The overnight train was surprisingly comfortable and clean. Steph and I felt especially clean since we had our sleeping liners, which we highly recommend for those who stay in hostels. It's a thin sheet bag that you slip into...like a cocoon. We woke up around 7:30am to prepare for our arrival at Xi'an at 8:25am. We were able to wash our face, brush our teeth and use the toilet on the train! This is a cheap and comfortable way to travel overnight and save on an evening's accommodation.
When we arrived to Xi'an, a guy from our Qixian (7 sages) hostel came to pick us up for free. We originally thought the pick up meant car ride, but it really meant walking us to the hostel with our big bags. Good thing it was only a 15 minute walk. Everyone thought Steph and I looked ridiculous because our bags are practically half the size and weight of us. The guy that picked us up was really nice. He was really interested to meet Erik since he is planning to go to Finland for acting school. Too bad Erik didn't know any finnish to teach him.
While we were waiting to get into our rooms we had breakfast and planned the next leg of our China itinerary. Erik and Alan had an english breakfast for 22RMB (~$3), while I had an instant noodle for 5RMB (~$0.75). Oh did I mention our room was $9 per night per person and it's nice? Steph and I saved each of us $0.50 by showing our youth hostel card that we got for free by saying we were 17 years old. Hey, a dollar here and there adds up.
After checking in, we started our day's activities, but first we had to book our flights. We looked up prices on elong.com first, then asked our hostel for the cost...both prices were the same. I read online and in the rough guide that we can bargain for tickets at travel agents. So, we decided to give it a whirl. We went to search for a travel agent.
Within a few blocks we found one. Steph was practicing her mandarin skills to get us cheap rates. At first we got the same rate as elong, so we said forget it and that we would book at our hostel. When we said that another agent stopped us and said he would try to get us cheaper. We were there for another 30-45mins. As you can imagine, Erik and Alan got pretty bored watching steph and I talk to the guy, so they got themselves a 3RMB beer that was slightly bigger than a pint. Also, Erik was scaring a little chinese boy by just looking at him. He was laughing and jumping before he saw Erik, but once he spotted Erik he sat still and wouldn't talk. I guess Erik's charm does not work for asian boys that have never seen a green eye fair skin man. Anyhow, after all that the agent said he would call us with the rates.
So a bit about Xi'an: It's the capital of Shaanzi province, and was the capital of China for eleven dynasty between 1000 BC and 1000 AD. The translation in chinese means west peace.
So off we went to the big wild goose pagoda. We got a taxi to near there and decided to get a snack first. We saw a noodle shop called Huyongfeng, so thought it would be good to get a snack. For $10 we got three huge bowls of spicy noodles, braised pork, greens, a pork sandwich, green tea, two huge beers, and two waters. The food was yummy in my tummy for a very good price. We also played a scratch up game when we got our receipt.
The chinese government wants all restaurants to pay for taxes on their earnings so they're offering scratch games to customers to win money as a way to register earnings. We didn't win anything off the games though. Boo!
We saw the big goose pagoda from a distance, so the logical thing was to walk towards it. Little did we know it was surrounded by a wall, so we had to walk around it to enter into the temples where the pagoda was. Along the walls there were many bronze statues of people from the ancient times. It was really neat, especially with kids climbing all over it. Fyi - boys in china wear pants with a slit in the middle of their pants....think of it as the seam where the two pant legs are attached...it's designed this ways (so I think) to create easy access when the kid needs to poo or pee. Yep we see kids parts everywhere we look.
I'm starting to think Alan needs those pants too because he got lost when he went to the bathroom on the way to the pagoda. We saw him wandering aimlessly when he came back, but that could be because we were hiding from him.
Surrounding the big pagoda, there are tons of little temples for buddhist gods. It really looked amazing, but it was unfortunate that we did not know too much about the history of buddhism. We then headed into the big goose pagoda, hoping to see something neat. We climbed straight up 5 flights of stairs, huffing and puffing...and sweating thinking there was something rewarding when we reached the top, but all we got was a view of the city. We were all a bit disappointed. That put a damper in our energy factor, so we decided that was enough culture for the day...but we had to stop by the water show at 4pm.
Right in front of the big goose pagoda they have a water show, for which we were fashionablly late. Alan wasn't so happy about that so he ran to it....which was a bit silly in the end since it went on forever. It was pretty cool, sort of like the bellagio water show, but in the daytime with lots more water shooting up. They played chinese themed music, so I think. We watched it for 15 mins before we had enough.
We took a taxi back to our hostel, where we booked our flight to Chengdu and from Chengdu to Hangzhou. Erik and Alan went for a quick game of ping pong first, guess who lost....of course Alan. Steph and I went back to our rooms to shower before our dumpling banquet and tang dynasty show. We were all dressed pretty nicely, by our standards, but erik wore shorts. Alan mocked him for that saying jokingly that he was not properly dressed for the theater.
The dumplings were cutely shaped into animals like pigs, ducks, walnuts, and chickens. They were ok, but we were spoiled by the taiwanese dumpling place in beijing, where it was freshly steamed. The dumplings we had were probably mass produced and cooled down already. I had an almond juice there from a can that was pretty good, while erik and alan had some good old beer and steph had trusty water.
The show was enjoyable. We got to see the dances and music from the tang dynasty. I have to say ancient chinese people really knew how to enjoy themselves with fine arts, music, dances, paintings, and ladies. ;-)
While we were waiting for a taxi to get back to our hostel, a tuk tuk pulled up and wanted us to get on. If you don't know what that is, it's basically a motor bike pulling a cart full of people. Steph and I was like no way, the bike will be too slow for us, but he insisted it won't be, so we gave it a try.
All four of us hop on this dainty tuk tuk. I'm not going to lie, we were all very nervous. There were no seat belts and we were totally exposed to the open driving down fairly quickly down the large motor way. The guy just beep beeped his way through in front of buses and taxis. He even did a u-turn in the middle of the road and beep beeped his way down a one way street. The analogy I would use is a yapping small dog barking away the big dogs. Pretty comical so it called for some filming. I can't wait to post it!
As you know now, we got back safely and at a decent time - 10pm. So this means, I convinced alan and erik to run with me along the city walls in Xi'an the next morning at 6:45am. I need to burn off all the food I am consuming.
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