On the dot
Comfortable
No speedfelt inside
Met by Linda and driver in station
Got into huge van like car v comfortable
Xian stunned us as it was no small town as we thought
.
It was huge modern with wide roads filled with traffic
roadsides lined with roses pomegranates and sappotas and trees
Gardens shopping malls universities restaurants parks awesome
Due to national day on October first and eight days public holidays traffic was bumper to bumper a wee bit unruly with lane jumping horning even about turning but heard no curses like in India all cool .
This was after all the golden week for China and Xian a prime tourist spot had many coming to visit it
We took a lot of time to reach national museum because of the clogging traffic
The Shanxi museum was built in the shape of palaces in the forbidden .
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Later we went to see the Xian city wall which was 13.94 km long built in the fourteenth century under Hongwu emperor Zu refurbished many times more than 1400 years old ,initially built of rammed earth later with bricks ,there were towers according to directions ,in the Quin dynasty major fortifications and repairs were done ,
The wall is one of the best maintained fortification wall in the world of that antiquity and is a known international tourist attraction .
and needed a short climb
It was a broad walk paved with stones.by walk it would take four hours to go around, one could also see sections like we did or use bicycles to go around .
Incidentally there was a plaque and photograph of Indian PM Modiji visiting same part of the wall in commemoration of his visit .
Our guide took us here so that we could see that too .
We also saw the parade of the security guards wearing mediaeval costumes .
The Xian wall was huge and stretched on both sides neatly paved with cemented cobwebbed stones with turrets .
On one side the inside was the older Xian many quaint houses markets etc
The two famous towers the bell tower was also seen a far walk
The Muslim quarter known for its tasty halal food street was near the Bell tower .
there was also a drum tower ,drums and bells were rug for the hours ,we had no time to visit the inner city and also the two Buddhist pagodas Giant wild goose and small goose pagodas
We then had to take a long time on the traffic filled road to reach an Indian restaurant Ganges for our late lunch cum dinner .
and then go to our hotel to check in and take rest ,next day we would g to the Terracotta mines and see the three pits .
From prehistoric times the history of the place , the dynasties that ruled like Han , Tan Song Ming and Qing
were all depicted .
The first king of unified China of the Ming dynasty Qin shy Huang in 259 to 210 BC started building his own mausoleum at age of 13 years and he completed it at 39 years though kings were not asked to build their own mausoleums as it was considered bad luck to do so .
he needed 700000 workers to do the job ,it had 130 chariots ,520 horses ,150 cavalry horses ,officers, 8000 soldiers
Its at Linton 40 km from Xian city .the mound in a hill with jade and gold mines was chosen by the king for its richness
The huge tomb contained ceilings with studded pearls and diamonds to depict starry skies .,flowing rivers of mercury the tomb still remains unopened in order to preserve its antiquities as the terracotta pits that were opened had their colours faded in minutes
A whole army of terracotta warriors were in the burial chamber soldiers ,knights , officers , horses etc in neat order .
Centuries later in 1970 one farmer dug a well and found parts of terracota sculptures .
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| showing how the terracotta sculptures were made |
Many were intact , some were broken and had to be restored but amazing for two centuries clay models to last so long .
The technological know how of those days were amazing
the present archaeological site itself is the museum a huge complex
We in India having such heritage sites like Ajantha ,Ellora ,Mahabalipuram ,Taj Mahal and scores of historical palaces and buildings should learn from the Chinese how to not only preserve them but also how to market them .
The whole complex covering acres is turned into a mini township which is entered after buying tickets ,the one ward path to the site is a walk of about 3 km through green woods lovely trees flowers lawns where one could rest a natures delight and on reaching site which has three massive pits termed 1 ,2 and 3 where the terracotta figures are seen from platforms around ,the pits are air cooled and temperature maintained ,.
The return from the pits was by another route this time the whole place is one huge market with varieties of stalls for food ,souvenirs ,heritage restaurants tea houses all preserving ancient culture and Chinas nationhood ,the clever way of making people walk back through this township is for making them buy food as they are hungry after the exhibit viewing and also buying souvenirs in a relaxed way ,this is nowhere like the ramshackle shops one sees in Indian sites but very well organised and neat .
Taj mahal is just entered from the dirty streets of Agra with no fanfare .
People in the area often did find some strange pieces of pottery etc in the earth some they used in their
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| Yang Zhifa the discoverer of the Terracota warrior site |
The pit one was filled with lines of soldiers cavalry men standing kneeling arrow shooting in different postures of defence with chariots and horses all life like .
in pit 3 there were several areas still not dug up and one could see the sand roofs ,archaeologists are working intently in the pits with computers and desks in the middle
xian was well known for very sweet pomegrenates and everywhere one looked there were pomegrenates even on the road sides in neatly pruned trees ,as we neared Lintong the shops grew and pomegrenate juice was sold briskly
We then went to a heritage tea house and had another demonstration of tea making also drinking fine pomegranate juice ,
we then moved to Indian restaurant for our lunch and later into the station for out overnight train to Shangia the last leg of our China tour
1 comment:
That was nice, we had gone there some years ago...
i still recall the many buildings we saw on the way - apartments but empty,and we were told that for a time there were many Indians there, they planned to make an IT city or something
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