September 23 - China: Xi'an
Terracotta Warriors
Today we went to the Terracotta Warriors. They were absolutely amazing and I think I could have stayed there for days.
The Terracotta Warriors were built 2000 years ago for Qin Shihuang, who wanted the warriors to "guard" his tomb. After the construction was complete, roofs were built over each corridor of warriors and earth was used to cover them up and hide them from thieves. In 1974, part of a corridor was discovered by 4 farmers trying to dig a well. Can you imagine being one of these farmers? Or maybe the first archeologist called to the scene? He probably thought he was going to find a few pieces of pottery, but then unearthed the "greatest find of the 20th century". It truly is fantastic.
Our guide (who never told us his name) was a very energetic and smiley guy. He kept bouncing at the completion of each sentence, which was fine because we couldn't understand everything he was saying anyway. And most of it was the party-line crap - full of measurements and statistics - so what's the point?
Regardless, China has done a pretty good job of presenting the warriors in a tourist-friendly format. Huge museum-like buildings have been constructed over each of the 3 pits to provide us with quality vantage points at discreet distances. This was especially nice for us because today was extremely foggy and rainy, and we would have been devastated if they had been outside because we couldn't see very far through the fog. These buildings also allow for the archeologists to continue digging, which is still going on 30 years later. Indeed, many of the corridors have yet to be uncovered - although they do know what's inside.
First we went to a museum which houses two bronze carriage statues that were unearthed in 1980. They were crushed when their corridor roofs collapsed at some point, but archeologists painstakingly pieced them back together again and put them into large glass display cases. One was a chariot with a general and four horses, and the other was the Emperor's carriage and driver - also with four horses. Both were incredible in their detail. It's amazing to think of the time it would take to make these by hand.
The chariots were lovely, but we were anxious to see the real thing. So we went to Pit #1 - which is the largest and most extraordinary. This is the pit with 6000 standing warriors, and each seems to have a different face and expression. It's almost as if each was specially modeled after a specific person. But we'll never know because there is no ancient documentation about the warriors, only documentation about Qin Shihuang's tomb - probably to keep the warriors secret from would-be robbers.
The building around Pit #1 is as large as a football stadium with the same domed rooftop. On each of the four sides of the warrior pit was a walkway for the hundreds of tour groups that were there. So we could walk around the perimeter of the pit, looking down into the warrior corridors. The detail of these statues was incredible, and our guide whats-his-name told us it probably took 50 years to complete the entire army. We walked around to the other end of the pit, taking pictures regardless of the "No Pictures" sign because everyone else was snapping photos. And really - we came all the way around the world to see this. How can they expect us NOT to take pictures?
Then we went to Pit #2, which has the standing archers, middle archers, cavalry, and generals. This pit is obviously still a work-in-progress from an archeological perspective, because most of the corridors were still covered by their petrified wooden roofs. Bright single bulbs hung from the ceilings and there was a huge treadmill which took the dirt out of the building. However, no one was working today and whats-his-name told us that they work during the evenings when there are no tourist disruptions.
While there were many less statues to see in this pit, it was much smaller so the observation platforms were closer to the actual pits. We could see the damage that was done when the wooden roofs collapsed over 2000 years and water damage molded one warrior into the next. I have a great deal of respect for the archeologist who sift through this grain by grain. We could see faint colors on some of the statues, giving an idea of how brilliant they must have been.
Pit #3 is the smallest of the three, and is supposedly the "command post" for the army. There are generals and weapons and a chariot. All in all, it was quite incredible to see.
Archeologists believe that there are more warrior armies around Qin Shihuang's tomb, but it will take years and years to locate them.
Whats-his-name took us to the souvenir shop, where one of the original farmers was signing souvenir books. So some people of the group bought books about the warriors and had him sign them. Anne bought a replica of a warrior for her yard.
Our Quest for Lunch
When we got back to our hotel, the group had a "free sight-seeing day" and everyone went their separate ways. Jon and I were starving so we looked in Lonely Planet for a place to a few places to eat nearby. We found something a few blocks away and walked to where it appeared to be on the map. Unfortunately, we couldn't locate any of them, and assumed that they are probably no longer in business.
We did find the food market though, and walked through a long alleyway filled with meat, fish, crabs, snakes, squid, frogs, snails, slugs, and many other unrecognizable things. But we were the main attraction for the people there, and most everyone stopped and stared at us as we walked through.
We finally wandered into a random place for lunch a few blocks away from the market. This place had a cafeteria-like setup. We bought a "debit card" at the cashier, grabbed a tray, and walked along the counters pointing to dishes that looked interesting. Each time a dish was put on our tray, the person swiped our debit card through a card reader to reduce our balance. We got 3 dishes and 2 Sprites for 23 Yuan (around $3.00). The food wasn't bad, but I swear I can feel my arteries clogging from all this oil. I don't know why we don't see any obese Chinese. It must be the morning Thai Chi.
Gu Lou - The Drum Tower
After lunch, we walked across the Bell Tower traffic circle to Gu Lou - the Drum Tower. We bought tickets and climbed up the many steps, just ducking in when it began to rain a bit. The tower marks the beginning of the Muslim quarter of Xi'an, and has a furniture exhibit on the top floor. But it wasn't the furniture that amazed us, but the ceiling. The artwork on the lattices was amazing and had so many beautiful colors. We just walked around with our necks cricked backwards the entire time. We did walk around the outside of the tower, but it wasn't very high so the view wasn't spectacular.
Daqingzhen Si - The Great Mosque
We walked through an arched tunnel under the Drum Tower to get to the Muslim Quarter and followed the signs to the Great Mosque. We had to walk through a long narrow alleyway filled with vendors selling all sorts of great Chinese stuff: stamps, fans, Buddhas, chopsticks, Terracotta warriors, purses, and other nick-knacks to clutter our shelves. It seemed strange to us that China has Islamic culture this far east, but there seems to be a sort of "arc" of Islam that has spread from the Arab countries all the way to Indonesia and Australia. Regardless, this mosque was nothing like what we've seen in other countries. Daqingzhen Si is very Chinese, with many courtyards and Chinese architecture. Each time we left one courtyard, we entered another more beautiful one, and had to pass through at least 4 gardens before we got to the actual Mosque.
They had the evening Call To Prayer while we were there, and by the time we were got to the Mosque the prayer was just ending. As non-Muslims cannot enter the Mosque, we stood outside and watched the end of the prayer session. I must admit, it was nice to see this again. It's easy to get caught up in the events of the past week and to question the intent of a religion that spawns such horrific terrorism. But the men we saw today - these are men who are just expressing their devotion to a God they whole-heartedly believe in. They are religious and devout, but they are also quiet and peaceful. Osama bin Laden does not represent these people, and they should not be held responsible for his heinous ways. It's sad to read in the IHT that many Americans are giving grief to American Muslims. As if we've digressed back to the 1940s when we put German-Americans and Japanese-Americans into internment camps.
Sorry. My soapbox again.
The Mosque was beautiful and we were very glad we went there. On our way out, it began to rain heavily, so we used the opportunity to buy some gifts from a little man we met on the way to the Mosque. We liked the prices he gave us before, so we went back to him and bought some other little things. He had a little boy with him who was about 3 years old and he was so sweet. We went back to the hotel to nap for about an hour until it was time for dinner
Dinner in Muslim Quarter
Last night's dinner trauma did produce one good thing: when the group split up, Ken and Mel stumbled onto a great restaurant and they decided they would take us back there tonight. Although it was pouring rain, we set out for the walk to the Muslim Quarter. Most of the group had umbrellas, but Jon and I broke out the bright blue ponchos and we are quite happy with them. The restaurant had an English menu, but we ended up Ordering by Pointing anyway, which we seem to do very well. Ken and Mel spoke highly of the beef kebabs so Ken ordered an obscene amount of kebabs which we inhaled in record time. We also had a delicious Gung Bao Chicken and some fabulous vegetables. Jon and I decided that we would come back here to order take-out for our train ride tomorrow night.
When we left the restaurant it was still pouring rain. Some people went into the Mosque alleyway to buy some gifts, and Jon and I went into a bakery to get a loaf of bread for PB&J. We had to wait for the nice lady to slice it for us, but it didn't take very long and at least we were out of the rain. When we left the bakery and began to walk back to the hotel, Anne and Laurel passed by in a taxi cab. So we ran to catch up with them and hopped into the back seat with Laurel. Much better than walking in the rain!