The Legend of Richard

(Allison)

We are in Xi’an – a history teacher’s dream! It is a bustling large modern city, but at the same time incredibly rich in history dating back to ancient times. Richard – the legend…is our tour guide. Richard is a wonderful man..he is the travel agent who is in charge of the travel portion of our trip. We have the honor of having him as our local guide during our five day stay in Xi’an.

Unfortunately, Mark became ill last evening and was not able to join us for the day. Richard met us in the lobby of our hotel - which is in an excellent location – it is in the center of the city – inside of the fortifying walls built by the Ming dynasty – that have been maintained and destroyed and are complete today.   It is in the midst of the historic drum and bell towers, high end shopping malls, several restaurants, and the Muslim section of the city.  

Our first stop was to go shopping for the students of the school in Pangliu School (Richard grew up in Pangliu Village, a village outside of Xi’an, and still has very strong ties to the village – especially the school). Richard, Alex, Lianna and I went to a large sporting goods store, it was going under some renovations…and the sound of a large drill made it a little difficult to communicate, but we survived. Richard helped us pick out a bunch of things for the children – jump ropes, Chinese checkers, a soccer ball, ping pong balls, and few other items. We will bring the items when we visit Pangliu on Tuesday.

We then traveled to the Shaanxi History Museum (Shaanxi is the province that Xi’an is located in). Richard told us it is one of the three best museums in China. He also told us that Xi’an was formerly known as Chang’an, which means “perpetual peace” in Chinese. Xi’an has been the sight of the capital of 13 different dynasties of China including the ancient dynasties of  Western Zhou, Qin, Han, Sui, Tang dynasties --as well as the later –  Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing.

Richard is incredibly knowledgeable on the history of China. Although museums are not their favorite places to go, Alex and Lianna were really good sports as Richard and I moved very slowly from exhibit to exhibit. The history museum has an incredible collection of over 3,000 pieces of historical artifacts. Including several Neolithic tools, bronzes from the Zhou period, terra cotta soldiers of the Qin, pottery and currency of the Han,  a detailed exhibit on the Silk Road (began during the Han dynasty - Chang’an was the start and end of the Silk Road in the east), tricolored pottery and silk of the Tang, and stunning celadon pottery of the Song dynasty.

For lunch, Richard selected a local noodle restaurant! Northern China is famous for their noodles and dumplings (we had dumplings for dinner last night). Alex saw Chinese meatballs on the menu and had to have them – good thing because they were so good! We sampled two different types of noodles – first, a thick noodle with a very tasty sweet sauce - second, a thinner noodle in a beef based broth=delicious, once again.

Second museum = The Xian Beilin Museum, also known as The Forest of Steles in Xi’an – it is the oldest museum in China. It was initially founded in the year 1087 CE - inside of a very old Confucius temple. It is the home of China’s largest collection of stone steles.  The steles include inscriptions of classic Chinese literature, historical events, and other important pieces of information engraved in Chinese calligraphy. The stones are massive and very impressive. Several of them are supported by large stone tortoises (Richard explained that it is because tortoises symbolize longevity and they can carry a large load) One of the stone slabs describes Nestorian Christianity arriving in China around 635 CE, a reproduction was made and stands in the Vatican. The museum also includes some beautiful tomb stones, large statues excavated from ancient tombs, and a grand collection of decorative horse hitching stakes.  After spending a considerable amount of time in the second museum of the day - we were slightly museumed out – but rallied to visit one more site – The Great Mosque of Xi’an – the largest and oldest mosque in China.

The Hui people are the largest group of minorities in China. They speak mandarin Chinese, but they practice the religion of Islam. The mosque was built in 742 CE --during the Tang Dynasty. It was built in the style of traditional Chinese architecture—so at first – you feel that you are simply in another Buddhist or Taoist temple - but when you look closely - you can see Arabic writing and art engraved into the walls.  On the way out - several of the Hui people were congregating in the temple for their mid-afternoon call to prayer.  We walked through the Muslim bazaar – and the shop keepers were yelling out at us “hello” and “just looking”.  We walked back to the hotel to check on Mark…he was feeling better but decided not to join us for dinner.

Dinner plans – a Muslim dinner! I did not know what to expect – but – as usual it was amazing. Once again Richard, Alex, Lianna and I headed out from the hotel and walked back to the Muslim section of the city and entered the restaurant. Richard took us up the counter and had us select some appetizers – we selected persimmon cakes, spring rolls, sliced cucumbers, and sliced lotus root. When we got back to the table there were four bowls with these flat round pieces of semi-cooked bread. Richard told us that we had to work for our dinner- and then instructed us to tear up the bread into very small pieces. We went to work…Once we were done the waitresses took the bowls away and we worked on the appetizers.

Eventually, the bowls came back and the torn up bread had transformed into an amazing lamb stew (I had never eaten lamb before our wonderful hot pot dinner the other night – now I have eaten it twice in one week). The stew was so delicious…and we were so full!  Ignoring our fullness and despite my mixed emotions of western food establishments invading the rest of the world.... Alex, Lianna and I were seriously wooed by the Haagan – Daz (with a Starbucks next door) located directly below the Muslim restaurant.  We gave in - the Haagan-Daz was actually more like a restaurant (with decadent ice cream creations on the menu) , but we opted for “take away”.  Alex ordered two scoops – and they put them in two different cups…it was funny. Lianna and I decided that we did want to sit down and enjoy the ice cream – Alex headed back to the hotel…

After we finished Lianna and I strolled back to the hotel – and we were fascinated by a women who was carrying a tiny puppy in a box. There were several rick-shaw drivers standing along the road – they repeatedly called out “hello – need ride?”. We declined. I convinced Lianna to walk to the fantastic pharmacy I had discovered when I went exploring last night…we made some purchases and then strolled, once again back to the hotel.