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Published: December 31st 2007
The outside of the Mogao Caves
Despite the fact that the actual wall has been concreted and in a way Chineseified, the caves themselves make up for any worries you may have.Mogao Caves and Crescent Moon Lake
Unfortunately, whilst typing this blog, and getting halfway through it, I somehow managed to drop my LP on to the keyboard and in the process it deleted everything that I had written, and I hadn't saved it. So, even though I am frustrated beyond all measure I will try and re-create the masterpiece that it was.
Yesterday, I managed to hire a taxi driver to take me to the Mogao Cvaes and the Crescent Moon Lake at Mighsha Shan (Singing Sands Mountain) so I woke up early after getting a good night's sleep to find that there was no hot water for a shower, it wasn't that it was cold, its just that when you turned the hot tap on there was nothing, not even a dribble. This was after I specifically asked if there was hot water all day and had recevied a response in the affirmative: not good enough, I thought. So after boiling the kettle and refreshing myself in the bathroom sink I proceeded to pack my bag, thinking that after my day-trip I would find another hotel that did have hot water. Just before leaving the room I thought I
would check one last time and lo' and behold, hot water came pouring from the faucet! So, I left my pack and headed down to meet my driver, happy in the knowledge that there will be hot water waiting for me later on, hopefully.
We headed off at 9.30am and even though I had hired him for the day, just like Chineses buses, this did not stop him from scouring the sides of the streets asking if anyone needed a lift in the direction we where heading. This didn't bother me, I am used to it by now, and luckily for him there was someone. We eventually arrived at the Mogao Caves at 10am and I purchased my ticket and found that included in the price is an English speaking guide. While she was helpful in establishing the history and purpse of the place, her 'cave spiel', which she had obivoulsy learnt from the cave-spiel cue cards, was monotonous and her monotone-robot voice didn't drum up any more enthusiasm from me. However, the caves themselves easily did the job of inspiring and exciting you, they were amazing. Also, after being exposed to a fair amount of Buddhst art in
the last few weeks I had a small foundation of understanding, so I wasn't completely 'in the dark' (see what I did there? In the dark, in a cave...come on that's quality material!).
There are 492 caves and each tour takes you to only ten of them, and these ten are rotated fairly often however there are usually a few that are always included. While you see only ten caves, they are absolutely fantastic: it is amazing that they are so old, and despite its age and the primitive material used to build the statues and paint the walls, the detail and craftsmanship is beautiful. There are generally three caves that are always seen are caves sixteen, seventeen and ninety-six. Cave sixteen you inevtiably see as cave seventeen is located inside it and it is cave seventeen that you really come to see. Seventeen is known as the 'library cave', which was discovered in the wall of cave sixteen and inside this small cave was tens of thousands (about 50,000 according to the cue card) immaculately preserved Buddhist sutras, military reports, muscal scores, medical papers, Confucian and Taoist scripts, paintings and other rare documents in rare or extinct Central
Asian languages. Unfortuately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it, but I'll get to that) a few years after the discovery European adventurers paid the self-appointed guardian of the Grottoes Wang Yuanlu the sum of 220 pounds and hauled away around 20,000 of the documetns and stuffed them into Museums and libraries. However, if we take into the years of chaos that struck China later that century, who knows whether thes documents would have survived, although the fact that the cue-card told us that the Beijing Mueum has about 8,000 seems to indicate that they would have, but then again it wouldn't be the first time that China has bent the truth, who knows if there really are 8,000 still in the library?
The other cave that is always on the list to see is cave ninety-six which houses a 34m statue of Maitreya Buddha making it the world's third largest Buddha. Maitreya is known as the future Buddha, a Boddhisattva (enlightened body) who will appear on Earth, achieve complete elightenment and teach the pure Dharma, thus being a successor to the present Buddha, Sakyamuni. The Buddha was beautiful and amazing, considering its size the level of
detail is fantastic, as the robes (made of the rock face) actually look like silk, and it helps that the colours are still quite vibrant. The paints used were derived from expenzive minerals imported from Central Asia, such as cinnabar (red) malachite (green) and even lapis lazuli (blue). It is believed that the Maitreya Buddha Statue represented the Chinese Empress Wu Zetian, cnsidering it was quite hard for a woman to come to power and to hold it back then, apparently the Empress had leading Buddhist scholars re-write the scriptures with the Empress as Maitreya thus using Buddhism to consolidate her power.
After the caves my driver took us for lunch, which I paid for (how kind of me...) and then we headed back out to Mingsha Shan and the Crescent Moon Lake. As we approached I could see these massive mountains looming silhoutted in the distance and I thought to myself that I hadn't noticed them from the train. However as we got close it turned out that these mountains were in fact sand dunes, they were massive, way bigger than anything I expected. It was quite bizarre to step out onto the dunes, sand dunes in China
was hard for me to take having come from the East first but I guess I should expect more of this if I continue to head west. I managed to negotiate the price of a camel ride out to the actual Mighsha Shan to the price recommended by the LP, and my pretty little camel carried me there easily. When we arrived at Mingsha Shan I was told that I had to pay another 15yuan (after paying 60 to get in to the place) to go up to the top and then have a ride down the dune. However, I did not want to ride down the dune, I just wanted to go to the top and walk back down, but nooo you can't do this, you have to pay 15yuan to go up and then you have to ride down the dune like a fool. No thanks, I'll climb the dune next to it for free, hell one big sand pile is as good as another.
My pretty little camel took me back to where we started from and I headed over to the Crescent Moon Lake and as I approached I eyed off a dune next to
it thinking that I would get some good photos from the top. For the next ten minutes I struggled up the dune, for every two steps up the dune I slid back down one, and even in the freezing cold I began to sweat. Although, I must say that my suspicions were right as the view from the top was definitely worth it, but as I began snapping away to my horror my battery light began to flash! I made it down the dune in no time, sliding most of the way down and I wandered around the building next to the miraculous oasis. I took a few more photos before my batteries finally packed it in and I was done. I headed back to the taxi and we headed back into town, on the way back though I managed to secure him for tomorrow and will be going to a few sights; to whet your apetite I'll give a brief run-down. First is the Western Thousand Buddha Caves, which are similar to the Mogao Caves athough not as touristy: Yadan National Park & Jade Gate Pass, the national park is suppposedly an eery former lakebed that eroded in spectacular
fashion. The Jade Gate Pass was originally a miltary station and part of the Han Dynasty beacon towers, and for caravans travelling west the pass was the marker of the beginning of the northern route of the silk road, the southern route being marked by the South pass. Just when you think I have seen the end of it, I will also be visitng ruins of the Great Wall, yes it even came this far! So stay tuned as tomorrow is going to be jam-packed.
As for it being New Year's Eve, who knew! I completely forgot until I read an email from my folks! I don't think that I will get up to much, but I hope that everyne els has a good night adn I wish yopu all a Happy New Year and all the best for 2008!
Thanks for reading and for the messages and comments. I'm glad that people are enjoying following me on my journey.
Matt out
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Michael
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Happy new year chief! :) Congrats on entering the new year riding a camel, and becoming laurence of arabia! Hope you bought the camel to bring back for me because he/she looked pretty spiffy!