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In Khovd aimag (Western Mongolia) an amazing woman lives. Her name is Agini Eezh. She is
a mother of many children, a widow. At first sight she is just an ordinary elderly Mongolian
woman, and it makes more striking what she did.
She is a daughter of a lama and strictly fulfilled all of her worldly feminine duties:
raised children, grandchildren. Yet at the same time, she apparently felt that these
were only a part of her life goals. Agini spoke very little about herself but
only briefly mentioned that she experienced an internal Calling to establish and construct
a temple complex Amgalaang uzezh Maudaryn Gegeeniy hiyd, dedicated to the Marching Maitreya
(the Buddha of the future). Work began on the temple more than twenty
years ago in one of the most beautiful places in Western Mongolia, almost on the shores
of the large freshwater lake Khara-Us Nur. Initially, there was a garbage dump here,
and Agini said that she knew that she had to turn this dump into a temple—not only
to clean the polluted natural environment, but to elevate it in another way.
The most striking thing is that Agini did a large part of the work herself. She worked
construction, cleaned up trash, planted trees, and despite not being an architect, drew the
design of the buildings; by some miracle, she also brought from Nepal 108 Kanjur volumes—the
first part of the famous Tibetan Buddhist canon. Many helped Agini—with both money
and work; they helped decorate the temple with statues and painted scrolls.
Here is the result of her twenty years of work: Even grounds, paved with pebbles and
light slabs. On the dais—a central temple, dedicated to Maitreya. In one of the buildings,
there is a cleverly executed sculpture of a horse harnessed to a carriage, carrying
the sacred stone of Chintamani. On holy days, the carriage is taken out the temple.
There is a separate temple to the Green Tara, and a small altar in a tent dedicated to Genghis
Khan; Agini burns juniper in front of his sculpture daily. Pilgrims come here to
receive a powerful spiritual charge not only from the sacred texts and sculptures, but
from the founder herself. According to Agini, there are a few things which remain
to be done: to dig a pond from which water can be taken and which will beautify the temple
complex; sculptures of dragons will stand at its corners…
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