kjp

Another email for you, yes, I'm a bludger. I'm taking it easy this afternoon after riding around (on a dodgy bike that I couldn't raise the seat of the so my efficiency in pedalling was not as high as I would have liked....) Xi'an city wall this morning, and not feeling 100%. Which is a bit of a bummer. It's just my throat / sinus neck of the wood that is a bit on the iffy side.

Anyhow.

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China has been great so far. The first 1/2 week or so in Beijing were great. It's an amazingly big / oversized place. Heaps of big buildings, very wide roads that you can't cross on foot (there's heaps of underpasses everywhere). It took ages to go anywhere by foot. Anyhow, our day trip to the great wall was 'great' (funny that) - it's very impressive when you're walking on top of it. See attached - peace!! Tiannanem square and the forbidden city (where the emporers used to live when Beijing was the capital) were interesting and, of course, big as well.

Ohh yes, before I forget, my room mate is non existant... there's 12 people in the group - 5 couples and me and one other woman from Canada. So, no crazy partners for me...

At the moment I'm in Xi'an, a city south west of Beijing. It's the site of the Terracotta Warriors that you might have seen pictures of. It's an amazing site - 8000 or so ornate life sized teracotta models of warriors - foot soldiers, archers, cavalry, etc. They were burried as part of the first emporer of China (Qin) journey into the afterlife.

Xi'an used to be the end of the Silk road (at the eastern end). So in Xi'an there's a strong muslim community, and also buddist communities as well. There were some weird but yummy smells (and some foods I had no idea what they were) as I was cruising through the Muslim quarter yesterday. Xi'an used to be the capital in the Tang dynasty (600 - 900 AD or so - and was one of the high points of Chinese civilisation). We went to a show of Tang dynasty dancing and music last night which was really good.

Since ariving in Xi'an (morning of day before yesterday) I've got a funny feeling of almost getting a cold / sick. Hopefully it is just the polution in the air. Xi'an seems to have more people smoking than Beijing; but maybe thats just the places I went to. But it's good because it means that I can take it easy and catch up on my emails!

This afternoon we're going to head west - start of the silk road proper. And starting to get into the desert / more strongly muslim areas. Camel riding and kebabs await!

Anyhow, stay cool,

Kevin