Rain and the Terracotta Flop
Wednesday started out cool and damp. i got up and got ready to go on the tour that the LuDao hostel i was staying in arranged every day. i was to head out on the eastern tour to see the terracotta warriors and stuff. our tour left at 9:00. There were 6 of us. Three brits, two germans, and me. our tour guide, candy, spoke pretty good english and took every opportunity to prove it. first we went to the terracotta warrior reproduction facility where they showed us how they made the reproduction terracotta warriors. the place was a tourist trap. there were tons of foreigners and Chinese alike. my camera ran out of batteries right at the beginning so i had to run to the end to get some more batteries. charged out the rear too, 20 yuan for two little AA batteries. after the terracotta warrior production area there were about five rooms full of crap that you had to filter through to get to the exit. outside of the first room nothing had anything to do with terracotta warriors. it was all furniture, rugs, cloths and souvenirs. i was glad to get out of there.
from there we went to the hot springs where something happened that affected the history of china. something about the communists and the nationalist fighting there. it was also where the old emperors used to go to bath and their concubines went with them. there was a huge stature of one of the concubines, one of the four beauties of china, naked more or less. the place was pretty but they wouldn’t let us climb the mountain. again tourist trap. my fellow tour mates and myself amused ourselves by teasing our tour guide, candy, with questions about what a concubine’s duties were and whatever else we could to try to embarrass her. from there we went to some old dead emperor’s tomb and climb to the top. it began raining and the most interesting part was the view of the surrounding countryside and my tour group’s smart ass comments. The brits in particular always had something to say. i had a pomegranate on the way down. i must say i much prefer the juice to having to deal with all the little seeds and such.
somewhere in there we went to see a skimpy and unimpressive museum with few artifacts and i’m not quite sure why it was so important to go there. there was a small coffin that was supposed to hold some of the finger bones of the dude that founded Buddhism, looked a bit crappy though.
after an overpriced lunch we went to the terracotta warriors, the highlight of the trip. thats not saying much really. I’m not quite sure what i was expecting but after all the hype they get i was expecting something more that what was really there. it was just so sterile and the pits so unimpressive. very few of the warriors were even complete, most just lying in shattered piles where they’d been unearthed and never reconstructed. even beyond that most of the warriors weren’t even unearthed at that point. the crowds were awful. packing in like salmon in a run. i saw more foreigners there than in all my time previously in china. there were even some old Japaneses dudes in their traditional cloths which i mistook for the farmer who had first discovered the tombs in 1970something while digging a well. when the tour guide heard that i had seen the old farmer she took off dragging us all along to find him. by coincidence he was actually there only sitting in the gift shop signing the official books of the terracotta warriors.
the only really interesting part the complete warriors they had on display in the second site. you could get right up close to these to really see the detail which was quite good especially for something that old.
when we got back to the hostel the six of us went out to dinner together. we tried to get Randy Candy to go along with us but were unable. i wonder if any one remembered to ask Candy what flavor she was. we ended up at the Roast Duck for a very good and moderately priced dinner.
getting back to the hotel was about all i could do. i was pooped from the day’s activities. i took a scalding hot shower and collapsed into bed.
Thursday morning dawned cold damp and pouring rain. i went to the train station to try to get my tickets but after waiting in line forever the lady wouldn’t deal with me cause i didn’t speak Chinese. apparently booth 4 has a English speaker and thats where i was supposed to go but i didn’t find that out till i got back to the hostel. the rain was really coming down and not feeling like hauling my big but around in such foul weather i just holed up in an internet cafe for the day.
by the time i got out of the internet cafe the rain had stopped but with it my interest to walk all the way down to the big goose pagoda and the history museum. instead i headed east past the wall into the back streets were i came across this little temple. it was great to walk around in there. they had smoke and fire billowing from metal troughs to light their incense.the heat bent the air and presented a wavering image of the buddhas enshrined behind. there was even living quarters for the monks right there and a large cage containing peacocks.
after i left the temple i started north through the back streets loving the atmosphere of the neighborhood. trees lined the road and formed a leafy tunnel. streets slip away and rundown apartment complexes jumping up from behind walls topped with jagged bits of broken glass.
eventually i got out of the back streets and meandered my way over to the train station to buy my ticket out of here. first i waited in line again for 45minutes just so the girl, in english, of ticket counter 4 could tell me that she only sold tickets two days in advance. pisses off for being turned away twice now i stalked back over to the hotel where i was a little short with them about my ticket problems, not that it was really there fault but i did blame them a little for only giving me partial bits of information. i was my fault i didn’t fish for more.
they wrote down what i was to need and sent me to another ticket office about a kilometer west of the train station. fuck i was irritated as all hell by this point, and then had to stand in line again for 40 minutes while some family argued with the teller. eventually i did get my ticket and now am happy to say i’ve cooled down to my normal self again. i hate getting worked up over stupid shit. its time to hit the sack, tomorrow i head to hua shan.
October 17th, 2007 at 12:54 pm
Cool trippin wish i were there doin that…Happy Trails