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1997
Route in China (CHINA - Xi'an)
Bec2004-09-19 16:57:28
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Xi'an
This is the train station where I arrived in Xi'an after taking the night train from Datong. I had shared a six bunk hard sleeper section with two men and two girls who ignored me so completely that I thought they were being unfriendly or even hostile. I felt a little hurt and did not know what to do because I generally got a smile or at least a nod from total strangers in similar circumstances. I retired into my shell, stayed out of their way and read as long as I could with my flashlight before finally falling asleep. As we were approaching Xi'an the next morning one of the girls blushed violently and said hello to me. Only then did I realize that their cold behaviour could have been caused by extreme embarrassment of sleeping in the presence of a stranger. It was a strange experience which forced me to meditate on the deep cultural differences between East and West.
I dropped my bag at the"Flats of Renmin" hotel and undertook the exploration of China's odest and most famous capital, Chang'an, now called Xi'an, the starting point of the fabled silk route to the west.
It is in the fertile Yellow River basin that the ancestors of the Chinese first developed the social structures that made agriculture and sedentary life possible. Archaeological digs at Bampo on the outskirts of modern Xi'an have unearthed the traces of a neolithic village occupied as early as 4500 BC. Chinese chronicles refer to a "Well Watered City" on this site at the beginning of the legendary Xia Dynasty (2200 - 1700 BC). Excavations further down the Yellow river have uncovered cities of the Shang Dynasty (1700 - 1100 BC) at Zhengzhou and Anyang with its characteristic bronze weapons, ornaments and vessels.
Fenghao, one of the capitals of the Zhou Dynasty (1100 - 221 BC), who replaced the Shang, was only 15 km south-west of present day Xi'an. XienYang, the capital of the short lived Qin Dynasty (221 - 207), was 12 kms
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See photographs from:
China Gallery
