Xi'an, China- 13th October 2008

Terracotta wariors - AMAZING!
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The train got into Xi’an at 6.20am. It was difficult to get up after a bad night’s sleep. The beds on Chinese trains are a lot narrower than Indian ones so it’s harder to sleep. After a sleep we went for a walk round and breakfast. In the afternoon we went to see the Terracotta Warriors. The sheer scale of it is remarkable, there are just so many warriors there and so many parts of the pits not yet excavated. We also saw the farmer that discovered them, he was signing copies of his book, he’s 81 and the only one of the farmers who found the site still alive. They found it when they dug a well but they were very lucky as the well is right at the edge of the main pit, if they’d have dug 5m the other direction I think they could have missed it. I loved seeing some of the warriors up close as they all have amazing facial expressions. You can also see some of the trenches as they were found, the warriors haven’t been put back together yet, it’s quite a feat because only 1 warrior was found complete, all the rest have had to be re-assembled.

This is the only complete Warrior found,all the rest were in pieces.
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Our second day in Xi’an we went with some of the group to watch the morning exercises in the park just outside the city wall. We paid 1 Yuan each (12 to the pound) to join in with the dancing. It was really quite fun and the Chinese people loved it that we were joining in. We also watched fan dancing, tai chi and sword dancing. After that we walked up onto the walls and hired bikes to cycle the 14km round the top of the city wall which is about 70m wide. It took us about 90 mins as we kept stopping. It was a bumpy ride due to the way the wall is made but it was a great way to see the city. In the afternoon we went up the Bell and Drum Towers which are located in the centre of the city. They house, unsurprisingly, bells and drums respectively! In the evening the whole group went out for Karaoke which is a bit of a strange experience in China. The building the karaoke is in looks like a hotel and has all these little rooms with numbers on the doors but each one is actually a karaoke room! It’s quite a good idea because it’s not quite so embarrassing when it’s just your group in the room, but it’s a bit weird too!

Morning fan dancers in the park
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On our last morning in Xi’an we went to the Muslim Quarter to go to the market there. I bought a pashmina and a bracelet and Mat got an “I love China” t-shirt...he looks like such a tourist now! Bargaining is such fun but hard work. The best thing to do is just walk away slowly if they won’t lower a price and that always makes them come down a bit. We also visited the mosque there which I really liked as it was tranquil and also it hadn’t been re-painted like the Forbidden City so looked old where as the Forbidden City looks so new. We had an interesting experience for lunch. We decided to be brave and went in a fairly local restaurant. All the food on the tables looked really good so we were looking forward to it. Most of the other’s weren’t hungry so everyone just ordered rice and drinks and I ordered a sweet & sour chicken to share with one of the girls. When it turned up it was horrible. It didn’t look like anything I’d describe as sweet and sour and all the meat was bony and horrible and it contained chicken’s feet! Lovely. Luckily it was only cheap so we paid and went to McDonalds (I know..I know we succumbed to McD’s but you really just have to sometimes!)