XI'AN

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

XI'AN.
A couple of hours in a park illustrated the best of modern and the beautifully gentle life style of old China. Modern because the park had been recently added to the rather uninspiring Tiananmen Square development around the Big Goose Pagoda. 

The design was excellent with some slopes added to the otherwise flat surroundings, and neither too small nor too big. It was beautiful with grass as green as any in Britain, and a variety of trees, some being shaped into animals by topiary. The pathways were lit at night by lamp stands in the form of dragons. Interesting large bronze statues added interest and an artificial lake with a jetty allowed one to be surrounded by water. There was a small area of perhaps 10 exercise apparatus, to swing the legs, exercise on parallel bars, or flex the hip and knee joints. But the real inspiration was in the use of space and the consequent attraction to the local population. We visited on a lovely autumn morning and the other people were mostly over 50's or mothers with pre-school children. There was the odd student from the nearby Xian university, one of who spoke to us to exercise her English and explained something of the development of the park.
 

TRADITIONAL CHINESE MUSIC MAKING

But the really amazing thing was the extent and variety of activities, and one couldn't help feeling it had been encouraged by the fine design. Instead of park benches they had installed seat level tables which would comfortably seat six or eight people. There were at least three groups of aged musicians with old instruments playing traditional Chinese music which floated around the space. 

Their violin has only two strings and is played with a bow that fits between them playing two notes at a time with a metallic sound box giving the distinctive timbre, the other instrument was a bamboo flute. The groups took it in turn to conduct and scat Chinese sing along. Toddlers would stop and look on with awe, I just missed a wonderful photo opportunity when a mother came to snatch her child away just as I raised the camera. A old musician approached Joan as she was listening to their music and said 'welcome to China'.

In different spaces all over the park individuals were practising their Tai Qi, if practising martial arts is what the women were doing. Some were dressed for the part, the woman in loose cream top and pyjama trousers and the two men in loose fitting black costumes. The male routines were clearly with a Kung Fu flavour, some distinctly remembering their kick boxing days. Everyone did their own thing gracefully, with tremendous balance and concentration. One lady was doing a dance routine with a fan which she snapped open and closed at appropriate stages. Three 50 year old women were practising high kicking routines. The exercise apparatus was always in use, how many have we seen in China and rarely saw them in use.

Joan discovered a group of old men using song birds in cages, 30 in all, to attract wild birds which they intended to catch in nets.

Park attendants were picking the high Persimmon (Sharon) fruit from the trees with a rake and offered her one which she ate with relish. We had not been surprised to observe that the fruit on the lower branches had already been removed. The atmosphere was so peaceful yet so much activity, something very special was happening here. We moved on reluctantly with many a wave exchanged with the others we had contacted though not spoken to.

We had gone early to the bus station at Tianshui and got tickets for the 9.30 bus before leaving to look at the food on offer in the street stalls across the road. We settled for a stall selling pancakes filled with egg and spring onion and took them back to the station waiting room, where the woman mopping the floor ready for the day brought us drinks of hot water from her own flask, another typical act of kindness. 

By 9.00 the conductress came to find us since the bus had its full complement and wanted to depart half an hour early, such a pity then that it wasted 45 minutes waiting at the bus station at the other end of the city. The ride to Xi'an was in two distinct halves, the first wriggled its way through sandstone mountain pinnacles, thus emphasising the reason why Xian had like Lanzhuo for centuries held strategic points on the Silk Road. A narrow pass through the mountains was the only route east from the West to reach the great plains of China. The new railway lines cut straight through the bends in the river, its tall elegant pedestals supported a single track and whenever stopped by a mountain went straight through in a long tunnel. In fact there were two independent tracks, one up one down, which sometimes ran parallel and sometimes deviated hundreds of metres. The second half was one of the modern four lane highways to which we have become accustomed. Still it was late, and we were tired, by the time we reached Xi'an. But we had spied the Lu Dao hotel recommended by the LP and quickly checked in.

The first task was to phone Michael to say we had arrived in Xi'an, the next to contact his girlfriend Wanglu. She was busy in the early evening but arranged to come to the hotel after 9pm. It was 10pm before we made our way on bus 603 to the centre of town near the Drum Tower. In doing so we learned that their buses, unlike the ones we had met so far, were operated by the driver and that you paid the fare by dropping a 1Y note in the slot on entry at the front of the bus. Just north of the Drum Tower is a street of traditional houses now used as shops and, most of all, as restaurants. 

After walking up and down to inspect what was on offer we went into a restaurant to eat some specialities of Xi'an. Wanglu ordered four dishes but the most famous Yang Rou Pou Mo (lamb stew thickened with bread), it failed to arrive and we did not bother to re-order since we were already full. The others were, a rice based sweet soup with walnuts (Ba Bao Xi Fan), delicious cold noodles with a hot sesame seed sauce (Liang Pi), and a stir fry of chili and transparent cubes, of what we never established the ingredients (Liang Fen). Her father met us in his people carrier after the meal and kindly drove us to our hotel where we established a plan for the following three days sight seeing.

Next day we took the local bus 306 to the Terracotta Warriors. There was a long queue but frequent buses so we were soon on board a crowded bus. We knew from the night before there were three destinations but were surprised when over half the bus got off at the first sight seeing stop, the rest except for us and two other European tourists got off at the second. However we could immediately tell from the park full of coaches that we were in the right place. 

Three archaeological sites are now housed in museum aircraft hangers and are now under the auspices of UNESCO. Dramatic though Pit1 is it is hard to recapture the thrill of the original discovery. It is clear that the dig finished long ago and although well over half the site is still under ground it is doubtful if there is much enthusiasm for uncovering much more of the same. Pits 2 and 3 are smaller and less impressive. My main feeling was of wonder that the fashion for burying life size pottery replicas of armies, or servants or friends, for such is the variety in this region, should ever have taken hold. Walking out the crowds are directed past a km or so of stalls selling replicas and mementos and a whole new village was being constructed to provide the accommodation to house ever more foreign tourists (most of the Chinese on our local bus obviously judged the site too expensive, or perhaps too dull). We are beginning to form the impression that achieving UNESCO World Heritage status is the kiss of death to any romance that once existed.

On the way back we skipped the middle site but stopped off at Hua Qing. A theme park created in what was once a famous mountain resort of temples for the nobles of the Tang dynasty. A place for relaxing in the hot springs and ancient Roman style baths, to enjoy the famous beauty of the Tang women, their beautiful dresses and hair styles, made them deservedly much painted. The Tang women were mostly concubines. Though in appearance with their white faces, buns and kimonos, they appeared Japanese to us. It was here that Chiang Kaishek, whilst relaxing, was betrayed by two of his generals who wanted him to join up with the communists and together fight the Japanese invaders, in what was known, but not fully explained, as the Xi'an Incident.

Next day it rained, the first day since our arrival in China if you exclude half an hour in the Forbidden City. So changing plans we took bus 5 to the Shaanxi Museum, just over ten years old, said to be the first modern museum in China with descriptions in English and Chinese. It housed a fine collection of artefeacts, especially pottery found in graves dating over 4000 years or so. History in this part of China was claimed to go back 7000 years. We also found another fine restaurant called Little Bee in English anyway, at 311 Cui Hua on the street east of the museum, very popular with the Chinese. It had a badge of the Chang'an (Xi'an's previous name) University outside, though I am not sure there was any connection, if there was Wanglu didn't know of it. In the afternoon we walked to the Big Goose Pagoda and located the Furong Lake Park for the following day.

BUDDHIST HAND SIGNALS

The third day we took a bus to the Big Goose Pagoda again and in walking there discovered the fine park described at the head of this posting. The Lake now surrounded by a high wall and charging 50Y entrance has been turned into a theme park called Tang Paradise, and as theme parks go it is a good example. They had the advantage of a large lake to begin with, though it was embellished here and there for instance by an artificially fed waterfall. The park was full of interest with many fine bronze statues, many continuing the theme of hands held in Buddhist gestures which were explained in English and Chinese. Another area devoted to the Tang women was called the Elegant Lady Area. 













One hundred 12 inch plates had been placed along a covered wooden walkway by the lakeside, one side had a painted copy of one of their portraits, the other had a suitable poem in Chinese. I took to walking backwards to view the paintings as we proceeded, like good Buddhists, in a clockwise direction. Other statues of note were enlarged replicas of the beautiful objects we had seen the day before in the museum, such as life size replicas of the much smaller coloured pottery horses which had been buried in tombs. The children's play area was also special with bronze statues illustrating folk and moral tales. One of them showed a man rolling a tubular piece of metal, the moral being if you persevered long enough it would be thin enough to make a needle. Joan liked the soothing piped Chinese music, which floated in and out as you walked around.

For lunch we walked back passed the Large Goose to the restaurant we had found the day before. 






After lunch we continued walking to the Small Goose Pagoda and in so doing exhausted ourselves, not for the first time on this trip. We didn't even eat dinner but collapsed into bed. A few blocks on the maps of these large cities seems little enough but the distances are soon measured in kms. Silly really because it's so easy and so cheap to use taxis. About 10pm Wanglu called to give us contact details of her friend in Luoyang.

Still a little behind I am finishing this from our hotel in Pingyao on 20 October, having spent two days in Luoyang and now ahead of schedule. Only one more stop from Beijing..