Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum, X'ian, China

Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum

A little history, and anecdotal advice first:

In 1974 a 26-year-old farmer, Yang Jide, was drilling a well and found fragments of the terracotta soldiers and bronze weapons.

What was discovered later was one of the biggest attended burial pits of China’s first feudal Emperor, Qin Shi Huang.  In the following years remains had been found in 3 pits, yielding at least 8,000 soldiers and horses, and over 100 chariots.  The soldiers were infantry, cavalry, and others.

Emperor Qin was born in 259 BC and died in 210 BC.  He began building a mausoleum for himself at the foot of Mount Li when he was 13.  Construction took 38 years, from 247 BC to 208 BC.  It was divided into 3 stages and involved 720,000 conscripts.

The pits of pottery figures are 1.5 km east of Emperor Qin’s mausoleum.  Pit 1 has about 6,000 terracotta armored warriors and horses and 40 wooden chariots.  Pit 2 is estimated to have over 900 terracotta warriors and 350 terracotta horses with about 90 wooden chariots.  Pit 3 had so far yielded only 66 pottery figures and one chariot drawn by four horses.

Official records say it was discovered later that it was likely Xiang Yu, a rebel, intentionally damaged the Mausoleum and the soldiers in the pits, by setting fire to the wooden roof rafters, and these fell on and broke the warriors into pieces.

However, we were told that after the terracotta warriors were completed, the Emperor ordered the builders to be killed so that they would not tell anyone about the warriors, and then of those that remained alive deliberately smashed all of the artifacts.

The thing is, all of the terracotta figures that have been found are in pieces, and they need computers to piece them back together again.

The visit:

The first impression is the size of the car park and the number of buses parked in the lot, and a hell of a lot more outside up the road an off on side streets.  Obviously, it costs money to park in the parking lot.

The other first impressions; the numbers waiting to get in were not as many as yesterday outside the forbidden city, in fact, a lot less.

Be warned there's a long walk from the entrance gate where your bags are scanned and a body scan as well, before admittance.  This walk is through a landscaped area which it is expect might sometime in the future reveal more soldiers, or other artifacts.

At the end of the walk that takes about ten minutes, you can get a one-way ride to the second checkpoint, but we opted not to as no one else in our group did.

That walk is the warm-up exercise to an organized viewing of the exhibits after going through a second ticket checkpoint.  On the other side, we had to hand our tickets back to the tour guide which was disappointing not to end up with a memento of actually having been there.

So, on the other side in the courtyard, the guide told us the most important parts of the exhibition, that we should spend most of the time looking at pit 1, and then spent a little time in 2 which is only there in the first stages of excavation.  Then move onto the museum if only to see the replica chariots.

We do.

The chariots were small but interesting



The horses were better and intricately detailed



These are soldiers, perhaps complete examples of those types found in the end pit.



This is one of the archers.  You can tell by the way he wears his hair.

Pit 2

The excavation of this pit has only just begun, so it is possible to see where they have carefully removed the top cover, and you can see the broken parts of the warriors lying in a heap.



Some parts of the warriors are more discernible closer up



These parts are carefully extracted and taken to the ‘hospital’ where they are digitised and the computer will match each part with the warrior it belongs to.

Pit 1

This has quite a number of standing soldiers that have been glued back together, but not necessarily complete and I notice a number if the statues were incomplete. And if they cannot find the missing pieces, then they are not added to or filled in.



The scale of the pit is enormous, and they have hardly scratched the surface in the restoration process.

What is there is a number of horses as well.



That's at the front of the pit, a long line of statues, and what is clear is the location of the well where the first fragments were found by a farmer.

There are about eight lines of soldiers, and some lining the sides.

Midway down there is a large area currently under excavation



At the back is the hospital where the soldiers are reassembled.  There's nearly a hundred in the various stages of rebuilding.  These days the soldiers are rebuilt using computer imaging.



The hospital area is where they are put back together



And these are some of the statues in various stages of reconstruction



Another two views of the size and scale of the reconstruction project





The coffee shop is also a sales centre, but there are too many people waiting for coffee and too few places to sit down.

The Terracotta Warriors Reproduction Factory, X'ian, China

The Terracotta Warriors Reproduction Factory

First, after passing through the gateway you notice a half a dozen other buses, and then when you drive down to the end, there was another bus that just arrived before us, disgorging passengers.

As we are getting off we have a tour guide specifically for this place waiting.  Just as we finish getting off another two buses had arrived, ready to unload.

We have to wait for the group before us, to see the ovens, and take photos with the headless terra cotta replica soldiers.  Then it’s our turn.

I'm not sure whether it is of much interest to learn that takes 30 days, at 900 degrees, to fire a full-size soldier in an oven before its fully hardened, and will last 2,000 years.  Still, it's the thought that counts.

I'm not sure the fact that they use coal to create that heat helps all the good work they're doing to reduce pollution.
                 
Outside they have a number of full-sized statues, some representing the warriors that we will soon see at the site, and some are without heads so that we can take photos of ourselves as a warrior.



Next, we go inside and get a demonstration of how the soldiers big and small are made, out of the same clay, we're told, like the originals.  Maybe I got my numbers wrong because I think it takes 30 days for the clay to air dry.  Of course, the smaller ones take less time to air dry before they are fired in the kiln



We eventually bought a general, and if what we're told is true it should be still around long after our planet had been destroyed.  Aliens, if they come visiting are going to be very surprised to learn the only people lived on the planet were Chinese soldiers.
             
Next, we are taken through to the big-ticket items, those ornate and highly polished portable screens, the ones with countryside scenes, flowers, and people that are highly polished and look exquisite.

There are also much larger statues


 
But you need to be very wealthy if you want one, or a tabletop filled.



You can also buy one of these warriors in jade, though I shudder to think how much that would cost.



There are also big and small tables, ornate cabinets, and other wooden based products that Australian customs love to confiscate because it's wood.  And the prices for these, too, are very expensive.  Nice to have but so many impractically trying to get them home.

Failing to raise any interest there he moves on.  More groups are arriving all the time, so maybe someone has a spare 50,000 to 100,000 yuan to spare.

We get 40 minutes to wander around, but all we're interested in is a turtle and some small figurines for our granddaughters, which turn out to be pandas.  I think you can see the reason why we picked pandas.

At the end of the allowed time, it is a pleasure to get out into the fresh air, slightly tainted by diesel fumes, after inhaling that eye-watering aroma of shellac.

The Jade Factory, Beijing, China

The first stop is at a Jade Museum to learn the history of jade. In Chinese, jade is pronounced as “Yu” and it has a history in China of at least four thousand years.  On the way there, we are given a story about one of the guide's relatives who had a jade bracelet, and how it has saved her from countless catastrophes.

It is, quite literally 'the' good luck charm.  Chinese gamblers are known to have small pieces of jade in their hands when visiting the casinos, for good luck.  I'm not sure anything could provide a gambler with any sort of luck given how the odds are always slanted towards the house.
At any rate, this is neither the time of the place to debunk a 'well-known fact'.


 On arrival, our guide hands us over to a local guide, read staff member, and she begins with a discussion on jade while we watch a single worker working on an intricate piece, what looks to be a globe within a globe, sorry, there are two workers, and the second is working on a dragon.

At the end of the passage that passes by the workers, and before you enter the main showroom, you are dazzled by the ship and is nothing short of magnificent.

Then it's into a small room just off the main showroom where we are taken through the colors, and the carving process in the various stages, without really being told how the magic happens.
Then it's out into the main showroom where the sales are made, and before dispersing to look at the jade collection, she briefly tells us how to tell real and fake jade, and she does the usual trick of getting one of the tour group to model a piece.

Looks good, let's move on.  To bigger and better examples.

What interested me, other than the small zodiac signs and other smallish pieces on the 'promotion' table, was the jade bangle our tour guide told us about on the bus.  If anyone needs one, it is my other half, with all the medical issues and her sometimes clumsiness, two particular maladies this object is supposed to prevent.
Jade to the Chinese is Diamonds to westerners, and the jade bangle is often handed down to the females of the family from generation to generation, often as an engagement present, to be worn on the left hand, the one closest to the heart.

There are literally thousands of them, but, they have to be specially fitted to your wrist because if it's too large, you might lose it if it slips off and I didn't think it could be too small.  
Nor is it cheap, and needing a larger size, it is reasonably expensive.  But it is jadeite, the more expensive of the types of jade, and it can only appreciate in value, not that we are interested in the monetary value, it's more the good luck aspect.

We could use some of that.

But, just to touch on something that can be the bugbear of traveling overseas, is the subject of happy houses, a better name for toilets, and has become a recurrent theme on this tour.  It's better than blurting out the word toilet and it seems there can be some not so happy houses given that the toilets in China are usually squat rather than sit, even for women.
And apparently, everyone has an unhappy house story, particularly the women, and generally in having to squat over a pit.  Why is this a discussion point, it seems the jade factory had what we have come to call happy, happy houses which have more proper toilets, and a stop here before going on the great wall was recommended, as the 'happy house' at the wall is deemed to be not such a happy house.

Not even this dragon was within my price range.  Thank heaven they had smaller more affordable models.  The object of having a dragon, large or small, is that it should be placed inside the main door to the house so that money can come in.
It also seems that stuffing the dragon's mouth with money is also good luck.  We passed on doing that.

After spending a small fortune, there was a bonus, free Chinese tea. 

            Apparently, we will be coming back, after the Great Wall visit, to have lunch upstairs.

A trip to China - Day 5 - Xi'an, and The Terracotta Warriors and Horses

Day 5  The Terracotta Warriors and Horses

Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum.

The first impression is the size of the car park and the number of buses parked in the lot, and a hell of a lot more outside up the road an off on side streets.  Obviously, it costs money to park in the parking lot.

The other first impressions; the numbers waiting to get in were not as many as yesterday outside the forbidden city, in fact, a lot less.

Be warned there's a long walk from the entrance gate where your bags are scanned and a body scan as well, before admittance.  This walk is through a landscaped area which it is expect might sometime in the future reveal more soldiers, or other artefacts.

At the end of the walk that takes about ten minutes, you can get a one-way ride to the second checkpoint, but we opted not to as no one else in our group did.

That walk is the warm-up exercise to an organised viewing of the exhibits after going through a second ticket checkpoint.  On the other side, we had to hand our tickets back to the tour guide which was disappointing not to end up with a memento of actually having been there.

So, on the other side in the courtyard, the guide told us the most important parts of the exhibition, that we should spend most of the time looking at pit 1, and then spent a little time in 2 which is only there in the first stages of excavation.  Then move onto the museum if only to see the replica chariots.

We do.

The chariots were small but interesting



The horses were better and intricately detailed



These are soldiers, perhaps complete examples of those types found in the end pit.



This is one of the archers.  You can tell by the way he wears his hair.

Pit 2

The excavation of this pit has only just begun, so it is possible to see where they have carefully removed the top cover, and you can see the broken parts of the warriors lying in a heap.



Some parts of the warriors are more discernible closer up



These parts are carefully extracted and taken to the ‘hospital’ where they are digitised and the computer will match each part with the warrior it belongs to.

Pit 1

This has quite a number of standing soldiers that have been glued back together, but not necessarily complete and I notice a number if the statues were incomplete. And if they cannot find the missing pieces, then they are not added to or filled in.



The scale of the pit is enormous, and they have hardly scratched the surface in the restoration process.

What is there is a number of horses as well.



That's at the front of the pit, a long line of statues, and what is clear is the location of the well where the first fragments were found by a farmer.

There are about eight lines of soldiers, and some lining the sides.

Midway down there is a large area currently under excavation



At the back is the hospital where the soldiers are reassembled.  There's nearly a hundred in the various stages of rebuilding.  These days the soldiers are rebuilt using computer imaging.



The hospital area is where they are put back together



And these are some of the statues in various stages of reconstruction



Another two views of the size and scale of the reconstruction project





The coffee shop is also a sales centre, but there are too many people waiting for coffee and too few places to sit down.

A trip to China - Day 5- Xi'an, and The Terracotta Warrior Workshop

Day 5  The Terra Cotta Warriors and Horses

The brochure says: The highlight today is a visit to the Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum. Unearthed near Xi’an, the thousands of life-size sculptures of soldiers, chariots and horses are considered a world wonder. With different facial expressions and weaponry adorning each soldier, the Terracotta Warriors were believed to have been created to accompany the Qin Emperor into the afterlife. This site is among the top archaeological excavations of the 20th century. You will definitely be amazed by the scale of the Terracotta Warriors Army.

This the first stop of the terra cotta warriors tour, is the Terracotta Warriors Reproduction Factory, the place where they make the replica soldiers as souvenirs, as well as a lot of other distinctively Chinese goods.

The Terra Cotta Factory

First, after passing through the gateway you notice a half a dozen other buses, and then when you drive down to the end, there was another bus that just arrived before us, disgorging passengers.

As we are getting off we have a tour guide specifically for this place waiting.  Just as we finish getting off another two buses had arrived, ready to unload.

We have to wait for the group before us, to see the ovens, and take photos with the headless terra cotta replica soldiers.  Then it’s our turn.

I'm not sure whether it is of much interest to learn that takes 30 days, at 900 degrees, to fire a full-size soldier in an oven before its fully hardened, and will last 2,000 years.  Still, it's the thought that counts.

I'm not sure the fact that they use coal to create that heat helps all the good work they're doing to reduce pollution.
                   
Outside they have a number of full-sized statues, some representing the warriors that we will soon see at the site, and some are without heads so that we can take photos of ourselves as a warrior.



Next, we go inside and get a demonstration of how the soldiers big and small are made, out of the same clay, we're told, like the originals.  Maybe I got my numbers wrong because I think it takes 30 days for the clay to air dry.  Of course, the smaller ones take less time to air dry before they are fired in the kiln



We eventually bought a general, and if what we're told is true it should be still around long after our planet had been destroyed.  Aliens, if they come visiting are going to be very surprised to learn the only people lived on the planet were Chinese soldiers.
               
Next, we are taken through to the big-ticket items, those ornate and highly polished portable screens, the ones with countryside scenes, flowers, and people that are highly polished and look exquisite.

There are also much larger statues


   
But you need to be very wealthy if you want one, or a tabletop filled.



You can also buy one of these warriors in jade, though I shudder to think how much that would cost.



There are also big and small tables, ornate cabinets, and other wooden based products that Australian customs loves to confiscate because it's wood.  And the prices for these, too, are very expensive.  Nice to have but so many impractically trying to get them home.

Failing to raise any interest there he moves on.  More groups are arriving all the time, so maybe someone has a spare 50,000 to 100,000 yuan to spare.

We get 40 minutes to wander around, but all we're interested in is a turtle and some small figurines for our granddaughters, which turn out to be pandas.  I think you can see the reason why we picked pandas.

At the end of the allowed time, it is a pleasure to get out into the fresh air, slightly tainted by diesel fumes, after inhaling that eye-watering aroma of shellac.

A trip to China - Day 3 - Hutong, and a genuine Chinese meal

Hutong

The brochure says: In the afternoon, take the opportunity to join an optional tour (not included) to see Beijing’s 700-year-old Hutong’s (narrow lanes) area by old fashioned pedicab. You will also visit a local family living in a courtyard style home to experience the local customs including a delicious home-cooked dinner. 

The optional tour also includes a visit to Shichahai, a historic scenic area consisting of three lakes (Qianhai, meaning Front Sea; Houhai, meaning Back Sea and Xihai, meaning West Sea), surrounding places of historic interest and scenic beauty and remnants of old-style local residences, Hutong and Courtyard.  

First, we had a short walk through the more modern part of Hutong and given some free time for shopping, but we prefer just to meander by the canal.  

There is a lake, and if we had the time, there were boats you could take.

With some time to spare, we take a quick walk down one of the alleyways where on the ground level are small shops, and above, living quarters.

Then we go to the bell and drum towers before walking through some more alleys was to where the rickshaws were waiting.

The Bell tower

And the Drum tower. Both still working today.

The rickshaw ride took us through some more back streets where it was clear renovations were being made so that the area could apply for world heritage listing.  Seeing inside some of the houses shows that they may look dumpy outside but that's not the case inside.

The rickshaw ride ends outside the house where dinner will be served, and is a not so typical hose but does have all the elements of how the Chinese live, the boy's room, the girl's room, the parent's room, the living area, and the North-south feng shui.

Shortly after we arrive, the cricket man, apparently someone quite famous in Beijing arrives and tells us all about crickets

 and then grasshoppers, then about cricket racing.  He is animated and clearly enjoys entertaining us westerners.

I'm sorry but the cricket stuff just didn't interest me.  Or the grasshoppers.

As for dinner, it was finally a treat to eat what the typical Chinese family eats, and everything was delicious, and the endless beer was a nice touch.

And the last surprise, the food was cooked by a man.

A trip to China - Day 3 - The Great Wall of China, or part of it

The Great Wall of China

The brochure says, [After the Jade Museum], Afterwards take a scenic drive through the countryside and mountains to reach China’s most renowned monument—the Great Wall. You will visit the less-touristy and more original Juyong Pass, avoiding other sections which are the most accessible and consequently most crowded. The Great Wall meanders through China’s northern mountain ranges from the Yellow Sea to the Gobi Desert - a distance of more than 3500 miles. 

This is in a very scenic area and on the first impression; it is absolutely stunning in concept and in viewing.

As for the idea of walking on it, well, that first view of the mountain climb when getting off the bus, the first question was where the elevator is?  Sorry, there is none.  Its walk on up or stay down the bottom.

Walk it is.  As far as you feel you are able.  There is quite a few who don't make it to the top.  I didn't.  I only made it to the point where the steps narrowed.

But as for the logistics, there's the gradual incline to the starting point, and what will be the end meeting place.  From there, it's a few steps up to the first guard station no 7, and a few more to get up to the start of the main climb.  The top of the wall is guard station no 12.

Ok, those first few steps are a good indication of what it’s was going to be like and it's more the awkwardness of the uneven heights of the steps that's the killer, some as high as about 15 inches.  This photo paints an illusion, that it’s easy.  It’s not.

If you make it to the first stage, then it augers well you will get about 100 steps before you both start feeling it in your legs, particularly the knees, and then suffering from the height if you have a problem with heights as the air is thinner.  And if you have a thing with heights, never look down.

This was from where we stopped, about a third of the way up.  The one below, from almost at the bottom.  One we’re looking almost down on the buildings, the other, on the same level.

It requires rest before you come down, and that's when you start to feel it in the knees, our tour guide called it jelly legs, but it's more in the knees down.  Descending should be slow, and it can be more difficult negotiating the odd height steps, and particularly those high ones.  You definitely need to hang onto the rail, even try going backwards.

And, no, that rail hasn't been there as long as the wall.

While you are waiting for the guide to return to the meeting place at the appointed time, there should be time to have some jasmine tea.  Highly refreshing after the climb.

Lunch, today, is included, back at the jade factory

It is also a restaurant, and here we are being served Australia Chinese dishes that lean towards Chinese cuisine, but, it's definitely not authentic Chinese food.

I won't say it's disappointing because it tastes delicious, but I think it would have been more important to continue the Chinese experience.  Maybe that will come with the Hutong tour, which will be tonight.

With dinner included this should be the authentic Chinese food.

The trip back to Hutong was through the Olympic village where we saw the cube, for water sports and the bird's nest used for the opening and closing ceremonies, and several other stadiums, including the tennis, and archery, though this has been removed and is being replaced with an indoor ski centre.