After checking out of our Beijing hotel, we proceeded on to our next city; Beijing. We arrived at the train station, and I was surprised about the amount of security they had. At the train stations, they have many metal detectors and public safety officers. It was difficult with the amount of luggage we had, but we got by. The train ride was about 6 hours long. It was very smooth and very fast. I saw the train reach speeds of over 330 kilometers per hour, but their record speed is around 450 kilometers per hour. We were riding the fasted train in the world. Although it did not feel like we were traveling as fast as we were, we quickly traveled to Xi’an. Xi’an was very different from Beijing.
The muslim street was a crowded yet amazing area. People are stepping over each other to walk down the street. There were also many food stalls with workers calling out to people passing by to buy their food. There was also a shopping area, where it is common for people to bargain prices of goods. I was able to bargain prices down to under half of what the owner originally offered. This place was also a great shopping area to buy souvenirs. After exploring a little bit, we finally went to visit the Drum Tower. The Drum Tower was built during the Ming Dynasty and has 24 large drums to represent the 24 solar terms. Inside, there are more beautiful decorations and drums. I believe that they have a performance here every day, however, we were not able to see it. During this day, we also had dumplings for dinner. Dumplings have been one of my favorite foods for many years, but this restaurant showed me much more than I have ever seen before. They had dumplings that looked like the filling, for example, the dumplings that were filled with duck meat also looked like ducks! It was one of my favorite dinners.
The next day, we went to the Children`s Village. This village is the home to children that have parents in prison. These children are allowed to have a good education and a home with people that care about them. They are also able to make and sell little toys or decorations to gain money for textbooks or other things they may want. It was a great and colorful community of children of all ages living together and working together. It offers a home when the child may not have had anywhere else to go to.
After visiting the children, we went to the Greater Wide Goose Pagoda. We were able to see a cute and wonderful water show that had classical music. At the Greater Wide Goose Pagoda, many people were praying and there was a large focus on religion. After taking time to appreciate the beautiful Pagoda, we went to see beautiful pieces of art and we understood more about Chinese calligraphy. I used to love drawing and I am learning Japanese (Japanese uses Chinese characters), so this was a very fun experience for me. I loved looking at every piece of art and watching the speaker do calligraphy. Some pieces of art were simple such as only two fish swimming and some were intricate like a beautiful woman in a traditional Chinese dress. I really enjoyed this part of our visit to the Greater Wide Goose Pagoda!
