Traveling

Terracotta Army

Woah. We took a taxi out to the terracotta army early in the morning to beat the crowds. Ya right.
Ok, I'll try to explain a little about the "8th wonder of the world", but you can check this out : http://www.goworldtravel.com/ex/aspx/articleGuid.{542E0FE7-5C2C-43BC-8B5D-EADDC2C5682F}/xe/article.htm for much more detailed info.

First we drove past the emperor Qin's tomb. He ruled over 2000 years ago, and united China, standardised the currency and the written script. He is the reason this was all built. Normally, when an emperor died, his army was buried with him, but this emperor chose to have a terracotta army sculpted to buried with him - I believe this is in accordance with a dream he had. So about 1.5 km past the mound where the emperor was buried is the site where the warriors are being excavated- so logically, one would figure the area between the mound and where the warriors were found also holds warriors- bc why would you build your army so far away from your burial spot, right? So this was the first thing that amazed me- as you look out among the fields, you can just imagine the thousands of warriors buried below.

There are at least 3 buildings that hold everything- and everything is very well manitained- the are large expanses of grass (that you cant walk on) and the view of the mountains is gorgeous. We watched a movie explaining everything first- then went to check out the warriors. (Importantly, the movie explained that Emperor Qin was a tyrannical leader and after his death a rebellion broke out, so the warriors were raided for their weapons and part of the site was burnt- also, eventually the wood that held the earth up over them rotted and crushed much of the rest of the army)

The first view you get of the army is quite amazing as it's head on- but the problem is, everyone is trying to get a photo and trying to pose and just all in all squishing everyone else. Got out of there very quickly, and headed over to the side where you could see much more and not be crowded over.
All their faces were different, as were their poses, girths, height- it was absolutely amazing. 20o0 years old.
You get to see the sites where they are still excavating and that's pretty interesting too- although when we were there I think the archaeologists were on lunch :)

The amount of people around was amazing. Of course this is one of the most visited places in all of China, so it is expected.
Check out the review I pasted above- it does a much better job explaining the history surrounding the terracotta army and Xi'an.
And my photos are at http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jsfoisy/my_photos

posted by jjoollee @ 7:41 PM