Markets and the Drum Tower

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This morning, I was woken up by Avalon getting dressed. Yesterday Avalon and Bethany missed out on the opportunity to see the Terracotta Warriors because of kids getting lost and hopping on the wrong buses. So today they planned to go visit the Warriors early in the morning before most of the other tourists arrive. Faith and I went downstairs with Bethany and Avalon to have the buffet breakfast. After Avalon and Bethany started their journey towards the Warriors, Ken sent a text to the class groupchat saying he was going to try and find Xian’s Drum Tower and Bell Tower. Faith and I decided we would prefer to go and adventure around the city instead of spending the day cooped up in a hotel room.



It was just the three of us, Ken, Faith and myself. We walked for about 20 minutes through the hectic streets of Xian till we reached the cross section where the Bell tower stood. Lines of people were walking down into an underground passageway and, at closer inspection, we noticed it was one of the ways to reach the Drum Tower. You had to take several steps down and at the bottom was a large walkway with little police buggies that circled the corridors. We wandered around for a while till we reached an entrance that said ‘Drum Tower’.



When we actually found the temple we walked around it and peered up at it. Surrounding the tower were so many different alleyways of market stalls. I spotted the fluffy bunnies that most of my classmates have been trying to find for this whole trip. The man selling them asked too much and, unlike in Australia where there is only one confirmed price, in China you can almost always talk your way into getting a cheaper deal, which I did.



The alleyways with all the market stalls were really cool and fun to look at. I found some chopsticks that I didn’t even want and decided to see how much cheaper I could get it than its original price. It was originally 150 RMB ($30) and I kept saying no to the stallholder and went to walk away. I ended up lowering the price to 60 RMB ($12) but I didn’t buy it, which made her look slightly annoyed. It was probably the best place to buy gifts and most of the stalls sold the same kind of things but, occasionally, you would stumble across some new or interesting item. It was probably one of the most relaxed and entertaining days I’ve had yet.





Autumn Flint

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