Saturday, June 6, 2009

Luckily Local

Day 452
I got to Xi'an just before lunch. I had arranged for my hostel to pick me up. Well, the hostel wouldn't be picking me up its a building after all, but rather one of the staff members. After getting out of the station I couldn't see anyone. I was a bit irritated at myself as I had neglected to write down any of the hostel information. Just as I was about to go and look for an internet cafe I was found. Ten minutes later I was at the hostel.

Xi'an is kind of an important stop for me. When I was a child my parents made sure that my sister and I attended Sunday school every week. When we lived in Pasadena Maryland we went to a church called Mt. Carmel. Every year a missionary that the church supported would come to visit. I don't remember a whole lot, just that she worked in China and always had prizes that we could win. One year Sandy or I (I can't remember who) won a mini Terracotta Warrior. I think that this is the first time that I had ever heard about China. I remember seeing pictures and thinking that it was some sort of fairy tale land. Perhaps this is the place that I have been waiting to go for the longest. It's a toss up with Pompeii which I remember my uncle Steven telling me about. I just can't remember the time line.

By the time I had grabbed lunch it was too late in the day to see the warriors. Instead I took a rather long walk to the History Museum. On the way i decided to be a bad traveler and get a manicure. While I was there I met very friendly Vivian who spoke good English. She asked if she could come to the museum with me. I was very happy to have someone there to chat with.

The museum was nice, my camera is on the fritz so I had to beg it to take pictures. I was really trying to wait until Beijing to get it repaired. There were even a few full sized warriors to check out.

After the museum Vivian took me to an area that is know as the Muslim district. This is really the shopping area. I didn't buy anything but I did get a better idea of what things should cost with Vivian's help.

Vivian was from a small town about 5 hours away and took me to a resturant serving food from there. I had a pork and noodles dish, the noodles weren't so great. When the bill came I thought of Dong Dong paying for dinner in Guilin and I grabbed the check. It was time for me to play it forward. We finished dinner with just enough time for Vivian to run to her bus to some suburb or another.

I headed back to the hostel and wrote for some time. I ended up meeting a really nice Canadian girl from Montreal and eventually spent some time chatting with some Dutch people before calling it a night.

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