A Random Saturday - 31 May 2013

While all our Saturdays are different, there is a certain rhythm to them. Saturday May 31^st fit that pattern.

Up early, Honey Nut Cheerios and fruit, then into the office where we spend the majority of our time. Ann spent a large part of the morning on her American History classes while I corrected essays from my Intermediate Writing classes. These are all sophomore classes in the English department so we are teaching the same students and frequently shared comments about them as we corrected.

Kinda messy but very productive room

Ann finished before me and wanted to do some ironing (hmmm - maybe "wanted" is the wrong word choice; maybe I should have said "decided to"). Iron started leaking. 

She told me she was running to the store to buy a new one. Down 10 flights of stairs and a couple of blocks south, then over the overpass to Ren Ren - our big grocery store / department store on the south side of campus. Lots of choices. 

Everything was about twice the price of what it would cost in American - even though the American one would also be made in China. Since ironing is optional, irons are considered a luxury good and are highly taxed, like most “non-essentials” over here.

After the stairs walk along the walkway outside our apartment

Out the South Gate to the busy street that must be crossed. The taxi you see is where we usually catch a taxi to go most anywhere.

Fortunately we use the overpass 

RenRen -  the Kmart of the far east.  So interesting! And, they carry irons. Now just redo the above path.

Her way back was very crowded. What is normally only a 10 minute walk took much longer because a large crowd was gathering around the entrance of the campus high school (#1 in Xian and highly desired for admissions if you want to go to a good university). Ann said it seemed as if something/ someone was getting ready to make a fun appearance since it is a holiday weekend. She does not have nearly as much curiosity as she has an aversion to crowds so she worked her way through it and got back home to do her ironing.

Does this look safe to you?

I mentioned it’s a holiday weekend. Dragon Boat Festival. It honors a Chinese patriot from 2000 years ago. Like all Chinese festivals, it has very specific foods, events, activities etc. One tradition is hanging mugwort leaves which discourages disease, repels mosquitoes, and purifies the air. 

One morning last week, as we left for school, our door and all the others in our stairwell had mugwort (doesn't that sound like something from Harry Potter?) branches sitting next to our doors. Ours doesn't seem to be working. With all the rain of the past few weeks, Ann has been a fantastic feast for local mosquitoes. Me? Not so much. Too acidic I think.

On a holiday weekend like this, where the actual holiday is Monday, we most typically would be traveling. The trouble is we don't have passports. They are at the India Consulate in Beijing waiting for visas for our trip home. Church will be a little lite Sunday since 7 of the BYU teachers are off traveling. Donohoes flew off to Nanjing. Despains and Sandy went with their school to Mt Tai. Stevensons are biking the hills and plateaus around the perimeter of our area. And we are here with Powells.

Or this - maybe I should just concentrate on my cell phone and not look up.

Around lunch time we emailed Powells to see if they wanted to do some afternoon exploring. We arranged to meet them about 3:15 at the south central gate of the 9 mile city wall. For lunch we had peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and fruit.

I wrapped up my correcting for the day around 2:30 and we took off. Down the 10 flights, down the three blocks, and out the south gate. Looked for a taxi for a minute then crossed the overpass to the south side of Youyi Lu to catch an eastbound bus. 

Kept looking for a taxi but didn't quickly see one. We hoped to take the 707 bus which would have gone directly there although dropping us off a couple of blocks away. But instead, a near empty 700 bus drove past. Near empty? Never. Always stuffed about 20 people over sardine capacity. So we double timed to the bus and the kindly driver surprisingly waited for us to catch up with him. 16 cent fare.Near empty bus or not, it took us forever to go just under 2 kilometers east. We almost could have walked as fast. Eastbound on Youyi is always so slow. Got off the bus and looked for a pedi-cab to go the kilometer north to the wall. Did not see any. 

Side saddle is always an option.....

 Dozens of motorcycles were waiting and loading up people to shuttle them the short distance from the bus stop to their destination. So many middle aged men earn a living as $1/ride shuttle motorcycle drivers. We typically would just walk around the corner and take the subway one stop north and then walk the last few blocks through the parks across the moat and outside the south city wall. I did however ask Ann if she wanted to take a quick motorcycle shuttle. Her response was a predictable, sensible, "Asking me that is just like asking me if I want escargot for dinner tonight."

We went down, down, down into a very nice subway tunnel. Saw 3 very lost westerners in what I thought was the wrong line. We never see westerners. They just don't make it out of the major tourist spots in this city. I verified my thoughts and headed some very grateful young people in a different direction. We got on an overstuffed subway - I have no idea how we actually fit in - and rode it one stop north. Few got off with us so I am guessing everyone was going right into the center city/ Drum Tower/ Muslim Quarter - its everyone’s', including our, favorite destination.

Getting from this subway stop in the center island across to a walkway is crazy. You cannot imagine how unsafe the process is in this highly congested, totally unregulated area. It is actually one of our favorite parts of Xian - when we survive it - which Ann was not so sure about this time. The walk past the gardens, over the moat, and by the statuary and the park is so pleasant. We will really miss all of these back in Minnesota.

The larger than life statues are located all over the city and are so impressive to everyone, inlcuding the local residents.

We love our moat and all the walkways around it and the city wall.

We met Jordan and Cindy Powell, some of our favorite exploring buddies from Highland Utah, at the beginning of Shuyuanmen Street, the restored Qing Dynasty ancient cultural street. It’s a place we really enjoy. Several hundred small art and cultural stores and street carts along a winding road of maybe a little less than a kilometer. Cindy and Ann had a great time contemplating buying hundreds of very cool items from amazing paint brushes to pounds of rice paper, jewelry, carvings, statuary, to really anything you could possible get a tourist, or local, to decorate their home or body with – or that an artist might need. Fortunately they only bought a few very nice but inexpensive pieces of jewelry. 

That is until we came to the booth where the hand painted scarfs and fans were more than the girls could resist. Dozens of the booths are manned by artisans doing their painting or calligraphy. In fact, last time we were here we bought 4 woven scrolls representing a typical Chinese landscape in each of the 4 seasons. I am going to put 2 of them in my den and then give 2 away to anyone who wants them for their den. But I digress. These scarfs spoke to the girls and unlike the trinkets that cost little, these were very costly so they wanted me to negotiate. I willingly did it. So much fun. Well anyhow, Ann now has a beautiful hand painted scarf and a complimenting hand painted fan that we bought for $16 each.

He paints behind his booth. Just beautiful!

We try to decide - they are all wonderful!

We buy and are very pleased!

This is a fellow teacher and friend, Cindy, standing in front of the door to one of the restrooms. Do not, I repeat, do not be fooled by the cute doorway...

Ann said I paced things perfectly, but I kept gently moving us along because we also wanted to go to the Stone Forest at the end of the culture/art street. We made it and had a couple of hours to explore. Both couples had it on our list to see but we were totally unprepared for what it was. It should have been WAY higher on our list. It was almost as cool as the Terra-cotta Warriors. It is China's home for thousands of ancient stone tablets like Moses had. 2-4' wide and 4-8 feet tall. Full of ancient writing, religious scriptures, and ancient literature - just mind boggling. It was also full of hundreds of life-sized or larger carvings of animals, Buddhas, and ancient Chinese leaders.

What was really amazing to me was how many of the items were 1-2,000+ years old yet had just been unearthed in the last few decades as they built the airport, this campus building, that office building. Most of this was actually from the area around here when Xian was the ancient Chinese capital. The walled-in Stone Forest itself first felt like a huge, beautiful Chinese park with pavilions here, courtyards there, and buildings here and there. The park was wonderful until you started entering buildings and were blown away by what was displayed. We were so overwhelmed by it that we nearly forgot the wonderful afternoon we had just spent on the cultural street.

The number of stone tablets that have been found is just staggering!

This is a picture of Mt HuaShan whichis a mountain we, Jenny and Mary have actually visited.

This guy was about 8 feet tall and most imposing.

Ok ,these are hitching posts in the Chinese tradition. Kind of makes you embarrassed with the wild west version.

When the park/museum/forest closed (ok - I have to ask again: how did this amazing gem get hidden in plain sight in the middle of the old city and we never really heard about it?) we walked a little more to the east and decided to take a crazy ride in a pedi-cab in very dense traffic north a couple of kilometers to a favorite restaurant. A Brazilian steakhouse in a hotel. We spent several relaxing hours replaying our day and talking about China in general. About 9:30 we left the restaurant and each couple quickly grabbed a taxi home. It is such a beautiful ride through the old city and especially along the lighted old city walls. It is so beautiful and we just love it.

Except for attending the temple or being with the kids and grandkids, Saturdays in America just cannot compete with what Xian offers.