Shelby H China 2010: Journal Day 5: June 11th

Journal Day 5: June 11^th

What did we do today?

v Woke up and got ready, downstairs for breakfast

v Took the bus to the site of the ancient Banpo Village (river valley village about 6,000 years old!)

v Went to the Terra Cotta Warrior making Factory

v Went to the Huaging Hot Springs (The former Tang Dynasty Palace)

o Favorite location for the locals

o We took the cable car up to the top of the mountain behind the springs

v Lunch

v Terra Cotta Warriors!!

o All 3 Pits and the museum

v Dinner: Hot Pot

v Big Wild Goose Pagoda at night adventure

v Hotel

Prompt: Compare Beijing and Xian (food, history, culture), describe the food, history, and culture, what was the most memorable?

Today was incredible! The Terra Cotta Warriors were beautiful. They looked so lifelike; the detailing on each one is intricate, and each warrior is uniquely different. Each one had different faces and different styles of uniforms. You could tell the higher ranking officers by height. You could also tell them apart by the way their hair is styled. The soldiers have one round ponytail, and the generals have one square ponytail. All of the ranking men in between them have different hair styles (one has two ponytails, etc). The First Pit had most of the Warriors in it. There were hundreds. I was amazed at how many soldiers are still being excavated. The entire middle section of Pit 1 was mostly covered in tarps; areas where archeologists are continuing to find new artifacts. There was a table where you could see a few archeologists restoring and identifying the objects (Unfortunately we couldn’t take pictures of the archeologists’ table L ). The Third Pit had more broken statues, and ancient building structures. The Second Pit was really dark, making it hard to see things. It had mostly the same as the Third Pit. I loved the Terra Cotta Warriors, and would love to spend more time there. This is definitely going be one of my greatest memories of Xian.

I actually liked the food a lot better in Xian than in Beijing. Initially, I completely expected the opposite. I thought, that since Xian is a more of a recent city (was more rural… the city is a lot more industrialized than I expected), the food was going to be ‘crazier’ (for a lack of a better word), but it wasn’t. I was really happy, since I was still getting used to the food there. The food wasn’t in too much sauce; which had been a problem for me in Beijing (if you don’t like the sauce and there’s a lot of it… not the best meal). There were also a lot of noodle dishes. We had the famous Xian noodle: a very long, wide noodle. One noodle is served on a plate; it was long enough for everyone at our table to try it (about 8 people). I am a lot happier with the food here.

The culture here is a lot different than in Beijing. I think it’s because Xian is a smaller city. There people here seem more connected. In Beijing, the people with blond hair in our group, myself included, got our pictures taken a lot with people on the street. They would just come up to us and ask to take a picture of us. I suppose they really have a fascination with blond hair. (We felt like rock stars in a land that’s foreign to us!) Well… in Xian people still came up to us to take pictures with our group, but it didn’t seem like as many were, as the amount in Beijing. Also since Xian was the ancient capital of China for some 6 Dynasties, there is more ancient history in Xian, than in Beijing; Beijing is mostly made of recent history. (The history of China seems to be either old or new… the middle history is really lost)