Travel Guide Aginskoye ())

Situated some 150 km south-east of Chita and lost in the middle of the Transbaikalian steppes, between the Onona and Ingoda rivers, Aguinskoye is the centre of the Buryat National District, an agricultural region (cereal cultivation and livestock farming). This small town in the Far East (15,500 inhabitants, mostly Buryats), where log houses, Soviet remains and buildings with Mongolian influences live side by side, is particularly exotic, even disconcerting. It gives the impression of being in the middle of the desert, somewhere in Asia, but not really in Russia. Don't miss to visit the datsan Aginsky (about 6 km to the southwest), it is considered the oldest Buddhist monastery in Siberia. Here you can admire a work of art by Dashi Namdakov, a famous Bouriate sculptor exhibited all over the world (see box).