Busy day in Xi'an. Huashan Tomorrow

Got on the tour minibus at 0730 with Charity, about 15 other tourist and a very eloquent mid-aged lady guide.

She wasn't happy about my joining her tour but sitting out the first 3 sites in the bus with a beer.

1. 临潼博物馆, Ling Tong Museum, 24 RMB, where the featured attaction was 4 of the "very first" Terra Cotta Warriors unearthed, and a piece of some shoulder bone of some famous budda. Later I found out that the 4 Soldiers were borrowed from the Terra Cotta site to boost business for the museum. I was right it was a waste of money, but some people buy the budda story

2. 华清池, 65 RMB, hot-spring-bath-themed park for the famous Yang Concubine 杨贵妃, as well as office and home of Chiang Kai-chek, after he was defeated by CCP

3. 秦始皇陵, 2x RMB, the grave site of Qin, the first emperor of China. This would have been a marvel to see except current technology still can't dig up this grave; furthermore, it is expected this will remain the case for 50 years in the horizon. Thus this site is nothing but a huge protrution of mud in the ground. You stand on it and wander what's 10 meters (?) below. Waste of money.

Charity went to the first 2 though.

We ditched the tour group and went to skip to 兵马俑, by ourselves. A local lady driver managed to temporarily convince us that the stuff in 兵马俑 was fake and was manufactured in one of the many factories along side the same main road as all of the above sites, and that if we were to see fake stuff, might as well pay 18RMB instead of 90 to see her friends fake 兵马俑.

So we bought her story and went to this "8 Wonders of the World" site, where the guide tried to convince us that Great Wall and the Leaning Tower wasn't among them. I got a little pissed and left the place then went to the 90RMB real 兵马俑.

I'd have to say it was quite something, but I'm not the type to appreciate it. Afterall, it's soldiers made from dirt, alot of them. I stare at them for about 20 seconds in amazement, then the next 2 hours was more or less boredom. I would have been more interested if the tour guide talked about the different weapons, and how they used them; but instead she spend alot of time talking about this farmer who discovered Terra Cotta, and now is famous and has a great signature designed by a famous caligrapher, and that if we buy this expensive book (which is not available elsewhere), he'd sign it for us.

I got more stuff to say about this but my card time in this computer cafe is running out.

Well, I ended the day with some nice food near 鼓楼 (Gu Lou -- Drum Gate), and bought a Tuo Luo to play with.