Xi'an Diary

10.11.17

⼤大家好！

For this blog entry I would like to tell you all about my weekend trip to Xi’an! Xi’an is a large city in central China. I am writing this blog in a taxi with two of the other scholars from Scotland and our Chinese friend. We have just arrived by plane, which took around 3 hours from Tianjin airport. I think if I could give any piece of advice to anyone who wants to move to China or abroad in general, it would be make friends with the local people. I can't explain how helpful and kind our Chinese friends have been, even though we are from opposite sides of the world we have so much in common and I couldn't imagine our lives in china without them!

The taxi arrived at the hotel that we booked online before traveling to Xi’an, unfortunately we have just found out that this hotel does not take foreign guests! So now we will have to look for somewhere else to stay.

After walking around for a while we have managed to find a hostel that has a spare room and is also very cheap , the equivalent to around £5 a night. Tonight is our first night in Xi’an and we are quite tired so have decided to visit the bell tower which is a 5-10 minute walk from our hostel. We all think it looks great at night time!!

After visiting the bell tower we went to try 兰州拉⾯面 (Lanzhou hand-pulled noodles) which are from the Gansu province. On the 11th of November in China there is a massive sale on the online shopping app called “taobao”. It is often called “singles day”, so single people will wait up until midnight to shop in the Taobao sales. In order to join in with the Chinese customs we order some Winter clothes online from the noodle bar!

11.11.17 (Singles day)

Today was our first full day in Xi’an and we have all had an amazing time! This morning we got up and took two buses to visit the Terracotta warriors. Emperor Qin Shi Huang had the massive army built in order to protect him in the afterlife. Every artist that sculpted a warrior had to be killed afterwards as the emperor wanted to keep his army a secret!

After the Terracotta Warriors we walked along the Great City Wall; the wall is massive and surrounds the old city in a large square area.

12.11.17

Today was our last day in Xi’an and now I am on the plane back to Tianjin. I feel very tired but today has been a great day and we would have really liked to stay for longer. This morning we got up with the intention to visit some pandas, unfortunately we missed the bus, so instead we got some bikes and cycled to The Great Mercy Temple of Xi’an. This was one of my favourite parts of the trip. We learned a lot about Buddhism and how it was introduced to China from India along the Silk Road. We couldn't take a lot of pictures here in order to show respect.

Now that we are heading back on the plane, we’re realising that Tianjin feels like our home, when a few months ago it felt so far away and unfamiliar. The university and the Chinese students have been so welcoming towards us and I think I can speak for everyone when I say we are all having the time of our lives studying and traveling in China! I hope you have enjoyed reading about my weekend in Xi’an and if you have any questions please let me know.

I'm looking forward to chatting with my link class very soon!