the fascinating, gaudy papier-mâché models of Khvashan's eight unruly sons urinating at one another.
Note the Gungarba shrine table (every Buryat home once had one), the Atsagat medical charts (Tibetan medicine was apparently standard here until the 1940s) and the walnut necklace on grey, clown-faced Sagan Obugen (walnuts were exotic in Buryatiya). The less-interesting 2nd floor traces Buryat history in maps, documents and artef…
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Ethnographic Museum
In a forest clearing 6km from central Ulan-Ude is the worthwhile Ethnographic Museum, an outdoor collection of local architecture plus some reconstructed burial mounds and the odd stone totem. Although lacking the pretty lakeside setting of equivalents in Bratsk and Irkutsk, it features occasional craft demonstrations, has a splendid wooden church and sports a whole strip of Old Believers’ homesteads. Marshrutka 8 from pl Sovetov passes within 1km and upon request will detour to drop you at the door for no extra charge.
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Datsans
En route to the Ethnographic Museum, you'll notice Ulan-Ude's attractive new pair of datsans backed by stupas and trees that flutter with prayer flags; there are services from 09:00 to 11:00 most mornings. The nearby hippodrome is the venue for major Buryat festivals, including the Buryatiya Folk Festival, which features horse riding, wrestling and other folky delights.
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Lenin Head
At one end of ul Lenina the main square, pl Sovetov, is awesomely dominated by the world's largest Lenin head, which looks less domineering than comically cross-eyed.
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Military Museum
The dry, Russian-language-only Military Museum is only for those with a passion for Eastern Siberia’s military history, though it does contain some semi-interesting exhibits on Beketov’s Cossacks, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and communist repressions. Each of the six floors bristles with weapons, and the museum’s collection of tanks and artillery can be seen by walking up the passage between the museum and the impressive Officers’ Club building next door.
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Museum
The delightfully eccentric museum retains its original 1922 hardwood exhibition cases full of pickled foetuses and pinned butterflies. Peruse musty displays of treasures salvaged from Soviet-plundered churches and datsany, bricks of tea, Buryat folk costumes and artwork brought back from trans-Asia expeditions by19th-century Russian gentlemen explorers.
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Butin Palace Museum
Butin’s four mammoth mirrors form the centrepiece of the Butin Palace Museum, along with a delightful pair of hobbit- style chairs crafted from polished tangles of birch roots. Three-quarters of the palace, including the grand, triple-arched gateway (demolished in 1970), have yet to be rebuilt.
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Wooden Houses
Chita also has a fair sprinkling of delightful old wooden houses, notably at ul Lenina 104, ul Chkalova 125, ul Babushkina 82 and ul Anokhina 53. Although the former historic centre is now mostly trampled by concrete towers, some timber cottages also remain on ul Dekabristov, southeast of the city centre.
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Buryatiya Literary Museum
In an attractive 1847 wooden house, the Buryatiya Literary Museum contains old photos and manuscripts. A rare 108-volume Atsagat Ganzhur (Buddhist chant book) is inscribed in multicoloured Tibetan script on special black lacquer made from blood, sugar and pounded sheep’s vertebrae.
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Kuznetzov Regional Museum
The excellent Kuznetzov Regional Museum is housed in an early-20th-century mansion. Beyond the gratuitous stuffed elk, you’ll find some pretty interesting local exhibits, including a very thorough examination of the heritage and architectural renaissance of the city and region.
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Opera House
A certain 19th-century opulence is still visible in the attractive commercial buildings on and around ul Lenina. Viewed from near the splendid Opera House, this street is given a photogenic focus by the gold-tipped spires of the 1785 Odigitria Cathedral.
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Odigitria Cathedral
The gold-tipped spires of the 1785 Odigitria Cathedral were rescued from near collapse in the late 1990s. It commands an appealing area of the old town, with carved wooden cottages extending as far as ul Kirova.
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Hippodrome
The hippodromeis the venue for major festivals including the Surkharban in early June, the biggest Buryat sporting event of the year featuring archery, wrestling and exhilarating feats of horsemanship.
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Voskreseniya Church
The recent- looking Voskreseniya Church is actually the city’s oldest, but was almost burnt to the ground in 1996. Some of the original 19th-century icons are displayed inside.
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Mosque
The eye-catching 1909 brick mosque has led certain Chita residents to declare rather absurdly that the area is some sort of ‘Siberian Jerusalem’.
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Lenin statue
That central square is also fairly imposing, dominated by a constipated-looking pink granite Lenin statue, surrounded in midwinter by ice sculptures.
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Trinity Church
Backed by a park with a Ferris wheel and Gaudi-esque fountain, the active Trinity Church sprouts a series of green bulb-domes.
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Art Museum
The Art Museum shows frequently changing exhibitions by school children and local artists, not always especially talented.
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Voskresensky Cathedral
The active 1825 Voskresensky Cathedral looks like an opera house from the outside; its interior is plain and whitewashed.
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Former Synagogue
Close to the Archangel Michael church, in an area the locals refer to as 'Siberian Jerusalem', is an impressive 1907 former synagogue.
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Archangel Michael Log Church
Hemmed in behind apartment blocks, the lovely 1771 Archangel Michael log church is an unexpected sight.
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Nature Museum
The Nature Museum has big stuffed animals and a scale model of Lake Baikal showing just how deep it is.
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Decembrist Museum
The small but interesting Decembrist Museum,has a posse of old-age pensioners as potential guides.
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