Xi'An, July 6-8

Ever since the famous terracotta warriors were unearthed, no tour group can bypass Xi'An. The city isn't quite as cramped with tourists as Hangzhou was, but the proportion of Westerners is so much higher, it makes it very obvious. After a gruelling 14hour train ride (which we involuntarily spent in the hard sleeper - a mistake I only discovered when boarding, it seems most people here assume you want hard sleeper and not soft sleeper, which is just a waste of money) we arrived to clear blue skies and scorching 38 degrees. We're staying in a really cute hostel, it's set in a traditional courtyard home, but equipped with all modernities such as wireless internet, a bar and a restaurant that serves Illy coffee :) The bar also shows the world cup which kept B. up till 4am (the games start at 2:30 Chinese time) - I was so bummed out after a day walking around the Muslim quarter and the city center, I didn't hear a thing. Thankfully I didn't make the effort to stay/get up just to watch Germany lose...

Things we saw:

Gao Jia Da Yuan - the former family residence of the Gao family, the highest ranking officials in Xi'An during the Ming. The buildings date from Ming and Qing dynasty and now house an artist's factory. There are painters, calligraphers and paper cutters and we got a really nice tour of the whole complex. Finally, I understand why there are so many round doors in traditional courtyard homes - square and rectangle represent yang (or male), whereas round and diamond shape represent yin (or female). According to Taoist belief (or Feng Shui as well), you always need your home to be well balanced. Also, these courtyard homes follow a typical layout - first, there is a reception courtyard - official male visitors may be invited into the first hall (mainly for representing), after the second court there is a hall for receiving female guest. Further inward are the living quarters, with the head of the family oriented towards the north (=up=head), the heir of the family following just south-west of there, the concubines live off to the side, the madam of the house sort of central. There is also a "bridal chamber," which really houses the daughter of the family from age 6 till marriage. That's where she learns to sow, maybe play an instrument or do calligraphy (if her father is not too Confucian and reserves those fine arts for men), servants bring her food and she almost never leaves. She lives there with a nanny, who is responsible for the most important beautification - the foot binding. Dear lord. The whole complex is quite well preserved (according to our guide, they survived the cultural revolution by simply shutting the door and being quiet - it was already an artists' residence, not a private home at that time) and a pleasant contrast to the usual over-the-top restored, fake colorful touristy stuff. They did talk us into buying some of their tea (we also got a tea ceremony there, but I had better before - it was really just a sales talk, and not the best one for that matter) - but we'll just consider it consensual mugging :)

The great Mosque - the first mosque I ever visited :) and really not the most representative. It's also set in a Chinese courtyard style, all the buildings look definitely Chinese, and the tower that serves as a minaret could well be a pagoda for a Buddhist temple. In traditional Chinese fashion you have to make your way through several courtyards and at the very end is the main building - the prayer hall. It can house up to 1,000 people, but is closed to tourists.

The City Wall - quite impressive, because it was restored on the full length, so you can walk or bike or hire a buggy to go around the whole city wall. Of course, the part inside the walls is not all of Xi'An, but unfortunately, it's not like historic Xi'An and modern Xi'An are separated by it. What's left of ancient Xi'An (Bell Tower, Drum Tower) is not much. But the walk on the city wall is really nice and they put on a quite spectacular drum performance. Also, it was hot, windy day and you couldn't help but feel like in a Lord of the Ring movie, on the walls of Helm's Deep :)

Temple of the Eight Immortals - that's an active Taoist temple, and I was quite keen on seeing it, because most temples in China seem to be Buddhist. Well, I was in for a surprise, because some of the deities I saw there were old familiars from the Buddhist temple in Nanjing. Our guide from the Gao residence explained to us, that in China Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism are really interwoven so much (since the Song dynasty, because one religion is better for the state, especially if you get to pick elements such as balance/harmony (from Taoism), and obedience to the state (from Confucianism)), you can't really tell them apart. Most Buddhist temples have some Taoist deities (in contrast to the other two big branches of Buddhism outside India - Tibetan and the one that developed in Yunnan/Laos/Vietnam). So, this temple was special in the sense of that the monks there have distinct clothing and you are only allowed to burn incense with the Taoist yin/yang symbol on it :) Unfortunately, no pictures allowed, I would have loved to take one of a monk. Their uniform is much more what you imagine a Chinese monk in contrast to the Buddhists, who look rather Indian. There is a bridge with a bell on either side and if you manage to hit the Bell with a coin (this explains the bridge - the money falls into the little pit beneath, you cannot just keep trying with the same coin), it expresses your life-long connection to the Tao, something along the lines that you're predestined for Taoism. Well, I, who couldn't hit a horse with a bat if it was right in front of me, managed indeed to hit the Bell and get a satisfying gong (instead of B.'s "clonk" from hitting only the frame) - probably because I had already bought a little jade Buddha and, as a gift, got my name written on a red "lucky paper" and hung on the gift shop wall - it means the Taoist temple grants me one year of luck - I guess after one year you have to come back and buy something else to renew your luck :)

Shanxi History Museum - thanks to the support and never ending glory of the party this museum displays China's greatness and the power of the people with several thousand tri-color glazed ceramic horse figurines. You simply have to be stunned. Especially after standing in line for one hour for a free ticket.

Terracotta warriors - overpriced for 90yuan and somehow disappointing after all the hype. I guess it's enough to see the few they have in the History Museum, you can save yourself the 1-hour trip to the little town. Also, they always advertise the place as there being thousands of statues, but most of them are not excavated. When they open a pit, it's really just a pile of debris and then they have to puzzle it together. But yes, it's huge, it's impressive. What I didn't know before - the underground chambers did not only contain the army, but it was in fact a replica of the whole court. There are two walls - court wall and city wall, so to speak, and there were bronze statues of zoo animals and artifacts for domestic use, as well as some terracotta statues of civil servants. They believe, the emperor expected his reign to live on in the afterlife, so he needed a fully equipped court. Supposedly it took 700,000 workers (many of them forced labour) 37 years to complete the mausoleum, which was planned when he was 13.

Things we ate:

The best thing about Xi'An: fresh, sweet, juicy water melons at every corner. They're so delicious when they're warm from the sun, taste like freshly gathered from the field. Melon juice in restaurants is also quite a treat, especially in this heat. One evening we had shrimps stir-fried with fresh fruit (papaya, pineapple, dragon fruit), although that strikes me as rather nouvelle Chinoise cuisine and not a traditional dish, it hit the spot. A much needed contrast to all the salty, cumin laden meat we ate. Some traditional Xi'An dishes include:

Rou jia mo (meat in bread) - sort of a small sandwich (Doener Kebab for those who had the luck to try the most famous German fast food), but the mo is closer to a cracker than to nan bread. The Chinese stuff it with fat pork, the Muslims with lamb or beef, if you're lucky they also throw in a bit of veggie and some chili sauce. We attempted to find a good one, but gave up after the third.

Yang rou bao mo - this is a mutton soup that is served poured over crumbled bread (mo). In the place we had it, it was rather bland and uninspired and the mo very dry again. They served it with chili sauce an garlic on the side, but that didn't help the clear mutton broth to much more nuanced flavours.

Biang biang rou - smoked meat (usually intestines, such as liver, or sausage), tasty, but as pretty much anything else - salty!

Lamb and beef skewers - very thin slivers of meat, grilled by the dozen, basted with the obligatory cumin-chili mixture (never hot enough for our taste, but we might have reached our cumin limit), we had this with a side of soybeans and boiled peanuts (in the shell) and more dry mo (also topped with salt-cumin-chili), washed down with a couple of beers, sitting outside in a street market, surrounded by locals, struggling to sit on tiny plastic stools that seemed fitting for 3-year olds, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.