Xi`an Trip - Part I

Xi`an Trip - Day 1

Place: Train z19, Non stop from Beijing to Xi`an. Subset of group in one cabin. Devan, Puneet, Sheela (Right), Jilu, Sudarsan and our Chinese friend of the day.

Many Trains in China are Non-Stop running between major cities. Specially the soft sleeper trains. These trains are faster, cleaner and very comfortable. In Each coach, there are 9 cabins and each cabin has 4 soft beds with a LCD TV and Headphones. Apart from this there are many other things provided. The interiors of train look very royal. Cost of tickets, affordable for me. But pretty costly.

Xi`an is about 1200Km far from Beijing. The Z19 train covered it in 1o hours. :-) During our journey, We played cards, watched movie on my laptop and also some talks... It was memorable journey.


Place: Terracotta warrior museum, Xi`an. The Green Ship is completely made of Jade. :-) It stands 5 - 6ft tall. The Ship was a show piece in one of the Shops, where only Jade Jewelry are sold. The sellers explained us difference between real Jade and Fake Jade. Its real hard to distinguish between real and fake one until we know the methods.
Place: Mausoleum of Emperor Qin Shi Huang, Xi`an, Ashwin and Jilu dressed in traditional Chinese Dress.


Its is said that, each face of this pottery art soliders looks different. For my own interests, I have captured more than 50 pictures. When I came to China, to me everybody look alike, same face. But once living among these people, I could dentify the different people. Its fun to be here in China until one is bachelor.






Place: Terra-cotta Pits, Xi`an. Emperor Qin's Terra-cotta pits are the largest attendant pits located 1.5 Km east of Emperor QinShihuang's Mausoleum, Symbolizing the main defending force that guarded the capital before the emperor died. The pits were never mentioned in the historical records until pit 1 wasa discovered in March, 1974 by local farmers while drilling a well. Then Archaeolofists began the explorations and excavations. On October 1st, Emperor Qin's Terra-cotta warriors and horses museum was opened to the public.

Pit 1, the largest pit is a subterranean earth-and -wood structure. It measures 230 mtes long from east to west and 62 meteres wide from north to south. Its assumed that more tan 6,00 pottery warriors and horses were unearthed from this pit. All the statues are big in life-size and ezquisitely made, representing high technology in chinese sculptural history. They are reputed as the "Eighth wonder of the world". The Excavation of the terra-cotta warriors and horses provides extremely valuable data for research of chinese ancient politics, military affrairs, science and arts.