allenaw88: Xi'An / Beijing Trip Part 1

Okay, I've finally decided to write my adventures in China over the past week now. I can't help but feel sorry for myself if I don't record my adventures here.

3rd March, left the house at about 9pm to the airport via a cab. Got there pretty early, probably the earliest since we ended up waiting for the tour company people. Boarded the plane at about 12am. So it begins, the 6 hour flight from KL to Beijing. It's a midnight flight, and I got bored real quick, since I'm most active at midnights playing games. Since I cant even play my PSP and listen to songs with my phone, I tried to sleep, but with my neck partially hanging sideways, it hurt pretty quickly. I did fell asleep I suppose, because I remembered I tried to sleep 3 hours before I'm supposed to reach my destination, and when I woke up, its already bright outside. I thought "Wow we must be reaching soon". Thats when I realized, its only 5am! What the hell? 5am and already this bright? I cant sleep with all the light shining in my eyes. So I just stay awake until I reach the destination.

4th March, Reached Beijing Airport at about 6am, gotta rush to another flight because we need to go to Xi'An first. When we were waiting for our luggages, a man showed up saying "The plane's about to depart". Everybody rushed to check in the luggages again, luckily we still made it in time. I really regret eating the food that doesn't even taste like human food, I threw up during the flight because of the dumb turbulence which lasted the entire flight. We immediately went to some garden, which is supposed to have lilies, but since its already spring, they're gone. It's raining, so its basically real cold. Went to lunch, and went to the hotel to get some rest. Went to "Big Goose Pagoda" after the rest. Nothing much, just a historical pagoda where this monk used to decipher Indian transcripts into Chinese. Oh yeah, our tour guide in Xi'An is called Eddie, hes a good guy, and speaks English pretty well too. Went to dinner after that, and then we went to some place I forgot the name. My phone ran out of battery, so I didn't manage to capture any photos. It's real cold out there, pretty much shivering the entire time. Watched a real nice and cool light performance. It's like projecting a movie on a screen of water. Went back to hotel afterwards.

5th March, had breakfast at the hotel, it doesn't taste that good, expected from hotel foods. Went to some Huaqing Pool, a hot spring where Lady Yang Guifei takes her bath, along with the Emperor and some other people. Chef's are considered honorable people because food is very important to the people back in the days, so they have their own hot spring there too. I forgot where we went after that, so I'll just skip that part. Went to lunch, and then went to the Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor, where the Terracotta warriors were buried under the earth. It's one of the historical places which I like there, theres a place there called the Circular Vision, which depicts how the history of the place, how its dug up and the excavation process. Its named Circular Vision because inside, its like a theater, but with screen all around, and it's like you yourself are on the spot. Imagine driving a car, looking at the front and back, thats how it works. Then we went inside the excavation sites, there are 3 pits. The 1st one was basically the outskirts, the remaining two was pretty deep, and researchers decided that it must be the headquarters, as statues of chariots and high ranking officers are found there. Quite a number of the statues are still intact, while most others were destroyed during a rebellion against Emperor Qin. Again, I forgot where we went after that. I will edit this part if I remembered. Thats about all I have to say about Xi'An, which used to be the capital of China, now switched to Beijing.

Part 2 will consist mostly of Beijing. It could take 2 posts though, as I'm there for 5 days, and visited a whole lot of places. If I have the time I will update it later in the night. Here are some pictures I took at Xi'An for now.