The Muslim Quarter - Xi'an

In the center of the walled city of Xi'an (the oldest part of the city) is the Muslim Quarter, a bustling, loud, colorful marketplace that is a tourist paradise - both Chinese and foreigner alike. Every few months we walk or take a cab there and spend a few hours walking along the crowded streets, taking in the sites, smells and haggling for a souvenir.

Most all tourists to Xian go here and most tourists are Chinese. The people watching here is spectacular and watching the Chinese from Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and other more developed cities is the most fun. It is as amazing a place, out of the ordinary from "their China" as it is for us. It is very popular and for good reason.

The Bell Tower is located inside the city wall almost in the center of the city. It's base serves as the entrance to the winding streets and walks of the Muslim Quarter.

The streets are lined with all kinds of food booths, markets, souvenier shops and peddlers. The smells range from the amazing to strange to great to, well, awful.

Dried dates, nuts, seeds and other fruits are painstakingly arranged for sale.  There are so many things we have never seen before.  Sometimes we take them to our students who fill us in on what they are.

The variety is almost endless.

Cooks prepare the food fresh while you watch. Everything from lamb, pork, noodles, squid, crabs and lots of things we have never seen, almost all of it added to a spicy, hot sauce made of the hottest red chilis. When you say no spice they merely add just a "little". The white caps are religious head coverings.

This man is chopping meat on a wooden slab of a tree trunk. They are very good at it but you don't want to get too close.

Now add to the mix automobiles and life is really complicated. the streets are narrow, the traffic rules are ignored and the idea of yieldling is totally lost.  The following pictures show this well. Who will win?