So that just leaves us with the last day in Beijing, our Tianenmen Square and Forbidden City day. This was probably my least favorite day in Beijing, the smog was OUT OF CONTROL and yet there were still thousands of people surrounding me and it was quite warm. So all of these things cumulated to make me feel pretty nauseated, which is never a fun feeling.
Despite all that though the Forbidden City was really amazing! Once again I was able to connect with the history, but only from Mulan. We were so excited to see the huge courtyard with the giant steps, I could just imagine the statues on the roofs emerging and turning into terrifying Huns who wanted to take over the city. Thankfully for us that didn’t happen, like I said before I wasn’t feeling my best that day and I just don’t know if I could have pulled off breaking into the palace and saving the emperor.
What amazed me (which really shouldn’t have) is that the Forbidden City really was a city. There were many many buildings, not just one big palace for the royal family to live in. There were a couple different thrones as well, each one having a specific purpose, like for discussing crop matters or diplomatic issues and the like.
After the Forbidden City we had lunch then went to relax at our hostel before we took a sleeper train to Xi’an. This China trip has been amazing, but it’s times when I’m relaxing that I realize how exhausting it also is! My appreciation for sitting and for sleep has reached new levels.
At this point I was really ready to leave Beijing. I loved the city and I’m so glad I went, but by the end the smog was just too much and there were way too many people for a poor introvert like me. Even though I knew I was just going to a city that was also really smoggy and had millions of people, the knowledge that it was different smog and different people was somehow comforting.
The sleeper train was an absolute blast. I felt like a little kid for how excited I was to take it, and my expectations were not let down! I had never done anything like that before, but the idea of sleeping on a moving train in a tiny room with 3 of my best friends was totally exhilarating. We spent the first part learning Chinese history from Steve the social studies teacher, then read our books all snuggled up in our tiny beds. I loved it so much! Even though I know that there have been many many many people in that room and there will be in the future as well, it just felt like we had a little home in there. It was our space and no one else was allowed to come in, and after being surrounded by so many people that was exactly what I needed.
Our hostel, the Han Tang Inn was awesome and picked us up from the train station, along with about 15 other foreign travelers. We all arrived at the hostel at the same time, so it was pretty crazy trying to get checked in and settled. Thankfully they have a great kitchen with delicious breakfast items, so while we waited for our room to be available we feasted on omelets and fried eggs and french toast. It was so good I didn’t even care that I wasn’t eating ethnic food!
Since we arrived pretty early in the morning, our room wasn’t ready for a couple hours after we got here. So we stored our luggage and went out on the town, towards a section of Xi’an near here called the Muslim Quarter. We had had it recommended to us by other travelers we had me in Beijing, as well as from Em’s guidebook, but we didn’t really know what it was.
Turns out it’s a huge marketplace! Kind of. I don’t know how big it is, but it’s a substantial part of the city with street vendors on both sides of the small alleyways, with tons of people buying and selling everything you could ever imagine; crickets, na’an, noodles, spices, beads, vegetables, eggs, clothes, raw meat, cooked meat, crickets (alive and in cages), chickens, and even puppies! Those of course were my favorite.
We loved it there. It was such a sensory overload, there were tons of people and smells but they were all nice people and nice smells. I don’t think anyone took my picture there (with or without permission) and the food all smelt delicious and fully cooked. Also there didn’t seem to be any public toilets, which were a major contributor to the foul smells in Beijing.
Did I mention how big it was? Well it was big. So big we got completely lost. We just wandered around for a really long time, taking everything in, and eventually huddled together and decided just to get out wherever we could. Not that it was stressful being in there, it was just time to leave to get into our room!
Once we had fully settled in we set off again to go to a museum. I can’t tell you what it’s called though, because our guide book called it one thing and the name on the entrance called it another, so I was really confused about what it was really called. And when my mind is tired and confused, it doesn’t really have much chance of retaining the confusing information.
Anyway, the museum which shall remain unnamed was also cool. It had a huge display of ancient Buddhist statues that had been recovered, as well as huge tablets that were used to record history. We even saw the first record of Christianity coming to China! That was really cool.
I wish I could tell you more about the museum, but I was really tired at that point and it all seems like a dream. And again, since I didn’t know any of the history going into the museum it was hard to get a grasp of what I was really seeing and learning about.
And that was our first day in Xi’an! Today we saw the Terra-cotta Warriors, but that’s a whole other blog post :).
No comments:
Post a Comment