Terra Cotta Soldiers
Trip Start
Nov 13, 2008
1
6
14
Trip End
Dec 01, 2008
Xi'an,
Shaanxi,
China
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Well we wok up on the train and then off to find our way to the Terra Cotta Soldiers. Some guy was going to give us a ride to the site but we didn't feel very comfortable so we told him no. There are a lot of scams. We found a place to check our bags for the day and off to grab breakfast. Where you ask, Mcdonalds I swear I am eating more of that stuff than I care to. As we were eating we saw a white couple and we figured they were going to the same place and wanted to tag along. I went up to them and started talking to them and they were going to take a bus so we tagged along. They were Damien and PJ an Austrialian couple who were traveling before moving from Britian back to Austrialia.
The Terra Cotta soldiers were found when a local was digging a well back in 1974. The emperor either had the soldiers burried there to either keep him safe or to take with him in the after life before he died. There were 3 pits one is being worked on now but one is almost completely excuvated. These soldeirs are life size and were painted. We are talking about thousands of them. It was one of my favorite things that I have seen thus far! Oh some people there took pictures of Denise, she felt like Britney Spears :)
There were these guys selling some little soldiers there and of cours Frank bought some. I swear he buys stuff left and right. It is kinda addicting because they over you a price and you know you can get it down to almost nothing! I also bought a box, hard to say no.
As you exit there they make you pass by all these vendors and they are trying to all sell you pretty much the same stuff. This lady was selling bags and Denise's eyes lit up. She was wanting one like the one I got with wheels. She haggled and bought it. Oh and at this point we both had two boxes of statues and then I bought another big one for 5 yuan, after she started at like 50 yuan. Every time we turned around though Frank was off looking at stuff.
Back to the city by bus we went to grab some lunch with our new Austrialian friends. We found a local place and you could tell that these people hardly see any white people cause they were all staring at us. There was this one little boy who worked there who would just sit at a table near us and stare. He didn't care that we saw him looking he was just looking and smiling. Kinda erie but kinda funny too.
Damien and PJ had to go and catch their flight so we walked around some and then to get our bags and take a taxi to the airport. We made it and they did in fact have our tickets, of course Denise looked at Frank and told him he was welcome for getting us to Shanghai. We landed late and had to take a taxi to the hostel. We were going to take their high speed train called the Maglev but it quit running at 9.32pm. We will take it on the way back though. It goes over 250mph!
Our taxi driver finally found the hostel and we checked in. This hostel is more like a backpackers than any we have stayed at before. Lots of younger people hanging around the commons areas and the room is pretty nice, 3 beds, clean, oh and we got a shower curtain!!!!! Well that is it for now, trying to catch up with these but these computers are popular here and feel bad hogging them.
Until my next one!
Nathan
