Baira talks about herself. I was born in Altsyn-Khuta, in the settlement of Tsegrg, where the famous Kalmyk poet Seryatir Badmaev was born. Other famous people from my clan are Muuta Garyaev, Lidzhi Inzhiev and many others. Now there are few people left there. When our elders were alive, they showed us the previous place of our village where villagers planted a tree. We gather there to worship that tree. My father was a teacher. He passionately loved his language and Kalmyk culture. For Kalmyk science he introduced the famous storyteller Sanzhi Butaev. My father brought him to Elista, helped him participate in TV programmes and festivals, and introduced him to the local scientific institute. Sanzhi Butaev was later studied by well-known Kalmyk scholars such as Nikolai Bitkeev, Erendzhen Bardaev and others. In the 1970s my father worked in the House of Culture where he often met singers, dancers and people who knew Kalmyk folklore. It’s there where he met Sanzhi Butaev. I went to secondary school in Ketchenery. After graduating from the Kalmyk Faculty at the Kalmyk State University, I did my post-graduate studies and the topic of my thesis was Kalmyk fairy tales. My supervisor was Andrei Vasilievich Badmaev. In 2006, in Maikop, I defended my Ph.D. and returned to Kalmykia to work at the Kalmyk Institute for Humanitarian Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences. There I continued to work on Kalmyk fairy tales. At that time Nina Goryaevna Ochirova was the director of the institute. She made it her priority to support talented young scholars. With her assistance, many young scholars received additional education in leading universities in Moscow and St. Petersburg. These measures contributed to our professional growth. When we were young our experienced colleagues, including E. Ovalov, N. Ubushaev, R. Dzhambinova, B. Okonov, helped us. This continues to this day, and they carry on helping us with their advice and knowledge. I grew up with my grandmother, Mikhailova Matsak Tyulumdzhievna. My grandmother was born when Kalmyks still lived a nomadic life. From her childhood she was accustomed to doing chores, cooking, looking after her family’s livestock and milking cows. Despite having problems with hearing, she sang and played musical instruments. My grandfather, Kheichiev Mikhail Badmaevich, was an educated man and he worked as a teacher. When the Kalmyks returned from Siberia, he was one of those who organized education in the Ketchenerovskiy rayon. We still keep his notebooks and his beautiful calligraphic handwriting.