Tim Boelter

We deeply apologize for the delay in getting these last few dispatches out. The final days in Beijing were spent conducting business and wrapping up this trip. Hopefully our followers will continue to come to this site as we will be updating it for months to come with photos, commentary, video, and updates on our series being produced in China. And we’ll be posting our final dispatches over the next several days.

On May 24th we departed out of Xian for our final destination, Zhengzhou. The drive from Xian would take us to the Army of Terracotta Warriors (more detail below) where we spent about three hours visiting and filming in two of the three excavation pits. Without any problems I filmed inside and outside throughout the entire complex. Although I wasn’t allowed to use the tripod, I had it in tow, and although ignorance is sometimes an excuse to push the limits, I did use it until the guards properly scolded me. Lucky for me they didn’t confiscate my footage.

Our stay in Zhengzhou was more or less uneventful. This was the end of our trip on the Silk Road and for Lao Wang it was time to reunite with his family and get back to work running his bar the Target Pub. The night before we left Zhengzhou, Mike and I spent time at the pub with Lao Wang.

Little did we know that reliving the experience with his patrons would take us well into the morning, 4:00 am to be exact. We helped close the bar and headed off to our hotel room where Mike and I fell into our beds exhausted.

On May 26th our flight took off an hour late from Zhengzhou but within an hour and half we arrived in Beijing and reached our hotel by midnight. Apparently the hotel had no rooms available except the high dollar top floor suites with an upstairs loft in them. But because I made the reservation online and had not received a confirmation before turning off the computer I would not know this. The hotel had tried emailing me to let me know they had no rooms available, but we were already enroute. When we arrived in Beijing we could not find the shuttle driver at the airport. I called my wife on the sat phone in the States to learn that the hotel was fully booked, but apparently the Sino Swiss Hotel would upgrade our room to accommodate us and not charge us the extra cost. So for the duration of our stay in Beijing, Mike and I had first class accommodations in the high dollar suite. This was a nice bonus after everything we had been through.

Before leaving China we still had some work to do in Beijing. I had some meetings to attend to concerning film projects here in China and we had additional footage to shoot at the Great Wall, the Temple of Heaven and the Forbidden City.

Beijing is a sprawling cosmopolitan city where an endless horizon of buildings stretches off into the distant haze. Billboards line the highways showcasing new luxurious condominiums and single-family homes that rival anything in the west. Modern glass skyscrapers thrust into the sky while broad clean avenues with thick green foliage extend into a sea of traffic lights and overpasses. It’s a city on the move and still under substantial construction. With the 2008 Olympics just around the corner Beijing has a lot to prove to the world and judging by the remarkable site of endless construction cranes stretching for as far as the eye can see, I think the world will be in awe of the remarkable changes taking place here.

But just as I write those words I suddenly realize that Beijing is becoming just like any other western modern city. In other words the world is becoming one big homogenous state that eventually will lack the unique diversity of culture, traditions, language, and even ethnicity. Sure we’ll be able to still experience it, but it will be a contrived tourist destination like a museum or mock up village with actors pretending to partake in traditional practices.

Just within the past ten years China has moved forward at lightning speed. During this time substantial changes have been made throughout the country involving almost every facet of life. Soon the Three Gorges will be under water, nomadic herders are being told that a sedentary life style is better, traditional practices and cultural lifestyles are being exploited for tourist dollars.

Now with all this said, I probably shouldn’t be too judgmental of China because they are going through the same evolutional changes that we have gone through here in the States. And in hindsight we all have made mistakes. Perhaps we tend to be more judgmental because today we see the mistakes of our past and would like to warn others not make the same mistakes.

So during our last few days Mike and I felt like tourists making our way through the traditional tourist sites being shuffled around with all the other foreigners.

All I can say is that for those of you who intend to visit China, before visiting places like Xian, Shanghai, Beijing, and all the other well publicized places make a point to travel deeper into the country and see the real China, because soon that’ll be gone also.

Thoughout this trip we’ve been trying to absorb all the history surrounding us. It’s been overwhelming. Here are some history tidbits from Xian and China overall.

Xian and the Army of Terracotta Warriors
In 1974 farmers were digging a well when they accidentally unearthed what would become one of the greatest archeological finds of the 20th century. They exposed underground pits constructed of timber and clay that housed life size sculptures of over 6,000 soldiers and horses in battle formation. This Army of Terracotta Warriors was created to protect the tomb of China’s first emperor, Qin Shihuangdi.

Visitors can see the actual sites and the excavation as it’s taking place. All three excavation pits are housed in three separate enormous buildings and a Museum also houses the remarkable bronze chariots and horses found in 1980 20 meters from Qin Shihuangdi’s tomb.

The beginning of China’s dynastic rule
It was under the Qin dynasty that China was finally unified. Although Qin Shihuangdi ruled with an iron fist and was considered brutal, he would become one of the most influential emperors of China by creating a standardized central authority, unifying the language, and creating a common currency. The capital of the Qin Dynasty would be set up in what was called Changan, meaning eternal peace, this city is known today as Xian.

Before Qin Shihuangdi became China’s first emperor, China may have had three “dynasties” or periods before the Qin Dynasty. Although there are no written records to confirm the Xia period, archeological finds just outside of Xian at the ancient village of Banpo have uncovered evidence that a sedentary society existed here almost 6,000 years ago. Today tourist can visit this village. We did not have a chance to visit Banpo simply because time was running out and we needed to get to Zhengzhou.

The Shang period was the beginning of textual evidence in which characters have been found on ancient bones, shells and bronze vessels. These characters are probably the foundation for the development of modern Chinese writing. The Shang culture was also concentrated in the northern part of modern day China around the Yellow River and the Huai River.

The Zhou period brought in the expansion of rule that reached as far north as Beijing and further to the south reaching the Yangzi River. When the Zhou capital was moved from the Xian area further east, the division created the Western Zhou and the Eastern Zhou. This would become known as the Warring States period. Under the destabilized period of the divided Zhou dynasty a nobleman by the name of Kong Fuzi wanted to find resolve within the warring states, but failed. So he headed off on a mission to find the virtues of a righteous leader who could once again bring stability to the world. Although he failed to find what he looked for his writings and teachings would live on. He became known in the western world as Confucius. His books would later become the principle tenet for Chinese scholars.

The Great Wall of China
During the Warring States period the great northern nomadic tribe known as the Xiongu Empire was continually invading the northern borders of China’s frontier. During the Zhou period, the northern states had been building walls to help prevent attacks from the Xiongnu. Later under Qin Shihuangdi (in an attempt to link the walls together to further stop the attacks) the Great Wall would begin taking shape. During the Qin Dynasty the Great Wall of China extended as far west as the eastern side of the Gansu Province. Once the Han Dynasty took control of China, Emperor Wudi expanded the wall to protect the Silk Road by establishing highly fortified garrison towns throughout the Hexi Corridor of Gansu and right into modern day Xinjiang Province. The Great Wall was constructed linking these forts giving protection to the caravans of traders on the Silk route.

Cheers,
Tim

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