Xi'an
I will skip ahead about a week and write about Xi'an, which is where I am right now and from where I will be leaving at 3 pm today.
We arrived in Xi'an on Saturday after being on the train for thirty seven hours. The train bunks were small and the compartment crowded. Everyone had so much luggage that there was not enough room for the people. I slept in a tiny bunk with my backpack. My suitcase broke when we got off the train and I was forced to carry it about half a mile to the bus. My arms and legs are covered with bruises from where the suitcase knocked against them.
Xi'an is a very modern city and reminds me very much of Hong Kong. We arrived at the foreign student dormitory at the local teacher's university and were realieved to find that the dorms had elevators. The dorms are not really dorms but a four star hotel, complete with chandelier in the entrance way. I took a short nap and then went off with a small group to the Muslim district which is downton in the old city and where all the shopping takes place. The old city is enclosed by a wall and a moat. I could not get a picture of it though, so I have no proof. The muslim district was an ecclectic place and it was fun walking around and of course, shopping. Afterwards one of my classmates and I went to McDonalds where I had my first Big Mac in many weeks. I've been on Western and Russian food withdrawal this past week, the food here is great but I wish I had food from home.
Sunday we visited the Terracota army. It was a bit anticlamatic. It was big, and there were hundreds of terracota soldiers and it did make you wander about the emperor who had this built for his tomb. But that was all, the tomb itself is still not excavated and we were not able to get close enough to the soldiers to really examine them.
Monday we visited the Neolithic village of Bampo. It is dated to 6,000 B.C. and was extremely interesting. The actual excavated site was closed because they are building a building over it, but we did get to wander around the museum which had many of the artifcacts and see pictures of the site. Then we went to a rebuilt to scale model of the village and were able to enter the huts. Finally our teachers took us around back to the actual village site, which was covered with plastic and we could not see anything. But it was cool to stand on land where once stood one of the first civilizations in China. It made me want to go to Messopotamia really badly.
Later on in the day we visited the Provincial Museum which is a history Museum of the province. It had artifacts from a homo erectus scull to terracota soldiers which we were able to see up close. It was a relatively large museum and if not for the heat I would have wandered there much longer.
The temperature here has been around 100 degrees the entire time we've been here. It's also very humid so it is almost unbearable to be outside. But it's been fun to be in Xi'an, though I prefer Kunming.
Oh yes, I forgot something. Yesterday at lunch we had the best meal ever. It was at a lamb restaurant where we ate what is called a hot pot. Basically in the middle of each table is a stove and they bring out a pot of broth with spices and put it on the stove. The broth boils and they bring thin slices of raw mutton. We picked up the mutton with our chopsticks (with which I am very proficient now since I've been baptized by fire five weeks ago when I arrived) and dipped them into the boiling broth. It was delicious.
Now I'm off to check out of the hotel room.
We arrived in Xi'an on Saturday after being on the train for thirty seven hours. The train bunks were small and the compartment crowded. Everyone had so much luggage that there was not enough room for the people. I slept in a tiny bunk with my backpack. My suitcase broke when we got off the train and I was forced to carry it about half a mile to the bus. My arms and legs are covered with bruises from where the suitcase knocked against them.
Xi'an is a very modern city and reminds me very much of Hong Kong. We arrived at the foreign student dormitory at the local teacher's university and were realieved to find that the dorms had elevators. The dorms are not really dorms but a four star hotel, complete with chandelier in the entrance way. I took a short nap and then went off with a small group to the Muslim district which is downton in the old city and where all the shopping takes place. The old city is enclosed by a wall and a moat. I could not get a picture of it though, so I have no proof. The muslim district was an ecclectic place and it was fun walking around and of course, shopping. Afterwards one of my classmates and I went to McDonalds where I had my first Big Mac in many weeks. I've been on Western and Russian food withdrawal this past week, the food here is great but I wish I had food from home.
Sunday we visited the Terracota army. It was a bit anticlamatic. It was big, and there were hundreds of terracota soldiers and it did make you wander about the emperor who had this built for his tomb. But that was all, the tomb itself is still not excavated and we were not able to get close enough to the soldiers to really examine them.
Monday we visited the Neolithic village of Bampo. It is dated to 6,000 B.C. and was extremely interesting. The actual excavated site was closed because they are building a building over it, but we did get to wander around the museum which had many of the artifcacts and see pictures of the site. Then we went to a rebuilt to scale model of the village and were able to enter the huts. Finally our teachers took us around back to the actual village site, which was covered with plastic and we could not see anything. But it was cool to stand on land where once stood one of the first civilizations in China. It made me want to go to Messopotamia really badly.
Later on in the day we visited the Provincial Museum which is a history Museum of the province. It had artifacts from a homo erectus scull to terracota soldiers which we were able to see up close. It was a relatively large museum and if not for the heat I would have wandered there much longer.
The temperature here has been around 100 degrees the entire time we've been here. It's also very humid so it is almost unbearable to be outside. But it's been fun to be in Xi'an, though I prefer Kunming.
Oh yes, I forgot something. Yesterday at lunch we had the best meal ever. It was at a lamb restaurant where we ate what is called a hot pot. Basically in the middle of each table is a stove and they bring out a pot of broth with spices and put it on the stove. The broth boils and they bring thin slices of raw mutton. We picked up the mutton with our chopsticks (with which I am very proficient now since I've been baptized by fire five weeks ago when I arrived) and dipped them into the boiling broth. It was delicious.
Now I'm off to check out of the hotel room.