Day: 246
I was expecting something astounding out of China’s officially rated “2nd largest tourist attraction.”, yet it was far from that when walking into the gigantic steel aircraft hanger that covered the recently discovered (1974) Army of Terracotta Warriors. Certainly, seeing six thousand unique life-sized mud statues in battle formation is remarkable, but the entire event just felt like one huge trap for the tourist dollar. I guess it didn’t help that everyone who had paid the exorbitant (for China) 90yuan was kept behind a steel rail, far from the Warriors, and the best photo spots were zealously guarded by the Special Tourist Photo Company. The STPC, as we’ll call them, had quite the racket charging around $20US just for an 8×10 with the Army in the background, or of you next to a Warrior. Rip off.
The Army was actually our second stop for the day; the first had been a factory where they make replicas of the Terracotta Warriors. The friendly staff there, gave you a whirlwind 5 minute tour of the process of making Terracotta, then lead you into their vast showroom filled with replicas in any size you could dream of, where we were left to “enjoy” the Chinese art for a solid 20 minutes. Everything had a price tag
Other scams of the day were; a solitary overpriced restaurant with no other choices for lunch, a shitty museum complete with gift shop, and silk factory, which also had a quick tour on silk making followed by an extensive silk shopping session. At least they had free tea for all the men sitting around while their wives shopped…
I couldn’t even get a moments peace in the van to and from these locations because our guide was dryly repeating in very excruciating English every fact she had ever learned about anything we went past. Finally on the way home the Ipod hit my ears and I fell asleep for a half hour or so until we arrived to drop me off back at my hostel.
The daylight hours of my day being a bust, I thought for sure I should take part in something I love doing during the evening. Last week I left just days before Spiderman 3 was released in the States, and since it was a Saturday night in a big city I figured I should be able to find it playing here. After some extensive wandering (including all 8 floors of the local mall), I found a place where it started at 9:30pm. I was giddy. This would definitely fix my woes. I bought a ticket, and headed to a coffee shop for a cappuccino while I waited the hour for it to start.
Sitting in the theater, surrounded by equally excited Chinese, Danny Elfmans theme music came up and I was content. Until Peter Parker said his first words…
It was in Chinese…
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Hey Rob! man too bad that I missed you yesterday, I fell asleep and by the time I got to your hostel (20:35), you were gone. I hang out there for 30 minutes, and then even look for you in the bar street, where else eh? 🙂
I had great fun with you, and it was so nice to meet you and learn from you some photography tips. I guess California or Colombia will be next.
keep rocking China!!
simon =)
AhhhhHaaaHaaaa…Chinese!!!! You had to laugh!!!! I am laughing so hard right now!!! So how was it in chinese?!?
I just got back from Exploring the terracotta warriors and felt equally let down by the whole experience. Not only were we scammed and got on the wrong bus to get there (at triple price of the ‘normal’ public bus) but just Xi’an city in general was not a very welcoming place compared to much of this country. It really felt like the city dies at about 6pm leaving you with little to no options for fun. Maybe I just wasn’t adventurous enough.
One thing I found funny was an old woman trying to sell knock off terra cotta warrior on the way out of the excavation site. She was in the parking lot and I got her down to 5 yuan (like 80 cents) for a 4 piece terra cotta set – amazing! Unfortunately, my compatriots were already loaded down with ‘official’ (scoff) terra cotta merch from inside the exhibition grounds.
Live and learn 😉