Xi'an, China
Trip Start
Aug 31, 2008
1
3
47
Trip End
Apr 30, 2009
Xi'an,
Shaanxi,
China
Sunday, September 14, 2008
We hopped in a van with some of British girls that stayed at Leo Hostel and were soon at the hostel which was situated right across from the South Gate of the old city walls. The girls from the hostel told us the walls were over 600 years old, dating from the early Ming dynasty. The hostel itself was about as traditionally Asian as we seen, much like Leo Hostel but much bigger. We had reserved a 4-bed dorm room (which was only a little over 50 RMB a night for both of us) but decided to upgrade to a private room again
Xian Gate
. The total cost for our room for four nights is 430 RMB, less than half the cost of Leo Hostel in Beijing.Naturally the first thing we did once we arrived in our rooms was to have a shower. Once we were clean, and said hello to the dog and cat, we ventured out on to the streets of Xi'an. We stayed within the old "walled" city and found our way to the Muslim Quarter. The streets were busy with activity and alive with the aroma of food and spice.
We also found a large park that had several amusement rides for kids. We were greeted by three very well dressed men that wanted to know where we were from. As soon as we said Canada, they asked about Norman Bathune (they pronounced Bay-Tune.) It seems as though most Chinese people have a fondness for Canadians because of that man. So far only one Chinese person has confessed to not like Americans, but he made sure that we knew how much he liked Canadians.
After a few hours of wandering, we got back to our room to catch up on some sleep. We noticed that the hostel was hosting a "BBQ candle-light party" that night and also that there were half priced drinks in the bar below from 19:00 to 21:00. We made sure we woke up in time to take advantage of both of these events.
We ordered duck breast (15 RMB) and some vegetable skewers (5 RMB), as well as a local draft called Hans (8 RMB)
Xian Hostel
. We were hesitant to order the Peking Duck while we were in Beijing, because it was rather pricy and I am rather picky, but it sure looked good when it arrived at my table. It was served with potatoe and a black peppercorn sauce and now I believe that I prefer duck to chicken...it was wonderful. The vegetable skewers also came with a delicious sauce and we ordered a 2nd one later.Shortly after dinner, we headed down to the bar to catch the Happy Hour pricing. Previously I had noticed on the menus that small (330 ml.) bottles of Tsingtao actually cost more than large (600 ml.) bottles. At some places it actually cost twice as much to get half the volume of the same brand of beer. I enquired why and was told that the smaller bottles were substantially stronger and tastier. We did not want to test this theory earlier, but at this bar they only served the small bottles and the happy hour pricing was great, two bottles for 10 RMB. We could immediately confirm that the small bottles were tastier and after we had two bottles each, we could confirm that they were also much stronger. We ended up having a 3rd each and then realized that this hostel provides its guests with a free draft per night. The local draft (Hans) is bottled by Tsingtao, but not nearly as good in my opinion.
The bar in the basement of the Shuyuan hostel is one of the nicest that we've seen attached to a hostel
Terracotta Soldiers
. It was decorated with Terra-cota soldiers that look pretty authentic and it attracted a high-end domestic crowd. The prices for bottle service seemed high, even for Canada, but apparently the locals were able to afford this, because that is pretty much all they used. The club was filled up with what must've been all the best looking women of Xi'an, so I guess the guys had to pay. It is too bad that the prices are rather high (except during happy hour) because there were not a lot of hostel patrons at this place.Lisa and I played pool and darts as we drank our beers, but we ended up going upstairs for some food before going to bed. I noticed a sign that says they provide a free beer or coffee for anybody that wants to burn them an audio CD from their iPod. Considering that I have access to thousands of albums, we will likely be taking advantage of this deal often. By 1AM, we were both a little tipsy and it was time for bed.
We awoke the next morning around 9 AM. We showered, grabbed the cameras, and headed straight for the streets of Xi'an again. Today the skies had cleared up, so we already knew from yesterday where we wanted to take some pictures and video. The architecture in Xi'an is quite traditionally Chinese, so we took pictures of many of the older buildings. There are two huge pagodas that dominate the busiest central street of Xi'an: the Bell Tower (which was used to mark the coming of dawn) and the Drum Tower (the alter-ego, used to mark nightfall).
We had heard about a particularly delicious soup that was available in the Muslim Quarter, so we went on a hunt to find it. Before we found it, we came across a few snacks. The peanuts here are better than any that I have had before. I am not sure what is different, perhaps they are deep-fried or something like that. I also found some dried kiwi, which I had only had a few times before because it was usually quite expensive. Not here; only 12 RMB for a huge bag (almost 1 KG I think).
By the time we found the soup, which is called Yangrou Paomo (a soup dish that involves crumbling a flat loaf of bread into a bowl and adding noodles, mutton and broth), we were actually quite full. Lisa and I ordered a single serving to share in a restaurant that only had a domestic crowd. We have used this strategy in the past with great success...the locals always flock to the best foods and this was not an exception. I tried eating it with chopsticks, but it was going to take too long so we broke out the spoon. Nobody really paid much attention to us (unusual in China) and we ate until neither of us could eat another bite. There was still a little bit left though; they serve quite large portions for a country with such skinny people.
We finished our meal and headed back to the hostel. By the time we found our way back, it was after 3PM. We had been walking for over 5 hours straight, so we decided to relax before happy hour was upon us again. This catches me up to where we are now. It is 18:30; 30 minutes until Happy Hour. We are going to try the hostel's own restaurant and I will continue this story again soon.
Sept 14, 2008
Lisa and I enjoyed happy hour and drank several half-priced Tsingtao's as we played darts. It was a slow night for foreigners in the bar, even though a lot of Chinese people showed up. After happy hour was over, we had a few more beers but turned in for a rather early night.
We had to wake up fairly early the next morning for our tour of the Terracotta soldiers outside of Xian. The cost of the tour was 160 RMB each and that included the 90 RMB entrance ticket to the terracotta museum, a free coffee and an English speaking tour guide. A lot of people from the hostel signed up for this tour; the tour bus was filled to capacity (around 10 people).
The first stop was the "terracotta factory" on our way to the Lishan Mountains, where the tomb was situated. This factory was little more than a tourist shop in reality, with a small workshop for show. The furniture was exquisite, but also extremely pricey. I found one piece that cost over $50,000 (350,000 RMB) and the average piece was thousands of dollars. I am curious how many people that are staying in cheap hostels (like this entire tour group was) actually purchase any pieces of fine furniture on their way to the museum, but I guess that there must've been at least one. A salesperson saw Lisa's interest in a piece and tried to negotiate a price. Considering that the starting price was over $1000 CDN, they really did not stand much of a chance.
We soon headed out of the tourist store and were back on the bus to the museum. Once we arrived we had to walk about 10 minutes to get at the park entrance. Much like the train stations, security was quite tight. We had to have our tickets checked at two separate points before we even entered the museum and then again a third time to get out.
The museum consists of four different buildings, but the first building was definitely the grandest of the exhibition. There were approximately 1,000 restored soldiers standing in formation with a few horses in between. Each of these soldiers is very unique, modeled after the army of Emperor Qin. The entire museum is really just the "first emperor's" tomb. He is known as the first emperor because he united the different provinces of China that had been warring for several hundred years before hand (although there were older united dynasties situation in the Xi'an area over 1000 years before him).
The tomb dates to around 200 BC and was discovered by a farmer digging a well in 1976. The actual farmer that made the discovery actually comes to the museum everyday, even now that he is over 80 years old. We were warned in advance that he is renowned for his grumpiness and that he would get very upset with anybody that took his picture. He would however sign his book if you purchased it for 120 RMB. We were told that he did not originally know how to write and was taught how to make a signature shortly making his discovery which brought him wide-spread fame.
Although 8000 terracotta soldiers have already been unearthed, there is still a lot left to discover. Only quite recently was the actual entrance to Emperor Qin's tomb discovered due to the availability of modern technology. However nobody has yet tried to excavate it because it is heavily booby trapped with poisonous darts and arrows. Unfortunately the tomb was raided in ancient times, so most of the soldiers' original weapons were stolen by Qin's generals for their own use. They also set fire and destroyed his tomb which has made the restoration and excavation a very tedious process. Apparently the Qin dynasty was not meant to be a long lasting one and was replaced by the Han dynasty shortly after Qin's death. I am sure that the destruction of this awesome tomb was not a good omen for the future of his dynasty.
I had learned about the uniqueness of the terracotta army before I had ever seen them, but I was really amazed at the level of detail put into replicating the models used for this army. The men were constructed in two main pieces (the body and the head) and then assembled after they were fired (to make the clay hard). The bodies consisted of two main types, those ready for battle and those in regular clothes. The bodies were done to such detail that even the fingernails and lines on the individual's hands were unique and to scale.
We were told that the heads were done to such exact standards that they constructed the nose, eyes, eyebrows, etc. separately and then mounted them to the head before they were hardened. The artist was required to sign their work and if it wasn't to the Emperor's standards, the artists were executed immediately. Even the horses were modeled after real horses in his army, so again each one was unique. Emperor Qin ruled for quite a long time and preparing his tomb involved around 700,000 people's labour over 40 years. It is reported that there are entire castles and rivers of mercury that are yet to be unearthed.
The first building we visited was the most awesome, but we were only given 30 minutes of free time to take pictures. There was not a lot of light though, so it wasn't very easy to get the pictures that I was looking for. The 30 minutes passed by before I even made a single round of the building, but I still managed to a few pictures that I liked. The soldiers were all painted vividly 2200 years ago, but alas the paint disappeared shortly after being unearthed. The Chinese were not aware of how to preserve these elements and were actually scared by what they saw.....this was considered a bad omen and they almost buried it right back up without telling anybody. Fortunately there are still thousands more soldiers that have not yet been unearthed and thus they retain all of the original colors of paint.
The second building was much smaller than the first, but was perhaps the most important from a historical perspective. It was not the general army/infantry, but just senior generals, four horses and a chariot (that was made of wood and therefore no longer with us). Since the second building was so small, we were only given 15 minutes of free time for photos, which was ample.
The third building was similar in size to the first, but since it was only recently opened, there was not many fully restored statues to look at. It was more of a work in progress and it was easy to appreciate why it took so long to reassemble such vast quantities when starting with such small pieces.
One thing that the third building had was glassed off examples that you could really get close to. It was here that I verified that the soldiers' life-lines (on their hands) were actually present and unique. Each of these glassed off displays was of a soldier of differing rank and our guide explained how you could tell them apart. The shoes they wore were one important sign; the higher ranking an officer was, the higher the toes of his shoes pointed. A high ranking officer was also most likely to have the roundest fingernails, as this was regarded as a sign of being vital and healthy. Besides the officers of different ranks, there were also archers in battle formation and a cavalry horseman. Again we were provided with 15 minutes of free time, which was ample.
The fourth building was simply a museum and it was very crowded with Chinese tour groups. It seemed quite anticlimactic compared to the first three buildings, but was for some reason, the most crowded building. It was around 2:30 PM by the time we had reached this point of the tour and by now everybody was quite hungry. After 15 minutes in this building we walked the 10 minutes back to our tour bus and left for a restaurant.
The restaurant we were taken to was huge, with a capacity that must've approached 1000, but we were the only people there. For 25 RMB/each we were provided with several Chinese dishes in a buffet style. Considering how hungry I was, this was a real bargain and I ate for about 30 minutes continuously before we left.
The last stop of the tour was to get dropped off at the Big Goose Pagoda, situated south of the old city walls. It was built around 700 years ago by some Buddhist monks. We walked around it and decided it wasn't worth paying to go in, but I did manage to get some pictures of it as well as a statue of the Chinese monk that built it. It was an easy ride home on a crowded Xi'an bus, which only cost 1 RMB/each. Shortly after we returned from this tour, we showered and napped so we would be ready for the upcoming "dumpling party" that the hostel put on every Friday.
The dumpling party started a little later than advertised (20:30 vs. 19:30) which gave us time to join up with the other people from the tour for some happy hour drinks. By the time the dumpling party started, everybody had already had a number of drinks, so we were all ready to eat. The party started with some quick instructions on how to make the dumplings and then we all joined in to make some. After several hundred were constructed, they were prepared and somehow they all got eaten. We had not yet had any dumpling in China but these pork and vegetarian dumplings were just great. I would've liked to have had some sour-cream with them, but that is not a common practice in China.
While we were waiting for the dumplings to be cooked, a Xi'an native started playing with some cards. I noticed the incredible dexterity that he had and soon after heard people gasping and applauding. We approached for a better look and were told he was the most famous magician in Xi'an. After watching a couple of his tricks, I can see why; they were spectacular and unbelievable. We ran for our video camera and managed to get a few of his tricks on tape; perhaps we can some of his trickery if reviewed in slow motion. I was surprised that he didn't ask for any money afterward because he really deserved some. We bought him a beer in the bar downstairs as a token of our gratitude.
The bar was way livelier on this Friday night then the previous nights. It was near capacity and there was some live entertainment from Korea. The entertainment was called "Beatbox" and was a guy that put on a beat with his voice. It was really cool and soon he was joined up by a Scotsman in a kilt and full uniform. He sort of rapped along with the Beatbox and it was an unusual and very entertaining site. Between the magic tricks, the free dumplings and the weird entertainment, we reckoned that this was one of the top hostels of the world. We stayed out partying in the bar with the other guests of the hostel well past the regular closing time; the staff was nice enough to keep the party going until it ended of natural causes.
The next day we woke up a little later than normal and it was easy to remember why. We ventured out to the local grocery store to pick up some water and supplies and then took it easy throughout most of the day. By night time though we were ready to venture out again and decided that we should see the Muslim Quarter at night, especially considering that they were celebrating Ramadan.
The streets of the Muslim Quarter were even more alive than when we had visited during daylight. We managed to walk our way through the crowded streets soaking in the smells and sounds that made this part of Xi'an unique. We were looking for some of the fresh flatbread that we eaten during one of our earlier trips, but it seems that it is more popular during the day. We did manage to get some more of those delicious peanuts though. This time we bought about 500 grams for 12 RMB which should last us a long time.
We sat down at one of the more popular restaurants and ordered 20 roasted beef skewers for 10 RMB. We also tried a couple types of local beers that we had not yet tried: a 500 ml bottle of Tsingtao draft (3%) and Red Wolf Hans (4%) which cost 10 RMB each. I cannot really overstate how delicious those skewers were but by the time we finished them it was nearly 23:00 and all the shops started to close. We decided to head back to the hostel for our free beer and went to bed shortly after that.
Today we woke up around 9 AM and prepared our bags for travel again. We had to check out of our room for noon, but that left us enough time to make it to McDonalds for a coffee (9 RMB) and to a food stall that we ate at previously. They sold fried eggs wrapped in a croissant for only 2 RMB each. These made for an absolutely delicious breakfast; I wish Toronto had similar foods available on the street. Two of these filled me up and Lisa could only eat one. We also made our way to a place that sold fruit drinks for 6 RMB and I tried the "Paw paw" fruit. It turned out to be Papaya I believe. Mine was good but Lisa's banana one was even better. They put a lot of fruit in these drinks and our diet really appreciated that (there was two full pears in one 500 ml drink that we got earlier).
Anyhow I am all caught up with our story again. We had to check out of our room for noon and now we are sitting in one of the comfortable open-roof lobbies of the hostel. Our train leaves at 20:20, but since today is the 2nd biggest holiday for the Chinese (the Moon Festival), we plan to get to the train station very early. We will be riding in the bottom bunks in a hard sleeper cart and the cost of the tickets was 195 RMB + 40 RMB commission each. We don't know how long this train ride is, but we heard it is between 15 and 19 hours which makes it the longest trip yet. Hopefully this time we will not be stuck with world-class snorers.
