Rainy Days in Xi'an

We arrived by train from Beijing on Sept. 11th. We took what is called a hard sleeper where each compartment is two triple bunk beds. Tim and I had the middle. It wasn't too bad as most of the trip was spent sleeping. We arrived at about 7:30 am and after checking into the youth hostel we visited the Big Goose Pagoda. This is a temple where a famous monk returned from India to translate some of the Buddist Sutras into Mandarin from Sanskrit. In the evening we headed toward the muslim section of town to 'Snack Alley' to try some of the local food. Since it was Sept 11th, I was a little leary but it was fine. I am assuming that in the states the day passed without incident since I haven't heard about anything.

At the market, the food we bought was either very greasy or very spicey. Since I was still not satified, I broke down and got some KFC nuggets. KFC is really big in China. In Xi'an they just got their first McDonalds so they have 1 but they have 300 KFC restaurants. The population of this city is about 6.5 million.

Yesterday, on the 12th we went to see the Terra Cotta Warriors. They were buried about 2.5K away from the firt emporer's tomb. The first emporer took the throne at age 13 and united six of the provences in China under one state. So essentially, he was the first emporer about 2000 years ago. He seemed to have spent most of his reign fighting so it only made sense that he surround his tomb with his warriors. No two warriors have the same face. The site was discovered only in 1974 when some farmers were drilling a well. Although you can't tell from the pictures, each warrior was also originally painted in full color. The soldiers with upturned moustaches were Mongolian and the soldiers with straight or downward moustaches were Han (original Chineese). So far three pits are in the process of excavation. They are not yet complete and the work continues. Unfortunately, you can only walk around the outside of the pits, above them and the lighting is very dim. It is difficult to take pictures as flash is forbidden. Overall, I thought it was pretty cool but once again, I question whether it was the wisest use or the country's resources. If I recall correctly there were about 6,000 warriors, there were also horses and originally chariots but the chariots were made of wood and rotted away.

After the tour we returned to the hostel and checked into the service office to try to book our train ticket to Chengdu and maybe the Yangzi River ferry. Apparrently, the ferries are not travelling right now because the river is too high or flooded. Getting a train ticket from here is a major ordeal. All of the agents buy all of the tickets up so nobody can just buy a ticket from the station. Therefore you have to pay a commission. Last night the guy told us to come back in the morning since we want to leave on the 15th and he said it was too early to buy the ticket. This morning, there were different people there and they indicated that they didn't think it would be possible to get a ticket until the 16th. Luckily, a different girl at the hostel pointed us to the train booking office at the Bank of China office. They don't have anyone who speaks english so she wrote down what we wanted. We trucked over there but unfortunately, their computers were down and we were told to come back this afternoon. We are starting to figure out the system but it is definately a scam!

Today we will have a quiet day just trying to get a ticket and hang out. I have a cold and it has been misting here for two straight days. The temperature is about 68F. That's all for now.

Happy Birthday Jillian!! I love you!