We arrived in X'ian today after an overnight train from Beijing. The train was much better than expected - filled with the common Chinese people but everything was pretty clean. The Chinese people stared at a girl in our group from Scotland (blonde hair, blue eyes) and even took pictures of and with her. Compared to being in Japan, we get a lot of curious looks, but no one has given us a hard time.
From the railway station to the hotel, we saw tents in the park areas of X'ian. Our guide told us that there were people sleeping in tents outside because they are afraid of the aftershocks of the earthquake and they live in poorly constructed buildings. There were seven aftershocks felt yesterday, and during the first quake, people in X'ian died when construction cranes dropped. Buildings cracked here even though this is about 600 km away from the epicenter.
We made our way on a bus to see the terracotta warriors. It is a huge complex with a beautiful musuem covering the excavation site. There were so many warriors, each one unique and modeled exactly after a warrior in the emperor's army 2,000 years ago. The site was discovered in 1974 when a Chinese farmer was trying to dig a well, and pulled up a terracotta head. They were very afraid and thought they had interfered with the god of the earth and so contacted the government, who began excavating the site.
It is incredible to see how many soldiers and horses are there - each one took a long time to create, and burn in a kiln and paint. It took 37 years to do this, his tomb started construction when he was 14! The emperor must have been crazy to do this - and his people were mad, because after he died, they burned the tombs and destroyed many of the soldiers. Archeologists are putting them back together piece by piece. There is a lot of work left to be done, but it is amazing that they did all this 2,000 years ago. They even used chromium as a coating on their weapons to prevent corrosion, which the west only figured out worked in the 1930s.
We are off to eat more dumplings today and hear some Chinese music and see dancing! Tomorrow, it's off to Suzhou (like Venice) and then to Shanghai!
From the railway station to the hotel, we saw tents in the park areas of X'ian. Our guide told us that there were people sleeping in tents outside because they are afraid of the aftershocks of the earthquake and they live in poorly constructed buildings. There were seven aftershocks felt yesterday, and during the first quake, people in X'ian died when construction cranes dropped. Buildings cracked here even though this is about 600 km away from the epicenter.We made our way on a bus to see the terracotta warriors. It is a huge complex with a beautiful musuem covering the excavation site. There were so many warriors, each one unique and modeled exactly after a warrior in the emperor's army 2,000 years ago. The site was discovered in 1974 when a Chinese farmer was trying to dig a well, and pulled up a terracotta head. They were very afraid and thought they had interfered with the god of the earth and so contacted the government, who began excavating the site.
It is incredible to see how many soldiers and horses are there - each one took a long time to create, and burn in a kiln and paint. It took 37 years to do this, his tomb started construction when he was 14! The emperor must have been crazy to do this - and his people were mad, because after he died, they burned the tombs and destroyed many of the soldiers. Archeologists are putting them back together piece by piece. There is a lot of work left to be done, but it is amazing that they did all this 2,000 years ago. They even used chromium as a coating on their weapons to prevent corrosion, which the west only figured out worked in the 1930s.
We are off to eat more dumplings today and hear some Chinese music and see dancing! Tomorrow, it's off to Suzhou (like Venice) and then to Shanghai!
5 comments:
We sent you a post so hopefully you got it. Sounds like a great trip. Thanks for the blogs we enjoy hearing both your experiences and impressions. All is fine at home. We love and miss you. Mom and Dad
What a Great Adventure!
Sad to hear no great Peking Duck.
I love the blog and the photos and the LONG Great Wall.
Texting works great
love Mom
thanks for the updates! where do i see pics??
Dear Summer & Brennan,
Love the blog and look forward to the next update. The packing tip was great, I always take too much! Have a safe and wonderful adventure!
Love,
Aunt Gina
thanks for all of your comments. great to hear from you! we are having a great time in thailand and wish you could be here with us!
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