Where Is Calderon?

7am.  That was the time I was up and out the door today.  I was excited because I was on my way to see the Terracotta Army and Horses.  I wanted to get there early to make sure I made it because today was my last day in Xi'an and I the only reason I came to Xi'an was to see the Terracotta Warriors.  So I hopped on a local bus to the train station, which only cost $0.07, and boarded another bus.  The second bus only cost $1 for a 45 minute ride out of town to farm where the Terracotta Warriors were discovered.  They were unearthed by a farmer only about 25 years ago and have been claimed as the greatest archieological discovery of the century.  After seeing them I have to admit they might be right about the greatest discovery of ancient artifacts this century.  It would be hard to beat them on that claim.  The Terracotta Warriors were definitely worth the trip to Xi'an just to see them.  There are 3 dig sites and a museum open to the public.  Pit 1 is the orginial find and is the largest of all the digs.  This is the view as you walk into Pit 1.



You just see all the rows of Terracotta people.  This place was huge.  All the pictures I am going to show you are from Pit 1 because it had the best lighting so therefore the best pictures.  Here is a closeup of some of the people.



Here are some horses.



Obviously these were some of the better kept Terracotta figures.  There were also many broken figures and pieces all over the place.  Such as in this picture.



If you look closely you can see a guy laying there just left of center.  His hand is reaching down and his head is slightly twisted off the neck.  To the right of his hand is the remains of another figure.  You could see all kinds of pieces lying around from heads, torsos, horse rumps, horse bodies, to arms and legs.  They were still working on uncovering more figures and it was interesting to see what an active dig site looks like.



In the museum they had all kinds of information and pieces and figures on display.  They also talked about the people that built the Terracota Army and Horses.  They even found some of their remains during the process of digging the area.  They also had a torch from the Beijing 2008 Olympics on display there.



At the monument I ate a local hot beef sandwich.  At least I think it was beef.  It was okay.  It kind of tasted like cheap carne asada in a thick bread.



For dinner I thought I would eat at the hotel restaurant again.  In fact I was going to order the same thing I had yesterday because it was so good.  Well I pointed to the same picture on the menu, but something else came out instead.  It was a beef and mushroom variety dish (at first I thought the mushrooms were noodles until I looked closely).  It came with seaweed soup, steamed rice, a scrambled egg, and spicy pickled mango (or some other fruit).  It was pretty good.  Yesterday's dish was still way better though.  But hey I just ate some of my first mushrooms and lots of them too.



The hardest part of dinner was not using chopsticks (I'm okay with them) or eating new types of food (because I am not a very adventurous eater), but doing it all with the chef watching you take every bite.  He did that yesterday too.  I think he enjoyed seeing a westerner eating his food and all of it too.  So I had to make sure I ate everything, didn't make any faces if I didn't like something, and become an instant expert at using chopsticks.  Luckily none of the food was disgusting or even bad.  Well I better get to bed now as I have to get up at 4:30am to catch a very early train to Chengdu, home of the one of the largest Giant Panda breeding centers.