My voyage around the world--China

On 10th January, at 8.30am went to meet my guide called Vivienne. She write things down what history of the buildings and so on. Went to visit the Tian'anmen (Gate of Heavenly Peace) Square, which is the largest city square in the world and the spiritual heart of China, where the national flag is raised exactly at sunrise everyday.

The Temple of Heaven – the place which was visited yearly by the emperors who performed intricate rituals to insure a good harvest for the whole nation at ancient times. They only visit twice a year once in the summer and once in the winter for peace.

Met another guide called Aileen where she take me with the rickshaw bike ride to the village and went see deaf school but it was closed due to Chinese New Year holiday but I look around the school which have 100 deaf children some with cochlear implant. Also visit the Drum Tower which in ancient time tell the time where people don't have watches, there is 24 drums in total climb up 69 steep stones steps to get the top where they beat the drums.

On 11th - a different guide name Emily who went with me to see the Great Wall of China which is over 2,000 years old and 6,700 Km long - the longest wall in the world. The weather is cold icy and snowing I had to be careful when climb on this wall hold on to the railing inside the wall because the wall building on hills where is not straight flat. You had to walk up and down where the wall was built. We also went to see Ming Tombs.

On 12th - After arriving Xian from overnight sleep on the train (11 half hours journey). Met a different guide name Winnie as we went to see Xian City where the life size Terracotta Warriors and Horses that discovered by the local farmers in 1974 when they digging a well near there. There are 6,000 life sized painted Terracotta Warriors and Horses which had been individually sculpted from real life models over 2,200 years ago since the first emperor in Chinese history - the Emperor Qin Shihuang. Xian was the capital at many years ago for several centuries before move to Beijing as the capital of China today. It is amazing to see the warriors and each of them are different by the size of their tummy, body, hair, clothing, movement, etc. but sadly the color had gone since discover them in 1974 then 2 years later all color had fade which now left with terracotta color. There are 3 different pits which discover in different period and found only 2 warriors riding with 4 horses which made full of bronze which display at the museum. Lastly we went visit up the Bell Tower which is at the centre of the city and there is 4 main roads through it to North, South, East and West.

In here most people ride on bicycles which are common form of transport and now with more people living in the city, the car had increased in numbers with so many hours on traffic. I was amazed at the train station where there is so crowd at any time of the day you had to push through to the crowd and bag are checked in before enter the station to avoid any surprise bombs.

I have learn so many history about China going back to 3,000 years which I not knew before and I will return here again to different part of China.

Catherine Green
Britain
(January 16, 2006)