Xi'an & the Terracotta Army

Bell Tower
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With four days in China under our belt, we were off on the overnight train to Xi’an. Quite the experience as there were six to a cabin, but the carriage itself was newer and it ended up being very fun. Eventually, we had all 13 of us in our carriage for some beers and chatter. Funny thing was that two Chinese men planted themselves in the chairs outside our cabin – we thought that they just wanted some entertainment, but at the end of the night Scott found out that one of the guys actually thought one of the bunks was his. He was supposed to be next door. They were very nice however and took photos for us. The train trip is where the toilet ranking system came into play. Our group now ranks the toilets in all public locations so that we aren’t thrown off when we enter. Let us just say that the train ranks as a 1 on a 1 to 5 scale. Scott has a new appreciation of the ladies in the group now knowing what we have to deal with when using the squat toilets.

Terracotta warriors
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After checking into our hotel, we had the day to ourselves and chose to bike around on top the old city wall. It was quite fun even though the entire city inside of the walls is newer and there wasn’t much history remaining. After our ride, a few of us went to have our first hotpot experience – a must do in the Sichuan province. It’s basically a big family style fondue pot with spicy oil on one side and a mild broth on the other. The most interesting thing about our lunch was that we somehow ordered a blue chicken. When you order a chicken you order it whole – so it comes chopped into pieces and you get it all, the head, the feet – nothing goes to waste. We hadn’t heard of the blue chicken and thought it was just bad. Turns out that in China, this is the best chicken. Oh well.

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Our next morning, we headed off with our local guide, Julie, to see the Terracotta Army. We were surprised to find here that the tourism and commercialism of the site was so grand. The site was only found 30 or so years ago, but was certainly built up for tourism. There are 7,000 or so figures in the tomb that Qing built in 200 B.C. to protect him after he died and was entombed. It was said that he killed the 720,000+ workers that helped to build it along the way so that the secrets could be kept hidden. One surprise was that we learned that the soldiers were originally painted but none of the paint was remaining. Many questions passed through our mind during our visit about the authenticity of it and we came to find that others in our group also are skeptical. Some of the questions were how some looked to new; why wasn’t any of the paint remaining? The timing of the discovery was also interesting in that it was found just a few years before China opened its doors to others. The warriors are also very large – much larger than the Chinese people. They say that this change is due to evolution of the people over these 2,000 years. We will have to do some research to find out if there is any independent scientific evidence to support their authenticity.

View of the main street in town - Drum Tower in the distance
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We also strolled through the Muslim quarter where there are hundreds of small alley stores that seem to go on forever and to the Great Mosque (the largest in China) which was quite lovely. Our little treat for the day was a pomegranate which are grown in the area for only 1.5 Yuan (21 cents) – what a deal.

Next on to Chengdu for the giant pandas!

Word of the day: Gan Bei (pronounced gan buy) – means cheers or bottoms up in Chinese