Thursday

Yesterday, after we had got off the night train and had breakfast at our hotel in Xian in which we would be spending the night, we took our coach to a local art museum full of wonderful paintings and shadow puppets etc. There we were shown round and told about a few of the paintings.

Then came, for me, challenging part. We were taught how to draw some Chinese ideogram characters, including the ones for the UK and China. It was tricky at first, but most of us got the hang of it towards the end of the session. Afterwards a few of us bought paintings done by art students.

We then took the coach to the Terracotta Warrior site. We parked our coach and took a buggy ride to the main site. First, we went into a 360 degree cinema to watch a 15 minute film about the creation and the discovery of the warriors.

We were then led to the biggest of the pits filled with lined up warriors. When they were first excavated they were in many pieces and still reconstruction is continuing today, many years later.

We then proceeded to have lunch.

Next, we went to a buddist temple. Inside the complex there was a large rectanglar tower with 8 floor which was used as a library for many scriptures although now, the building is empty so we didn't climb it. We also had around half an hour's free time to wander and explore the temple for ourselves. Some of my friends, Jess, Vicky, Yfke, and myself went and walked around the beautiful gardens.

We then went back to the hotel for about an hour to freshen up before tea. After tea, we then went out to the hussle and haggle of the night market. We were, again, given some time to wander about as we pleased.

We had a wonderful day and we were all exhausted.

Eleanor S.