Day 6 - Xi'an to Guilin

Today was our last day in Xi’an. We finally slept until our alarm went off! We may be over our jet lag. We got up and went through a quick yoga session before packing our bags and heading down for breakfast.

Today Kenneth had to take his daughter to get some vaccinations so his wife, Mary was our guide. At first, we weren’t sure how we felt about this switch. In the end, it was good. Mary was not as seasoned of a tour guide, but her inexperience was part of her charm. She tended to be more open about her life and her views on the topics we discussed. She also spoke English well. This was amazing because she told us she did not start learning English until she was in college. While we drove throughout the day we had many interesting conversations with Mary. One of the more interesting conversations was about marriage and dating in China. She told us the number one concern a girl has when getting married is the economic position of their husband - do they have an apartment, car, or job? She said that while a woman is in school it is much simpler and that they don’t worry about these things when they choose a boyfriend, but in most cases, those school romances end at graduation and marriage is more about economic expediency than true love.

We also had a very interesting conversation with Mary about guns in America. Mary really wants to visit America. It seriously is a huge dream for her. She wanted us to recommend some cities for her to visit in the future. We told her about New York, San Fransisco, San Diego, and of course SLC. As we were talking she told us her number one concern with America was that she would get shot while she is visiting. What makes this story even more disappointing is that Susie shared the same concern with us and Susie had actually visited America before. They both read the international news and are aware that the US has a big problem with guns. It is hard for them to fathom a place where innocent children, concertgoers, or nightclub roomers are in mortal danger. China has a lot of issues but they don’t have to worry that their children will be senselessly killed. It is very disappointing to us that America is infamous for its gun policies.

Our first stop today was the Wild Goose Pagoda and Temple of Thanksgiving. This was another Buddhist temple. It was the most interesting Buddhist temple that we visited. Mary is Buddhist and prayed while we were at the temple. She told us that she and Kenneth were married for a long time before they had children. They tried to have a child for three years and went through some fertility treatments with no success. Mary began visiting the Buddhist temple to pray once a week, figuring it couldn’t hurt her chances. A few months later she was pregnant with their first child. So she continues to pray once a week at the Buddhist temple.

This was a beautiful complex. At this location, they have volunteers who will explain the buildings and the rituals that are performed. This was superior to just having our guide show us the temple because these individuals have more specialized knowledge of this location. As we walked through the temple we learned about the founder or the master of this complex. He helped introduce Buddhism to China. He walked all the way from Xi’an to India (it took him three years) and then he traveled back with many sacred Buddhist texts that he translated into English. It is a very famous story and has something to do with a monkey king as well. That sounded familiar so I am going to learn more about it when we get home.

While we were there we observed some monks chanting and praying. They are seriously devoted to their beliefs. The room where they prayed was exceedingly beautiful. While we stopped at this room our guide explained that Buddhists believe that everyone will become a Buddha (an enlightened being). An individual becomes a Buddha through meditation, devotion, etc. He said if it does not happen in this life individuals can keep working at it in future lives until they reach the enlightened state.

We stopped by a room whose walls were covered in very ornate jade panels. They were unbelievable. Our guide liked to refer to this room as a National treasure of China. These panels told the story of the founding of Buddhism. Across from that building was a building where the Buddha of wealth is enshrined. People pray to his Buddha for wealth and success in business. The room this Buddha was in screamed wealth. Every building in China comes in pairs because it is Feng Shui. They always have a yin and yang to have the proper balance. Our guide pointed out this is a Taoist idea that has been embraced by the Buddhists. Really all of the religions of China - Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism all borrowed and adopted ideas and practices from the other religions.

We continued to the last building in the complex. This building housed a very beautiful-leaf-edged Buddha. It also had a  beautiful golden dragon roof. This building was exquisite.

We wandered through the complex past an area where monks have been buried. Our guide pointed out one grave in particular. Most of the graves were hundreds or even thousands of years old, but there was one that was built within the last 30 years. This was for a monk that protected the Temple of Thanksgiving and Wild Goose Pagoda during the cultural revolution. At that time (the 1960s and 70s) students known as the Red guard under the direction of Mao destroyed many cultural and religiously significant treasures. They even stole and destroyed some treasures from this temple. They were going to destroy the temple and pagoda, but there was one monk who stayed there. He shut the gate and told the students they would have to kill him if they wanted to damage the temple. He then covered himself with oil and kept a lit candle nearby. He was prepared to burn himself to death before he let these students destroy the temple. This frightened the students and they left him and these places alone. When he died they buried him in a place of honor to commemorate his act of heroism.

Now that the tour of the complex was complete our guide took us to the temple gallery. This is an area where the temple sells beautiful watercolor paintings. Our guide explained to us the techniques that are used to create these paintings. Because they use minerals to create the color the color can remain vibrant for 1,000 years. The guide also demonstrated calligraphy and wrote both of our names in Chinese for us. It was fun. The paintings were beautiful and very reasonably priced, but we did not know what we would do with one so we declined.

This Buddhist scroll from India is thousands of years old

Mineral watercolor was ks used to make the watercolor paintings found in the temple

Old and new symbols are the or west (Xi). The bird flies west to sit in its nest.

Alison's name

Our second stop of the day was the Xi’an museum. The museum was pretty crowded with a lot of jostling and maneuvering to see the exhibits. The exhibits themselves were interesting but got a little repetitive. There was pottery and terra-cotta-style figures. It was a fine stop, but I do not think that I would opt to visit a museum in China again.

This relic was interesting. This is one half of a special talisman that was cut in half. One half was retained by the emperor and the other half was given to the general of the army. If the emperor needed to send a message to the general he would give the messenger his half of the talisman. When the general put the two halves together he would know the message truly came from the emperor. It is old-school encryption. 

After the silk road, the faces in the art began to change to reflect European and Middle Eastern features

Around here they love terra-cotta people. Both big and small.

Next, we found a restaurant for lunch. It was a small local place. Our guides love to point out that they would take us to places where there were no other foreigners, only locals. Menus in China are huge and can be a little overwhelming. Fortunately, they have lots of pictures, or else we would be totally lost. Our guide would have us flip through the menu to see if anything catches our eye. We usually pushed them for a recommendation. All the food at these types of places is served family style. We will usually get two or three dishes (a couple of meat dishes and a vegetable dish) that we share. While Alison and I are proficient enough with chopsticks that we opt to use them we have been surprised by the number of restaurants that will ask if we need a fork. We politely decline. Today for lunch we had a spicy beef dish served with green beans and lotus root, a dish with beef short ribs and potatoes in a most unique sauce, and long green beans. It was all very good. The short ribs in particular were one of the most unique dishes we have eaten in China. I have never tasted anything quite like it.

After lunch, we headed to the Muslim section of Xi’an. During the height of the Silk Road Xi’an was a center of commerce which led to a significant population of Muslim individuals settling here. Now all these years later these people’s descendants still live in the same area. This quarter is an interesting mix of Chinese and Muslim cultures. Mary walked us through the quarter to see the Great Mosque. The mosque was a little bit of a letdown. It was interesting because it was built in a very Chinese style. The minnerette looks like a Pagoda. However, the buildings themselves were not in great shape. Alison asked why these buildings have not been restored (like most of the other ones we have seen in China). Mary explained that few people outside of Western tourists and Muslims (who get in for free) visit the mosque. Additionally, the ticket prices to enter are low and do not generate enough funds for renovations. Because of the relatively low attendance, it is not a government priority.

Our appointed meeting spot

Arabic writing found inside the Grand Mosque

The minaret 

Also, Chinese people do not really seem to understand religion, particularly religion from outside of China. I think the concept of one God and many of the beliefs of the major non-Chinese religions are baffling to most Chinese people. It was pretty obvious to us that Mary did not know the first thing about Islam. Really all she knew was that western tourists liked to visit the mosque.

After the mosque, Mary gave us some free time to explore. We walked along an area where they sell lots of trinkets. It kind of felt like we were back in Jerusalem. So many of the sites and smells were similar. These types of places are more fun if you want to buy something so I decided we should buy a happy Buddha. Chinese people love the happy Buddha because he is always smiling and they like to rub his stomach for good luck. I think the Chinese people may have come up with a happy Buddha. We walked along and anytime I saw a happy Buddha that looked nice I would barter. They would give an outrageously high price and I would give a low price. They would budge and I wouldn’t budge much. I didn’t really care if I got a Buddha or not so I had all the leverage. They weren’t going for it so we made it to the end of the street Buddha-less. I adjusted my strategy. I put a few more yuan into my pocket and decided I wanted to buy an all-black Yankees hat we saw and maybe a happy Buddha as well. Alison thought this whole thing was hilarious and couldn’t figure out why I would buy a happy Buddha. The lady selling the Yankees hat quoted us a much lower price than we expected so I negotiated her down and got my hat. I was still working on my Buddha. I was willing to pay a little bit more now, but still below the price these shops all claimed was the lowest they would go. We struck out with a few vendors before I got one vendor to agree to my price. I had my happy Buddha.

Looks kind of like the old city of Jerusalem

We made our way back down the street toward what we thought was our appointed meeting spot. Only it turns out we were heading in the wrong direction. Basically, every street in this area looks exactly the same and it is super easy to get turned around. Also, we only had a fuzzy idea of the location of the meeting place, to begin with. We walked pretty far before we realized we were heading in the wrong direction. Unfortunately, once we figured out we went the wrong way we did not know where to go to get back or even how to describe where we wanted to go. We pulled up Alison’s phone and couldn’t see anything on maps that would help us find our way. We started heading back the way we came, but we were running out of time (we were already late). I took a picture on my camera of the meeting spot, but it didn’t give us any clues about how to get there. I pulled back up google maps and noticed an area near us with a picture icon. I touched the icon and up came a picture very similar to the one I took at our meeting spot. We were able to get directions to this spot and found Mary. So glad we have awesome technology that makes the world a much smaller place.

We were running late so we jumped into the van and headed right to the van and headed to the airport. Initially, the driver dropped us off at terminal 2, but as we stood in line to check our bags they told our guide we were not on the flight. It turns out that China Highlights changed our flight a few weeks ago and somehow didn’t inform our guide. We were in luck because the flight was basically at the same time. We just had to go to the other terminal. Our driver picked us up again and drove us to the other terminal and we made the flight in plenty of time. Security and all of that in China was a breeze. We had a nice easy two-hour flight and we were in Guilin.

Our first impression of Guilin is that it is hot. Even at the airport, it was very warm. Air conditioning in China is not as good as in the US. It is not as cool and it is not used as often. As soon as we walked out of the airport we were hit with a wall of hot humid air. The forecast for our time in Guilin was for heat in the 90s and high humidity. It was dark so we could not see much on our drive to the airport. Our guide in Guilin is Lele. He is awesome. He is very excited and does everything he can to make sure we are comfortable and having a great time. He told us all about the great local food we will eat and the cool experiences we can have in Guilin. First impressions of Lele - two thumbs up. We made it to our hotel, which is very nice, but is also warm (see AC comments above) went through a little yoga to wind down, and called it a night.