We were in Xian and have now traveled to Chengdu, capital city of Sichuan province. Sichuan is famous for its spicy food (eg Kung Pao chicken and Ma Po Tofu) and its pandas, because the only wild pandas in the world live either in Sichuan or neighboring provinces. Chengdu is very charming, compared to the polluted Beijing or Xian (which was old but where it rained almost every day). I was very excited to see blue skies again!
Chengdu is also an ancient city, about 4000 years old, and was the epicenter of an independent Chinese kingdom and culture during the Neolithic and afterwards. We went to a museum about this culture (the Shu Kingdom) today, which was very interesting. While there were scattered historical references, and peasants kept finding artifacts, the actual existence of the Shu and the extent of their kingdom wasn't discovered until the 1980s, and most of the excavations were done in the last six years or so. So the museum is very nice and new, and was obviously constructed with the lavish use of funds. We also visited a Taoist temple (where Lao Tzu was supposed to have appeared in the form of a shepherd many centuries ago), an Imperial Tomb (the only one above ground ever found) from approx. 800 AD, and the home of Du Fu, one of the most famous Chinese poets (from about 700 AD). He is so beloved that his home has become surrounded by numerous shrines and buildings dedicated to honoring his memory and his poetry: it's probably 3 acres of Du Fu shrines and gardens.
Chengdu is quite hot, and very humid. Perhaps for this reason, everyone moves very slowly and seems much more relaxed than in the other cities we've visited. Tea houses are extremely popular here, and there seems to be one on every corner, full of people talking, smoking (Chinese males all smoke like fiends, everywhere), playing cards, eating, gambling, etc. for hours on end.
Tomorrow we will travel to see the world's largest Buddha in Leshan, and then we will fly to the wilds of Yunnan, China's southern frontier.
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