Our Trip to Xi'an - Happy Thanksgiving!

Hey Everyone! We just got back from Xi'An and we had a great time there! Zoie and I both have seen so many amazing places in China, and the Terracotta Soldiers was another Chinese landmark on the list that we can finally check off. We arrived in Xi'An around lunch time on Friday afternoon (we don't teach on Fridays). After about a 45 minute cab ride to our hotel, Zoie and I began to check out the city while also looking for a place to eat lunch. Backtracking a little, our school driver took us to the Shenzhen airport at about 6:00am, which is a good hour drive. It was extremely nice of him. Along the way, he told us about a soup dish called "Yang Rou Pao Mo." We didn't exactly know what the "Pao Mo" part meant, but from the beginning of the word, we knew it involved lamb (and our driver said it was soup). So anyway, back to the story. We had heard about a famous restaurant in the downtown area of Xi'An that served Yang Rou Pao Mo, and it was only about a 20 or so minute walk from our hotel. After search several streets, we finally stumbled upon the restaurant. We both really enjoyed our meal. Basically, the idea of this Muslim dish is to break up small pieces of bread into a bowl, and then the soup broth, noodles, and lamb are poured on top of the bread. The bread gets soft and the lamb is pulled (and is probably as close our mom's brisket as we will get in China...even though thats not lamb). After our lunch, we headed to a nearby hotel to meet with a local travel agency to figure out our plans/tour for the following day. We spent the next 3 hours or so walking along the Xi'An city wall, which despite being a little chilly outside, turned out to be a really enjoyable walk. There were very few people walking on the part of the wall that we were on, so it was a very quiet and secluded-feeling walk. Towards the end of our walk, the lanterns lighting the wall turned on. As you can see in the pictures (which hopefully will be up by the time you read this), it was very beautiful. Just to be clear, this is not the Great Wall, it is a wall that surrounds the middle of Xi'An, which used to be the capital of China (Chang'An). We headed back to our hotel for the night, and because we were so exhausted from the early drive to the airport and our long walk on the wall, we decided to eat at the dinner buffet at our hotel. Anytime we have a chance to eat an international buffet (especially with American food), it is hard to pass up. Just eating bread and butter is a treat for us.

We woke up the next morning around 8am and headed downstairs around 9am to meet with our tour guide for the day. We had booked a tour through the travel agency at the hotel, and we were excited to see that only 4 other people booked the same tour. One couple was at the hotel across the street, and we met the other couple at our first destination. We were lucky to have had 4 very nice people on our tour. There was a younger couple from Melbourne, Australia, and there was a couple in there 40s-50s from Denver, Colorado. It was quite cold in the morning, so our pictures show us bundled up. Also, all the museums and places we went that day, none of them had heat. So even in the museums, we were very cold! Our first destination was the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. It a is very neat and unique pagoda with an interesting story. Besides the Terracotta Soldiers, the Big Wild Goose Pagoda is a symbol of Xi'An. Our next stop was a place called the Banpo Museum. The neat thing about this place is that it is an excavation site of a village that was built over 4000 years ago. Although there wasn't much to see, it was pretty amazing seeing something from so long ago! After the Banpo museum, we headed to a factory where they build different size Terracotta Soldiers to sell to all of the tourists. The best part about that was the pictures we took in front of the factory where we got to put our heads on the body of a soldier as if we were actually one of them. After leaving the museum, we headed to lunch, which was another tourist trap. They tried to sell stuff to you the whole time, and the food was nothing spectacular. FINALLY, when lunch was over, we started to head toward the Terracotta Soldiers. This was the one thing that Zoie and I really wanted to see, and had been anticipating seeing for years! After about a 30 minute drive, we finally arrived at the museum. It is a GIANT museum that consists of 4 parts: 1) A movie theater area (the movie didnt really work though). 2)The large pit which consists of thousands? hundreds? of soldiers. This is the largest excavated pit at the museum. 3) A smaller pit that is still being excavated. 4) A pit that is being excavated and consists of many horses and chariots. When you see the pictures, it is extremely difficult to see the vastness of the place as well as all of the details of the soldiers. Each soldier is different which makes them even more amazing. I'm not going to go into the history because Wikipedia can do a much better job, but all in all, seeing this was as amazing as we had expected. We also saw two of the three remaining farmers who originally uncovered the soldiers. One of the farmers was in the movie theater part of the museum, and the other farmer was sitting in a store outside of the museum. The one outside of the museum is the farmer that took the picture with Bill Clinton. All three of the remaining farmers are paid to sit at the museum all day. Pictures are not allowed, and you have to pay to get a signature. Zoie's dad already had an autographed book, so we just looked at him and took a photograph in our heads.

After our trip to the Terracotta Soldiers, we headed back to the city center where Zoie and I decided to try one of Xi'An's most famous dumpling restaurants. The dumplings are made to look like the filling inside of them. For example: the duck dumplings are in the shape of a duck. We tried many different types (not the frog), and we also took pictures. The dumplings were actually very tasty in addition to their artistic beauty. After dinner, we headed to the hotel for the night to get some rest for the next day.

We woke up fairly early the next morning so that Zoie and I could get the breakfast buffet before a long day ahead. After breakfast, we headed toward the Shaanxi History Museum. We were told to get there early because it is free, therefore many people go there daily. We were also told that they only allow 4000 people in per day. So taking the advice from our concierge, we arrived at the museum around 8:45 and waited in line for about 30 minutes. The museum itself was pretty neat, but because Zoie and I have been to SO many history museums throughout China, we have seen almost everything there. This museum also had reproductions of many of the real things we have seen. We left the museum after about an our of touring, and headed back to the city center to check out a few more of the sights. We went atop both the Drum Tower and the Bell Tower before taking a little rest at the downtown Starbucks. After a quick break, we went to lunch at a nearby mall before heading to the Great Mosque in the middle of the city. After various twists and turns down small, loud, and overcrowded side streets, we finally found the Mosque. If you don't know, China has a very big Muslim population. The neat thing about this Mosque was that it was basically an old Chinese garden. It was nestled in the middle of this giant city, but once inside, it was an extremely beautiful and peaceful place. You would never think that it existed where it was.

After visiting the Mosque, we headed back to our hotel and waited there for about an hour until heading back to the airport. Unfortunately, we arrived a little early AND our flight had already been delayed an out. Nonetheless, we arrived into Shenzhen around 9:30pm, only about an hour after we had expected to arrive. Instead of taking a 2 hour bus ride home, I used my bargaining skills to get a 25USD taxi ride from the original 90USD taxi fare. Despite getting into a sketchy car to begin with, and having to stop at a random spot on the highway to transfer into a different car, we managed to get home in a very timely fashion.

Now we are back here in Dameisha and we have several things to look forward to. For 1) Zoie'ss sister and brother-in-law may come in this weekend pending flights and various other things. Hopefully they will make it here so we can see them. Also, even though Zoie and I are disappointed we won't be home for Thanksgiving, we are planning on making as much as we can with our microwave, hotplate and small toaster. There will unfortunately be no turkey at our Thanksgiving
meal, but chicken and beef should be present.

Other than that, life goes on as normal here. I can't believe that December is almost here. Wisconsin will play in a January 1st bowl game again barring some crazy end of the season antics, and luckily for me, college basketball is really starting to get going. Wisconsin's first tournament of the year starts tomorrow in Maui, which means the games will be on at noon my time! This is very exciting for me because I'll be able to watch during my lunch break. That's really all for now. I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving. Although being here is great, and life is pretty stress-free, not a day goes by where I really don't feel thankful for everything I have, and Thanksgiving is just another day I can be extra-thankful.

If you made it this far in my blog post, congratulations! I miss and love you all. Comment and update me on your life as well! Talk to you soon!

Love, Daniel