About the project
Oirat is a non-commercial volunteer project: a directory and a bridge between Oirat-Kalmyk communities in different countries.
Why
Oirat-Kalmyks live in Kalmykia and other parts of Russia, in the US and Europe, in Mongolia and China (the Torghuts, Khoshuts and Ööld of Xinjiang and Qinghai). Russian-language Telegram, the English-speaking US diaspora and the Chinese- and Mongolian-speaking Oirats rarely meet. We want anyone from any of these worlds to find “their people” in a couple of minutes: a temple, a language school, a community association, a news channel.
What's here now
- Catalog: 104 hand-checked resources, with filters by type, region, topic and language.
- Four interface languages: Kalmyk (хальмг келн), Russian, Chinese (简体中文) and English.
What's next
- A short news feed from across the Oirat world, always linking to the source.
- A diaspora map: khuruls (temples), community centers, language schools.
- An events calendar: Tsagan Sar, Zul, Kalmyk Language Day, Kalmyk Day in New Jersey, the Eastward Return festival in Bayingol.
Principles
- Original sources only. We link; we don't republish other people's work.
- Neutrality. The catalog is a directory, not a stance. Listing a resource doesn't mean endorsing its content.
- Reader safety. We don't list resources whose links could create legal risk for readers in their countries.
- Privacy. No ads, no cookies, no Google Analytics or other trackers. Fonts and scripts are self-hosted, so the site works where Google services are blocked.
- Moderation. New resources appear only after a manual check.
Community editing
Wikipedia-style: every catalog card has Improve / Suggest edit. Submissions are reviewed by hand, then land in the catalog and the change history.
How to help
- Suggest a resource or edit or report a dead link.
- Help improve the Kalmyk or Chinese translation.
- Tell us about your community's resources, especially in Xinjiang, Mongolia, Europe and the US: WeChat, Douyin and Bilibili channels and local sites are nearly invisible to search engines.