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Published: April 9th 2008
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They're all so serious...
I asked them to smile. Apparently they weren't in a good mood that day. Xi'An is known as the root of Chinese culture. If you picture a map of China, you are supposed to picture the trunk of the "tree" around Beijing. Then, the roots extend out to Xi'An and a few other older cities. The branches, leaves, etc are supposed to be represented by Guangzhou, Shanghai, and other cities throughout the nation. It's kind of hard to describe without a visual. But, what's important for now, is that you know that Xi'An is one of the roots because of how much history is found there and how far back it dates.
I experienced my first overnight train ride so that I could make it to Xi'An. We slept on the "hard sleeper" section, which to be honest, was soft enough for me to sleep. It's an interesting experience. You're in a room that is about 6 feet long by maybe 7 feet wide. By "room," I really mean that it is more of a cubby hole. It's a 3 walled area that is open to the 3 foot wide aisle. Did I mention that there are 6 beds in each compartment? 3 beds on each side stacked on top of eachother. The soft
sleeper trains have a door and it's more of a room/compartment, and they only have 4 beds in them. I'm not going to lie, I enjoyed the hard sleeper. It was pretty fun when you're with friends. The ride was about 12 hours one-way.
Many people do not realize that there is more to Xi'An other than the Terra Cotta Warriors. There are some fascinating places all around the city that were very cool to see. I would say that the Big Wild Goose Pagoda is one of my favorite buildings that I have seen in China so far. To be honest, I think that I am drawn to it because it does not look like everything else - it's not the traditional red and gold paint. The pagoda is a holy place for Buddhists. You can actually climb up all 7 floors - and we did. It was not too bad of a climb. Recently, they have built a huge, and beautiful, square in front of the temple. It has a light show at 8:00 every night (which we missed by 30 minutes), but it is still very cool to see during the day and at night. This
structure was built in 652, during the Tang Dynasty. It was used to house Buddhist materials, that were taken from India, and travelled through 100 different countries. Very cool.
I also enjoyed the Bell Tower. The tower stands in the middle of the city part of Xi'An. There is another nice square near by. Xi'An is a small city, but you still sort of get the big city-feel. What is weird, is that even though the Bell Tower is in the middle of the city, it's very relaxing to be sitting in the square around it. It takes you away from the city even though you're right in the heart of it (even with the round-about roads all around).
Another interesting thing about Xi'An is that there is a lot of Muslim influence. There are Muslim markets everywhere and we spent a lot of time on the Muslim market street. Essentially, it was a very long, narrow road of different items to bargain over that ended in a row of amazing food. Halfway down this market, you run into an entrance to a Muslim Mosque, which is another Xi'An attraction. Again, among the hustle and bustle, this time
Napping Outside the Goose Pagoda
I was tired...he looked friendly?? of the market, you find one of the most relaxing places ever. The mosque was probably one of the prettiest places that I have seen already, outside of the Summer Palace in Beijing. However, it is hard to judge the beauty of things when you see them at the end of the winter season. So, the newly blooming flowers could have had a huge influence on that, as it was nice to see nature for once. Regardless of how I rank it, it was very cool.
Also, as a side note to the entire Xi'An experience, everyone has a bird there. Before I came to China, I was always told that you will see people with birds everywhere. Being in Beijing, I have not seen that. I have a feeling that this is due in part to the fact that I'm in a major city and there are 18,000,000 people around. In Xi'An, it seems as though everybody has one. As for another observation, once again, the people were incredibly nice. Everytime that we got into a cab, we were greeted with cheerful smiles and cab drivers that would not stop talking to us because we spoke Chinese. They
wanted to tell us every good place to go and learn everything about us within the 10-15 minute cab ride. At the end of one cab ride, the guy wouldn't even let us pay because he liked us so much. Outside of this, my friends and I asked directions from 2 different people at 2 completely different times. Both of the people we asked immediately stopped what they were doing and walked us to our location. Even though they explained where we were going and we told them we understood, they wanted to make sure that we got there. We asked the one why people are so nice and willing to walk us places. He responded with, "People here like to help eachother out...and it's not often we see white people that speak Chinese as well as you all." So, granted, the Chinese thing was probably an incentive, but regardless, it was nice of them.
I assume that you have all been anxiously reading through my ramblings for news on the Terra Cotta Warriors. Well, here you go: They are amazing. To be honest, every location in China says it's, "Been called the 8th wonder of the world!" or
Some of the CIEE Group
CIEE students in front of the Bell Tower. "One of the most beautiful places in the world" or something to those extents when you're not really looking at much. However, the Terra Cotta Soldiers are that cool, so I will let them call them that. They were discovered in 1974 when some Chinese peasants were digging in their well and happened to be on top of the old Qin emperor's royal tomb. The Warriors date back to the Qin Dynasty around 211 BC. Over 8,000 soldiers, horses, chariots, weapons, etc have been unearthed. Right now, they are actually slowing down excavation for preservation purposes. You will notice that none of the soldiers have any color on them. However, in reality, when a piece is unearthed, it still has the paint on it from 211 BC!! But, because of the process of oxidation, all of the color disappears within 2 hours of the unearthing. So, new methods are being tested out right now to try to save the colors. They are only able to save the color yellow, as of right now, because that method only reacts appropriately with that color. It is pretty fascinating.
The warriors themselves are a sight to see. They are definitely one of
those things in life that you see and then stand there staring at them thinking about how old they are, what happened during that time period, and reflecting on every other thought that goes through your head and there are no words to describe it. I'm not going to lie, the area has become very touristy in some ways, but regardless, you still get the awestruck feeling. They are very cool.
Xi'An was a great city to visit. Everything there is awesome and the people are great. I hope you enjoy the pictures and if you ever make it to China, MAKE SURE that you make it to the root of China.
(Also, side note: Aunt Pat and Uncle Pete, THANK YOU for the package of Vermont Cheese. I don't get to eat cheese here, and as it is one of my favorite foods, I can't begin to tell you how much I enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I don't have a refridgerator here, so I ate it all over a course of 2 days. It was glorious and totally worth-it. I'm not sure if you got my instant message, so I figured you'd read this here.)
I hope
that every one is doing well! Talk to you soon!
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Tim
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Kentucky Fried Fan Dancing
I love how the "Fancing" is being done in front of a KFC. Their new slogan should be, "KFC, the true cultural melting pot".