Arriving in Xi'an

Wow, the train trip wiped us out! That was certifiably the worst night of sleep either of us have ever had! The lights were kept on, there was no space to move, babies were screaming, on and on it went. We got off the train feeling as groggy as we did after the plane ride to Korea. Except now we were in the middle of Xi'an, surrounded by crowds in the hazy 95* heat. We had finally arrived at around 1:00 pm, and found the local bus we needed with no problem. Xi'an, as a city, instantly felt more like China than Chengdu did. Right away you are met with a giant city wall with gates that reach over 200 feet into the air. The first impression was amazing.

We found our was through smelly, narrow streets to our hostel. With each step we tried not to get run over by bikes, rickshaws, cars, or mopeds, or step in anything to foul! This place is pretty amazing, it was voted the number one hostel in all of Asia last month on hostelworld.com! We had a lot on our to do list as soon as we walked in. We confirmed our reservations, found out about the Terracotta tour, and inquired about the train tickets to Beijing right away. The next night had already been booked solid, but that's ok because we had an extra day to work with anyways. We asked her about the next night after that and she said, "You're only choices are..." and my head went spinning, thinking we'd be stuck between seats and standing room only. What if we're stuck in Xi'an for days??? "choices are...soft sleeper or hard sleeper..." I don't think Dani and I have ever agreed on anything faster, we both said "soft sleeper!" after that horrendous experience on the first train. Alas, they didn't have two beds together, so we settled for a hard sleeper. Whatever, as long as we'll be able to be horizontal this time! After settling in, we took a four hour nap in our nice, quiet, air conditioned room! We needed a solid rest so badly! On the train I slept 30-40 minutes out of every hour, in 10-20 minute inervals (Dani slept maybe an hour all night!). Not to mention we had peanuts to eat the past 24 hours...literally, we split a bag of peanuts! The hostel's kichen was closed when we first got here, which was one of the most disappointing things ever after looking at the menu for 10 minutes trying to decide what to have.

So after our rest, we went down and both had nice big burgers and cold drinks. We spent a few minutes on the internet and waited for the tasting party to begin. The tasting party was a free event put on by the hostel, and was quite amazing. They sold the idea to us all by saying "come taste the local delicacies". Sounded harmless enough, I thought, it was about time we had some real Chinese food. The catch was that we are in Xi'an, with a famous Muslim quarter, home to the largest Mosque in China. In fact, we're only a couple of blocks away. So the food found here is quite a unique mix of ingredients and flavors. We stood in a circle around a table full of goodies, and handed each one around individually. I'm proud to say out of 25 or so dishes, Dani and I tried all but 2. This included a couple of "mystery meats" which turned out to be duck intestine, pig's lung, and pig's periteneal lining (the lining around the pig's heart and lungs). Some of it was much tamer, like "Dragon's beard sugar" and Persimmon cake. All and all the food was decent, but as Tom (the host employee) put it, this will be our first (and last) time ever trying this stuff. What an experience! I felt like Andrew Zimmer on Bizzare Foods! After the party we hit the bed early and slept for another 10 hours! What a day!