Eighth Wonder of the World

Eighth Wonder of the World - The tomb of the First Emperor of Qin - Qin Shi Huang and his terracotta army.

Reportedly there were 8000+ clay soldiers created and buried in the tomb to protect the Emperor in his next life. Emperor Qin made a lot of enemies as he was quite aggressive and waged many wars on neighboring states. Less than five years after his death, the Emperor's tomb was raided by General Xiang Yu for the weapons the soliders held and other items of value. Once they took what they wanted from the tomb, they supposedly busted many of the soldiers and set fire to the tomb causing structural beams to collapse.

The tomb was discovered in 1974 by 4 farmers who were drilling a well. Today only one of those farmers is alive. He comes to the grounds and signs books for sale in the "gift shop" area. Here is a funny little story though. Phil and Jenni bought a book and had it signed. A few days later some friends of their came through and bought the same book and had it signed as well. Now a sign above the farmer's chair says no pictures. In fact Jenni tried when we were there and he flipped out a fan to cover his face. Somehow their friends were able to snap a shot secretly (I guess). When everyone came back to Dalian and were sharing pics, their friends were showing the pic of the farmer to Phil and telling him, "This is the surviving farmer." Phil looked at the pic and said, "Uh, that's not the guy we saw." So they pulled out their books and comared signatures. They didn't match....OH WELL...so we don't know if we saw the real farmer or not....and really it is no big deal...but it does make a great, little story.

So to the pics. Pics 1-5 are various shots in pit 1 (there are three pits available for viewing). Pic 6 is from pit 2 and shows how not all of the tomb is in tact. Pic 7 is from pit 3 showing the collapsed roofs of unexcavated parts of the tomb.

Big Wild Goose Pagoda

This was the first pagoda we were able to go into and view the city. It is 7 stories tall and made of brick. Pic 1 and Pic 2 are of the pagoda itself. Pic 3 is looking out onto the north square. And pic 4 just struck me kind of funny with this dragon head sticking out as a drain spout for the tiled upper courtyard.

For more information on the Big Wild Goose Pagoda Click Here

The Great Wall - Badaling

I visited the Great Wall on a misty September Sunday afternoon. Taking the Beijing Tour Company tour instead of the more expensive English speaking hotel tour was quite a treat for practicing my Chinese listening skills...unfortunately with limited (very limited) Chinese speaking skills I only heard "Yes" and "No" and something about a horse when we drove by this statue on the way there.

Fortunately I had a very friendly Chinese girl around my age sitting behind us on the bus. She lived and worked in Australia (so her English was great) but was back in China visiting her family on holiday. She did a little interpreting when we needed to know something important from the tour guide. Most of the informational signs were in English as well as Chinese which was quite helpful.

We visited the section of wall known as "North Pass" of Juyongguan pass which is more simply referred to as the "Badaling". This is a very well maintained section of the wall north of Beijing by about a 1 hour tour bus ride away.

When we arrived, there was a throng of people trying to enter (and exit) through a little tiny door that led up to the top of the wall. The easiest way to get away from the crowds was to climb. And climb we did. I am pretty fit especially in my legs from all the squats in the gym. But nothing in the gym prepared me for the 40 degree angles and thousands of stairs to get to the top of the ridge. Getting there was worth the view. Yeah the mist limited the view but in a way it added to the mystical feel of being on "The Great Wall".

The pics are self explanatory I think. First one is of me with the wall coming out of my head (LOL). Second one is with the crowd looking up at the Guard House/Watch Tower that we would pass through. Third is a great pic of some of the stairs we faced to get up the ridge. The fourth and fifth ones (if you click on any pic, it will take you to a larger version) are pretty much from the top of the section we climbed. The last pic was taken from the road leading to our parking lot. I was able to hit Beijing while quite a bit of the Olympic decorations were still up. This is on the side of the hill in front of the wall. You can see the Great Wall off in the upper left corner.

I can now check off visiting one of the "7 wonders of the World".

Nothing like trying something new

So while I was in Beijing I thought I would try some scorpions on a stick. You know when in China...do as the Chinese do type thing. Funny thing is I was getting a lot of funny looks from the Chinese ;) Just as a precaution, I did not eat the stinger at the end of the scorpions tail.

Would I do it again? Sure...they tasted pretty good. Most of the taste was the peanut oil used to grill/fry them. (Costper stick of 4 = 20RMB ($2.94)

As you can see, sea horses were also available, but the thought of eating a cute little sea horse did not appeal.

The Forbidden City

SO here is The Forbidden City, home to 24 Emperors of the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Rather than give you all of the history and overload blogspot with millions of pics, I suggest you visit the following website: http://www.chinahighlights.com/beijing/attraction/forbidden-city.htm

I did post 7 pics of my own (video to be added later)...so let's get to it.
Pic 1 ... is outside the front gate. I am actually standing on the northern side of Tiananmen Square. Look for the posting on Tiananmen.
Pic 2... walking in through the inner gates. There are 9 knobs because 9 is the number of the Emperor. Touching the each knob as you walk in is supposed to bring good luck. I am not sure what draping yourself on them brings...LOL.
Pic 3...there is a huge restoration project underway. The right side of the pic is what it will look like. The left side is what quite a few of the less visited areas look like.
Pic 4...the figurines on the golden roofs. Gold tile roofs are for the emperor. Green signified military buildings. The figureines indicated what level of staff lived/worked in these buildings. The more figurines, the higher level of the staff. Again 9 figurines were for structures that were inhabited by the Emporor.
Pic 5...there are so many alleys and passage ways that it is like a maze here.
Pic 6...if you watched "The Last Emporor," this is the bed that they laid Puyi's mother on after she overdosed on opium. The silver ball hanging from the ceiling is the pearl (signifying the world) and there are dragons trying to come after the pearl. The job of the Emperor is to protect the world from the Dragons (very condensed explanation).
Pic 7...this is the front gate at night in the rain...little blurred but love the pic and outlines from the lights.

There is so much to see that it is impossible to see everything in one day. I hope to return before coming home.

Ni Hao from China

(Excerpts from 9/14/08 email)

Good morning all-

It is 8:45 am Monday morning as I write out my email to you. My computer shows 7:45 pm CDT Sunday evening for time back home. Believe it or not it has been nearly four weeks since I left the States to come to China. Time is moving quick. Some of you I have spoken with over the phone, some via email and some of you not at all. SO I thought I would send a little update email and let everyone know how things are going here.

First off living conditions. I have a 2 bed/ 1 bath apartment on the second floor of an 8 story complex. Fortunately the apartment is not representative of the stair well which looks and smells like a barn...and is pitch black at night upon entrance. The inside is quite nice with wood floors, recessed lighting and comfortable furnishings. I do have a western style "throne" toilet...so no deep knee squatting here. The bathroom is a true water closet with an eastern style shower that gets pretty much everything wet when you shower because it is just a shower head on the wall in front of the toilet...it gets me clean. Plus my hot water is not on a timer unlike many of my friends.

I do have a washer but hardly anyone here has a dryer. The apartment is equipped with an extending drying rack outside the kitchen window. Most of the time I dry mystuff inside which takes roughly 24 hours. I also have AC but since we are on the water (the Yellow Sea) we get some nice sea breezes so lately my windows have been wide open.

Regarding the people, you get a lot of stares from everyone and pointing fingers by little kids who have never seen a westerner. There are a fair amount of westerners here but we are spread out all over the city of 6.5 million people. Not wuite like Shanghai where the city is filled with westerners. Regarding height...the answer is "NO" I don't feel tall. Many of the Chinese men are taller than me. I would guess the average height to be 5'9" here for the men. A lot of women can look me straight in the eye. I am 5'6" so start dispelling the myth back home about all Chinese being short.

Most all have been very friendly and enjoyable to be around. You just have to watch in touristy areas that you don't get ripped by paying too much for something like a bottle of water. Example, cold bottle of water in the store below my apartment is 1 RMB (exchange rate is about $1 US = 6.80 RMB). Understandably it will be more just like at home when youare on a beach or other touristy area because of convenience so maybe 5 RMB at most. We had a guy try and charge 10 RMB per bottle of water on the beach yesterday. They see westerners and automatically think you have lots of cash so they jack the price. It's easy to play the game....just say no and walk on. More often than not they are on your heels. You learn to bargain here.

...I am giving this trip 2 thumbs up so far!