Day 8 - Xi'an

Our first stop of the morning was Xinging park to see how adults, especially those of the older generations, get their exercise and socialize.  Some people do Tai Chi but many people dance. The dance is called the "Younger" dance and it is done with fans and umbrellas. I got to participate.  My lady was so nice trying to teach me even with the language barrier we shared.  She and the other women congratulated me after so I must have done a passable job.

From there we went and learned about furniture lacquering and how the Chinese use the Lacquer Tree's natural lacquer which is heat, water and acid proof.  They had a lot of expensive items but this was the priciest of any I saw at $100,000 US dollars.

After lunch we traveled to the Terracotta Warriors, one of the stops I was most looking forward to on our trip!  It is the archeological site of the tomb of China's first Emperor, Qin Shi Huangdi.  It took 38 years and over 720,000 people to build this tomb.

 

 

 

Each soldier was based off a living man who was then later killed.

So far soldiers have been found in three separate pits.  But they weren't all put together link in the pictures.  They were found in a crumpled mess and put together like giant jigsaw puzzle.

It was truely remarkable to see what they were able to do over 2000 years ago.

 

Posing with one of the replicas in the gift shop.  If I remember correctly they started at $30,000.

This one is a High Ranking Officer.  You can tell by the number of bows he has on his uniform.

To end our day, we took a walk through Xi'an's Muslim neighborhood.  It has some great shopping!

At the far end of the neighborhood was the city's drum tower.