Xi'an- Information overload!

Xi'ian has been wonderful but information overload. We have a private tour guide, George, and driver, Mr. Lee. George is a walking Chinese Encyclopedia and really wants us to learn. haha even when we are tired/exhausted bad students... for example day one after being up since 4 and travelling to Xi'an our tour began and by 5:00 we didn't care too much about the museum relics but he made us look and learn. Good teacher!

We began the day at the wall. Xi'an has a city wall and moat seperating the new and the old city. THe wall was built in 1370 and extends 13.74 km. IN the past there were 4 gates but now due to traffic there are 17 gates.

From there we had an amazing buffet lunch and drove to a Pagoda. Pagodas are those rectangular shaped buildings that are 5 7 or 13 stories tall. Most small ones are used to house a monk's cremations but this one was used to translate some buddhist teachings by the founder of Buddhism, Buddha Shakyamuni.(note Prince Siddhartha Guatama gets credit for founding Buddhism but the latter reached enlightment before)

Then we saw a Chinese history museum. With the evolution of all the Dynasty's starting right from broken pots in the Neolithic Martirarchal soceity. Finally we ended with a show of Dancing and drumming and opera like singing reminicent of the Tang Dynasty.

Day 2

We started at an excavated site of findings from a Bampo Village (Neolithic/Matriarchal). A village that exhisted 60000 years ago! We saw the outlines of their stationary tipis like houses and the pottery of the day.

THEN we saw the Terracotta WARRIORS. Asssahhh life dream number 376... ha ha really I don't know what number it was but it was a goal... and they were incredible. So the terracotta warriors number to about 8000. They were created 2200 years ago around 221 B.C. They are amazing life like soliders prolly about my height maybe a little shorter all individually designed to match either soliders of the time or the artists that created them. The generals of the group weighed an impressive 300 kg!!!They were created for the grave of the Chian (?) Dynasty's Emperor, to protect him and create an army for him in the after life. The masoleum (underground palace he was enthroned in took) 38 years and 720 000 men to build. All for one man!!! Can you imagine!!! No dust in the wind here Kansas.

That evening Roberta and I wandered around the city... saw some shopping streets and wound up on a cute coffee/bar street with weeping willow ligning the streets. THe kids enjoyed a massage and some pizza hut.

Day 3

We drove to see a Buddhist temple that held some of the ashes of Buddha Shakyamuni. THis is a huge deal to a lot of Buddha followers as it is considered a pilgrimage site. The underground temple was cool to see and the ashes were held in a little gold shrine. Roberta and I did comment though that it did not seem as huge of a pilgimage site we had imagined. I am speculating that this is possibly the nature the religion in that it is a personal quest for enlightmenet and I believe the buddhas and bodhisattavas are there to guide your journey vs being the 'be all end all' to heaven- like Jesus is.

After this we had a traditional lunch in the country side. It consisted of many plates of greasy vegetables, noodles, whole chicken soup. (Gabby we needed you here to eat the neck :) From here we made it to another masoleum of an emperor and empress together it was also undeground of a huge mountain. IT was nice but what was great about this whole day was being out in the country and seeing a little of CHina that did not consist of the city life.

There was a lot of agriculture. Corn and wheat (as well as fruit apples, pompegrantes (I closed my eyes due to clusterphobia), and persimmions). The people drive these large trucks with two wheels in the back and only one in the front. THen to make matters even more unstable they stack them so full that they stock makes the truck double in width! The houses were obviously poor by western standards but still quite large. THey were falling apart but they were made from brick so they seem decent compared to a lot of places in the world. I doubt any of the houses had plumbing and the roads weren't paved but it had a good feel to it.

Ok but that all i got.. I will be leaving to Meditate on a mountain for 16 days... so see you some time after that

XO