After our arrival in Xi’an in the early afternoon, we went
straight to lunch at a Muslim restaurant for lunch. The food was delicious. Xi’an has an estimated 70,000 population of
Muslims, dating back to the Tang Dynasty when they came via the Silk Road.
Next we went to the Xi’an Museum, where we got to revel in
another one of the fabulous surprises that National Geographic arranged for
us. We went through the busy museum,
downstairs, and to a quiet room past some old Terra-cotta statues and animals
in a hallway.
Led into a room with cabinets and a big table, we sat down, put
on white cloth gloves, and got ready.
The two museum staffers assigned to work with us pulled out two artifacts
that were 2,000-3,000 years old. We passed
them around the table – always setting on the table for the next person, rather
than passing hand to hand.
Ironically, both objects were for alcohol – one to drink it
and one to hold it. They had intricate carvings,
including the name of the owner.
There were a number of big, easy to use magnifying glasses
with lights on them out on the table we could use to inspect the artifacts
with. One artifact was passed clockwise,
while the other went counterclockwise.
Simply getting to handle these precious artifacts (with gloves on, of course) was thrilling.
I had never imagined I would ever get to do anything like
that, much less hold and inspect incredible objects that were thousands of
years old. For a pair of political
science majors in Carol and I, It was very cool. The group peppered the museum staff with
smart, interesting questions.
(Btw, to be fair, the fellow who did all the talking whilst
Leo translated is not just staff, but clearly a lead archeologist. The other fellow spoke some English, so Carol
went to him for her questions (we were sitting across the table from each
other).
After the two objects were completely passed around, I
thought to myself – wow, that was cool.
And then they put those away and brought out two more. In total there were four sets of two objects
each, totaling eight objects (Editor’s Note: I’m betting ALL of your readers
could have gotten 4X2=8. Blogger: I’m
glad someone has faith in them!)
The remaining six objects were not as old, but still. .
.everything was at least 300 years old or older. Even holding and inspecting artifacts that
were 1,000 years old was thrilling.
While we couldn't take pictures in the
artifact room, these were hanging out
just outside of it.
Pretty sure that's a dog, albeit
NOT a Labradoodle.
Beautiful view outside the museum.
Dragons outside the museum.
One of the more ornate museum signs.
The Wild Goose pagoda. We would
have walked to it, but apparently
it's a wild goose chase to get there.
(Oh c'mon, I had to!)
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