Yesterday was a day of travel from Beijing to Xi’an the bullet train. This was my first time using a train for travel, let alone an engineering marvel that doesn’t exist in the United States. Speeding by the Chinese countryside at almost 200 miles per hour offered a view of China that we didn’t see in Beijing. The geography of China is beautiful! The ride also really exposed how large China’s population truly is (or is going to be); there were high rise apartment buildings lining the tracks for most of the trip. This really shows the usefulness of the bullet train not only for travel but also for daily commute, as these apartments didn’t appear to be connected to any city. Even though the train ride took over six hours, it went by quickly thanks to the views.
After a restful sleep, we set off for the sun children’s village. This village was founded in 1995 by a former law enforcement officer that saw the need for a stable home for the children of incarcerated parents. These children were either sent to live with relatives, often grandparents that were too old to take care of themselves let alone young children, or forced to fend for themselves on the streets. This was a very commonly voiced concern of the parents, which led to the founding of the sun village. The need was there, and the proof is in the fact that today there are numerous villages like this spread throughout China. After the history lesson on the village, we went to play with the kids in the village. We played soccer, basketball, volleyball, and ping pong with them. I’m embarrassed to say that many of them were better than me at basketball! We wrapped up our time there with a lunch of tofu, cabbage, and sticky rice.
Next we were off to the Wild Goose Pagoda. This complex was, and still is, a beautiful Buddhist temple. It was built in 497 AD, and had the title of Xi’an’s tallest building through the 1980s. This fact was hard to digest at first- hundreds if not thousands of taller buildings exist in Xi’an today.
We wrapped up the day with a delicious meal courtesy of Dr Li and a trip to the Muslim Quarter. We walked there via an alleyway that was bustling with people, traffic, and street vendors. You couldn’t pay me enough money in the world to try the street food they were offering- the food smelled disgusting and it seemed that cleanliness was not a concern. This was unlike anything I had experienced in my life and I feel that it really showed me a different side of China. Since I missed out on the counterfeit stores last time, I decided to go on a bit of a shopping spree right when we got to the Muslim Quarter. Bargaining with the shop workers was challenging sometimes, but it was lots of fun. There was a point when I wanted a t-shirt, so i pulled out fifty yuan bill and said it was all the cash I had. She regretfully accepted, then right after The sale was made I pulled another one hundred yuan to loan to joe so he could get a hoodie. I’ll lever forget the look on her face as we left the store laughing hysterically. Overall, it was a great day.
