Days 23-24 Sunday – Monday November 29-30, 2009 Xi’an, China

Highlights

- Secrets hide within the Muslim quarter.  When in Xi'an, make sure to spend the time to get all Indiana Jones and find those treasures.  And FYI, a Mandarin translator will help.

- If you ride a rented bike around the city's wall, make sure you have the world's strongest quads and are as in-shape as an Olympic athlete.

- The Terracota Warriors tell a mystical story of Chinese history, but visiting them feels more like a field trip to the local museum than it does a trip to a mystical land.  Souvenirs anyone?

The long way home version

Xi’an was more of a pit stop along our Chinese journey than anything.  Mostly, people come here to see the Terracotta warriors and then move on.  Yet, since our tour guide Frank is from and lives here, we got to know it a little more intimately than most.

After a lunch in the Muslim quarter, which by the way was so damn good we want to go back just for the meal, we walked over to the main entrance of the city wall.  In the olden days, the Xi’an residents occupied the land within these walls, and not outside of the wall and moat.  Nowadays, the city has expanded far beyond the water perimeter. 

Frank dropped us off at the wall on the way to see his son Eric, aptly named after his favorite musician Eric Clapton, and his wife.  The 8 of us rented bikes and rode around the top of the 13.7km/6 mile square shaped wall.  Let’s just say that even though my beach cruiser in Venice was a one-speed and got tough to ride around mile 2 due to it’s less than optimal engineering, my beach cruiser made this bike seem like the smoothest ride in the world.  So combining the world’s toughest bike to ride with the world’s stoniest and roughest road to ride on, you had the world’s hardest 6 mile bike ride.  Yet, like most inconviences we’ve encountered on this trip, we fought through it and enjoyed the funny times with the group and the fine views of the city provided from this higher vantage point.

What better to do after such a grueling bike ride than to get a foot massage?  As the group dispersed to different shopping and eating directions, Tania and I headed straight for a foot massage place that we noticed on the way to the wall.  It was only $10 for a 88 minute massage, and dear Lordy, it was worth it.  Not only did they rub out all tensions in our feet, they also spent some quality time on our arms and back.  And all in a private room with lounge chairs that would make Mr. Lazy Boy realize his chairs were rubbish (a new favorite word of ours after traveling with Linda, an Ausie who’s lived in London for a few years).  Such a great cure for the sore lower limbs.

We went back to the Muslim Quarter and grabbed some delicious street food (pancakes, hamburgers, and bao, all extremely different than the American versions you’re picturing now) before meeting the group for another round of karaoke.  This time, everyone joined in the fun and we belted out tunes until our throats could no longer last, especially since half our group was quite sick by this point in the trip, led by the ill efforts of Ali, Susie’s older sister.

The next morning, we hopped into our private bus and made the hour drive over to the Terracotta Warriors.  We had already been exposed to them last year in Atlanta where we visited the traveling exhibit with Roxy, Patrick, and the kids.  Even with that knowledge, it was still a site to be seen.  Broken into three different buildings, the first is the primary digging site.  Most of the pictures you’ve seen of the warriors were taken in this building, which is primarily filled with infantrymen and horses.  It was filled with natural light, a mistake by the government because they started to dig before building the structure, meaning the statues were exposed to enough sunlight to deteriorate the original vibrant colors.  Therefore, the two subsequent buildings were build next door prior to digging, with the necessary sun-blocking exterior.  It felt much more like a museum in the latter two, which delved into the cavalry aspect of the army.

Overall, visiting the warriors is a must for visitors of China.  I will say though, that I’m a tad skeptical of the authenticity of the whole thing.  Considering that this is the country infamous for creating dead-on knock offs, which will tell any story necessary to sell a piece of memorabilia, I can’t quite grasp the romantic history of this attraction to the extent that they’re selling it.  Call me a skeptic, but the whole site felt overly formulated to truly feel historic.  Maybe since I was expecting a work-in-progress plot of land filled with desperately excavating archeologists, but instead visited a comfortable set of museums predictably organized with the most well preserved statues right up front for the herd to photograph, and with most of the construction being done on the visitor’s exit area so that more stores filled with the same souvenirs one can find under any street underpass or market can try to cipher as much money as possible from said tourists, it just didn’t click for me as much as I had hoped.  But like I said, it was a must to do, so I’m glad I have the obligatory pictures of Tania and me and the warriors so we can say we had been there.

We then jumped back on the bus and headed over to the airport to catch a flight to Chengdu.  After a 5 hour delay, we boarded the plane for a quick flight and a quicker bite provided by the airline, a hot dog wrapped in tin foil like a backyard BBQ, topped not with relish or ketchup, but instead with a pickle and mayo.  Let’s just say it wasn’t horrible.