Xi'an to Shanghai

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In Shanghai at the moment and I'm all walked out. We took a six hour walk through town today and then walked for about 2 hours after an hour break at the hotel. My feet are slightly achey.

Despite the complaints, it was a very nice last few days. I saw the terracotta warriors in Xi'an and they were pretty amazing. It was very crowded though, despite being the weekend. It was raining out and a bit cold, but it wasn't too bad. The first building was definately the best, even if it had the most people squashed into it. The second and third were interesting too, though, with their mid-way evacuations. The strangest thing was walking out on the pathways between the buildings and realizing you were treking over the hundreds of shattered warriors yet to be uncovered. There were people selling the little terracotta warriors everywhere. You had to walk past all these stores to get out of the area. The highest price asked for was 290 yuan for a box, but by the end they were shouting "1 yuan! 1 yuan whole box!" There were also furs being sold everywhere which was a little weird for me, coming out of the museums.

We headed out of the place and that afternoon I went to the bell tower and saw a performance. It was quite pretty. I also bought delicious tea and a tea mug that's clear so you can see the tea leaves unfold(made of plastic, mom, but at least it's the better kind. Also, the metal bottle makes it impossible to drink hot liquid). We went to the Mosque in the muslem quarter and it was beautiful. I got some amazing pictures in there, but I can't load anything up from this computer.

We went to a dinner that night at this place Dragon took us, and the waiter was very ernest. He kept serving out our food and showing us how to do things properly. It was pretty sweet, if a bit odd.

The following day we went to the Xi'an national museum on the public transit, which was pretty standard. The museum was much better than I expected and I wish we'd been able to stay longer. Dragon took us to lunch at this sort of chinese soup-sandwich place which had meat and veggies in a halved sesame wrap and this bowl of noodle soup with a trillion different things in it. It was really good, even if I couldn't eat everything.

Got more tea in the muslem quarter and bought a couple of the terracotta warriors. Then we boarded the train that afternoon/night.

This train was far superior than the last in that the beds were very clean and it was a smoother track. I slept wonderfully. Dinner was nice on the train, too. Negative was that sometime in the night the water ran out in the bathrooms, which led me to experiance the most disgusting bathroom enviroment I'd ever faced. I'm not going to tell you about it; I'm sure you can all use your imagination.

So, arrived in Shanghai around noon and ate a half-iced curry (it was gross). After we checked in at around 2, Dragon took us on a walk to this huge indoor market. I'd never fully grasped the meaning of 'wall of humanity' until I got there. It was actually like swimming through people at some points. We headed back to the hostel, blah blah, boring boring, dinner, and then went out to a pub. It was fun, we chatted and drank outside and everyone had fun. Went back extremely early in the morning and everyone else woke up with hangovers today.

Had pork buns this morning for brunch, and then went on another walking tour, beginning with a bus ride to a cathedral. It was big but not that fascinating. Anyway, very long walk from there to this Mai something tower, were we got an amazing view of the city. It was the first clear day in a long time, so it was wonderful. I met this nice Japanese couple up there also. Went down and walked the Bund back to the hotel. Hotel for a bit, saw this creepy twenty minute propaganda being-nice-to-everyone commercial before heading down to the Bund again for a boat tour down the river. That was cool. Went to dinner (I was starving) and then headed here to the internet cafe where everyone is smoking again. WHY?

Anyway, I'll talk again in Beijing. Will also later tell about the hilarious anti-smoking commercial I saw. Heehee... Bye all!

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Comments

[Chris]

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YOU went to a pub? WOW. Glad you're having fun, I miss you <3