Into the Middle Kingdom- Xi'an

I'm back home now in Tokyo, though time is still precious with settling back in, getting started up again with Japanese classes, and oh yeah our household goods were delivered while I was gone so there are still lots of boxes strewn around.  Never stops...being fun!


Our time in Xi'an was very impressive for many reasons, mostly because it was completely different from Beijing or Harbin.  Enjoy the pics and captions, and then stand by for the Shanghai chapter.

The world famous Terra Cotta Warriors museum, one of the eight modern man'made wonders of the world, I think.  This is  Pit #1, the largest one which everyone remembers, and also the only one I am publishing pics from,  There is also one other pit and another exhibit hall on the grounds.  What needs to be remembered here is that all those statues lined up were assembled by the Chinese, the original state they were found in were crumbled, which can be seen in the distance of the rows.

This is a good example of an excavation site in Pit 1, and yes that is a "no photo" sign below, though I did not see a camera pass by me without a photo being taken.  A true symbol of Chinese laws- plenty published, few if any enforced.

The outside back wall of Pit 2.  As I sat on the bench resting a bit I saw those faces recreated in the huge wall and I thought deep thoughts, such as: here is an ancient display of man's supreme vanity, and now comes the new China who builds another immense museum and park to showcase the find, an area of development of colossal proportions, displaying yet another example on top of the old one, of man's vanity to a new generation.

Too fun to pass up...a separate photo op room with replica statues and a widescreen backdrop.  Had to pay to take a photo...very Chinese of them.

After the sort of splendor of the Terra Cotta museum, our hired driver for the day took us to a real local joint for lunch, which turned out to be the highlight of the trip.  Definitely off the beaten path, tons of authentic food which cost a total of about $30 for all four of us to eat.

At another historical park, the hot springs area, where we had a chance to engage the PLA!  Actually, he was PLA but like a basic private on leave with his sweetie.  He didn't know nothin' about nothin', but my buddy Paul still tried to do his duty of sowing the seeds of discontent.

Another thing to do is to take a cable car tram to the top of this mountain, where there is a temple to see.  Of course, you have to pay to enter the park below, pay to ride the tram, then pay to enter the temple.  We opted out of the third one and enjoyed the horrible smoggy view instead.  Though, in defense of the city, a large part of this pollution is dust that gets blown in from the nearby plain.  Still, Xi'an is just plain pretty dirty.

Before showing the current inner city wall, here is a pic of the original Tang Dynasty city wall, which we found by chance in a deserted museum hall below the new wall.  Quite interesting, really.

Now, I love to see butchered English phrases in Asia as much as the next guy, but the truth is we just did not see too many in China.  So when I caught a glimpse of this gem, I just had to share.  The ticket window to the wall.

A decent enough shot of the city wall, rebuilt and indeed impressive.  They say it runs about 15 K all around.  Good enough for me.  What struck me, though, was how few people were up there.  Seems like an awesome place of locals to have a stroll or bike ride and stuff.  But only scattered foreigners like us, for the most part, that day.

On to the next attraction, the Moslem quarter.  A simple enough looking outdoor market but they were always able to draw us in to check out all the crazy crap.  Lots of Chinese people in Islamic garb, especially headdresses, but I did not feel like stealing their souls.

Here is the main prayer hall of the Great Mosque in Xi'an, and I will say it was a very impressive compound, distinctly Chinese, what they called the minaret looked more like a pagoda.  What was not distinctly Chinese, though, was how immaculate the bathrooms were, the best we saw in China, hands down.

Time to beat feet out of town, and it's a long story but we had to take a slow train out of there, running out of time to departure and this is the line we were faced with.  But along comes Jamey "Quick Goat Thinking" Isaacs who decided to play stupid foreigner and go talk rapid English to as many guards as possible until somebody let us cut way ahead in line.  Made the train on time, and then 22 hours later we arrived in Shanghai, and to a whole different side of China.