Rewind - Xi'an China

One of our favorite stops from our travels has to be Xi'an China. Centrally located, this one-time capital of the country had one of AC's favorite attributes - cold weather! Although after spending a week there, it proved to offer much more than just that.

Compared to what we'd experienced in Hong Kong and Shenzhen, Xi'an is a place that embraces its history -- and there is a lot to embrace! Our first stop was the Big Wildgoose Pagoda. Around 1400 years ago, a man named Xuanzang traveled outside China to further study spiritual teachings. After spending about 17 years on the road (much of which was spent in India), he returned with over 600 Sanskrit texts containing expansive Buddhist doctrine. Upon his return, this pagoda was built to house the thousands of manuscripts that he painstakingly translated from Sanskrit to Chinese, an act which heavily influenced Buddhism's role in China. When we asked if the documents were still housed in the pagoda, our guide simply stated, "No, the government took them and won't tell us where they are." Now that's a response you can only appreciate in now-Communist China. Later in the trip, we made a stop by Small Wildgoose Pagoda -- the redheaded step-child pagoda -- which was heavily damaged by earthquakes, but a little more of the tourist track.

Our next stop was the Banpo archaeological dig site, which houses remains of a Neolithic village (read: end of the stone age around 5000 - 4000 BC). The museum houses an assortment of pottery and tools, but probably the most interesting item is the remains of the village itself. In it, you can find the remains of a moat that surrounded the village, hut outlines and ancient kilns used for firing their pottery. It can even border on creepy as you examine the many skeletal remains, most buried face-up with their heads pointing in the same direction. However, a smaller group are buried-face down. Perhaps this was some form of punishment or they suffered from a then-mysterious disease. They also suspect that this was a female-run society, although how they get that from looking at 7000-year-old scraps of pottery is anybody's guess.

Probably the trippiest part of this trip were the Terracotta Warriors. Not discovered until the 1970s (by a local farmer who was trying to dig a well and pulled up a head!), these life-size terracotta statues were buried with Emporor Qin in 210 BC. Although the ones you see are all put together, they were actually thrashed by peasants during an uprising that took place shortly after Qin's death. The statues were holding real weapons (you can't go chintzy when you plan to wage war after death you know) that were instead used to oust their cruel new leader. Then, apparently, everyone just forgot about them. Only a small portion of the 8000+ statues are actually unearthed, because their brilliant paint jobs oxidize in a mere matter of hours, turning them the greenish-gray hue you see today.

I totally dug the idea of bringing an army to the grave with you, ensuring your success in the afterlife. My new plan is to be buried in business casual, armed with a laptop and Blackberry to ensure my continuation of corporate domination in the afterlife as well.

There were many other notable things to see in Xi'an, including their city wall (complete with a Bell Tower and Drum Tower so you knew when to hustle inside as gates were going up!), and am amazing dumpling feast (think pot stickers of every shape and size. My favorite --walnut!). It was a very zen-like trip, nicely placed in the middle of getting our butts kicked in Hanoi and Bangkok.

Here are the pictures!