Gandan (Гандан) Monastery or better Gandantegchinlen (Гандантэгчинлэн хийд) Monastery lies in Ulaanbaatar and has been rebuild during the past 30 years. „The Tibetan name translates to the "Great Place of Complete Joy". It currently has over 150 monks in residence. It features a 26.5-meter-high statue of Avalokiteśvara. It came under state protection in 1994.“ [1] Therefore I decided to split writing about Gandan Monastery in two parts – the first part is dedicated to the area of the medidation center and the morning ceremony and the second part is dedicated to the area, where one can look at the monumental statue of Avalokiteshvara.
The first temple of the monastery has been constructed in 1809 and if interested, check the Wikipedia article for more knowledge on the history of the buildings. Important aer the 1930ies, when quite a lot of the sacral building have been destroyed and 15,000 lamas had been killed (the number still is uncertain). After the fall of the Soviet Union and end of Marxist rule in Mongolia in 1990, worship was possible again, monasteries were rebuild the statue of Avalokiteshvara has been reconstructed, and the monks came back.
I was very surprised looking at the two monks blowing the shell as a call for the morning ceremony. I had watched this in Tikse (Thiksay) in Ladakh [2], which looked more colorful and impressive, but non the less it gave a touch of both sincerity and tradition to the Ulaanbaatar monastery. I could see the monks joking and bustling to the assembly hall, where they chanted sacred scripts, which are printed as in fomer times. I had seen this in Tibet at Narthang Monastery [3].
One observation: I've seen a lesser number of prayer wheels than in Tibet or Ladakh.
Links and Annotations:
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandantegchinlen_Monastery
[2] https://rheumatologe.blogspot.com/2020/07/a-morning-at-thiksay-gompa.html
[3] https://rheumatologe.blogspot.com/2018/08/narthang-monastery.html
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