So, while a post regarding the trip to Yangshuo sits half-finished, I decided to upload some older pictures that I hadn't gotten to share. The first few are from last October's trip to Luoyang in Henan Province, south of Beijing. I took that trip to see the Longmen Grottoes with the other IUP students wrote a bit about it in an earlier post. The next set are from my trip with Mandi to Xi'an in November, where we toured the city and got to see the Terra-cotta Warriors. Finally, there are a couple extras from Tianjin. As always, click to enlarge.

So, the Longmen Grottoes. This area consists of thousands of carvings of Buddha, some as old as 1,500 years. It's suffered a bit through history but I still found it a very impressive and, in my experience, unique religious site. There are said to be over 10,000 hand-carved figures here, and I find it easy to believe (although some are quite small!)

A slew of empty niches. Many were stolen in the 19th century to fill Western museums, while a second round of destruction and defacement took place during the Cultural Revolution.



Some of the much larger figures in the largest "niche." Note the beheaded statues - the work of the Cultural Revolution.



A longer view from a bridge across the Longmen river. The niches extend all the way to the bridge in the distance.

Next we have a few pictures from Xi'an. Xi'an, along with Nanjing, is perhaps the most famous former capital of China having hosted numerous dynasties under its former name of Chang'an, Eastern terminus of the Silk Road. The city is notable for being one of the few in China to have retained the city wall that all major cities originally possessed, integrating it with the rapidly modernizing city and creating a second tourist draw besides the Terra-cotta Warriors. The Warriors were buried alongside the Emperor Qin Shihuang, first Emperor of China and the first to unite the various warring kingdoms in 244B.C. We took an hour long bus ride to reach the sloping fields in which they were discovered by a well-digging farmer.

The pollution was awful the entire time we were there. This view is from the wall towards the city center at the train station.



The wall extending into the smoggy distance. A park has been created in the space between the wall and the outer moat, and together the effect is to create a very distinct "old city" in the heart of Xi'an. I appreciate much more what Beijing lost during the 1950's and 60's, when the wall was destroyed to build subway line 2. We did get to ride around the entire circuit on rented bikes, which took about two hours and was delightful.



A vendor cooks up some delicious fried fare on Hui Min Jie (lit. Hui People Road). The Hui are an ethnic minority descended from Muslim traders who came to China in earlier eras, and today they are found throughout China. Xi'an, though, is something of a Hui capital, with a large mosque and entire Hui district. They make delicious food and wear distinctive white caps, barely visible in this photo. Mandi and I spent a long evening wandering this road and sampling every kind of (cooked!) snack.



A view of one of the smaller pits of Terra-cotta Warriors. Three main digs can be visited, and this is a small part of by far the smallest. We were disappointed not to be able to get closer to the figures, though a few are on display in cases around the viewing platforms.



The main, airplane-hanger sized dig. Truly incredible.

And last, lots of thing have happened in China besides travel. I've had a birthday, Christmas, Chinese New Year and lots of the daily occurrences that make life abroad interesting. Only two such pictures for today though, sorry!

This is a picture from my birthday dinner with Mandi at a Vietnamese restaurant in Tianjin :)



And finally, Tianjin at its showy best near the train station. Taken on a Fall evening some weeks ago.