Xi’an

This past month, Kristen and I took a trip to Xi’an. Most people know Xi’an for the famous Terracotta Soldiers, but there is so much more to experience. In order to get there, we took an overnight train (our first in China), which was an experience in itself. Our “room” had 4 beds, and we were with 2 other girls… awkward! They were sisters from our city, the oldest of which was traveling to Xian to deliver her baby. They were great roommates – shared their snacks with us, went to bed early, and didn’t snore 🙂

Here is a picture of our bunk beds. You can see the legs of our "roommates" in the picture.

Here is a picture of our bunk beds. You can see our roommates’ legs in the picture.

Upon arrival we bargained with a man, thinking he was a cab driver, to take us to our hotel. He proceeded to take us to this van and we hopped in the back…

I was a bit worried :0

You would think after 1 year of studying a language, we would be able to bargain for a little better vehicle. Maybe that’s part of year two’s curriculum.

Everyday for breakfast we would stop and get one of Xian’s famous “rou jia mo” (literally meat sandwiched bun).

Our hotel was in a great location, just inside the city wall! Xian’s city wall is one of the oldest and most in-tact in all of China. It’s approximately 8 miles in circumference, and it’s popular to rent bikes and ride around it.

We were also within walking distance of the famous Hui Quarter, where approximately 50,000 Hui (a Chinese Muslim people group) have lived for almost 1,400 years. It’s famous for its ancient mosques, and delicious snacks.

Here’s the famous “snack street”

Oldest mosque in China, from around 700AD

From our hotel, we were a 10min walk to the bus station that took us to the surrounding areas. Terracotta Soldiers were one of the stops. For those who have never been, it is pretty incredible. Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China, ordered the construction of the army around 200 BCE. His intention was to have them buried with him, and protect him in the afterlife. Much of the army is still buried, and currently being excavated! Interesting side note, he is also the guy who began the building of the Great Wall. The dude loved him some protection 🙂

We also took a trip out to HuaShan, one of the five sacred mountains in China. Unfortunately, the day we went, the air quality/cloud cover was really bad, so the views were subpar. This is the view of the mountain from our bus…

At this point we thought about staying on the bus and heading back to the city, but we decided to climb it anyway. There are 5 total peaks you can climb, but we ended up climbing just one of them. It was rough. Basically vertical the entire time… two hours of nonstop stairs.