From Hong Kong we did 24 hours by train to Beijin. The train was much better than we expected and in the end we had a pleasant journey.
Arriving in China was an instantaneous shock, with a mix of disappointment and surprise. The country does not look anything like the image we had in our mind, from the movies, the negative ads on television or etc.. Beijing is very modern, developed, organized, clean and polluted of course… But even with all its modernity many of the new buildings have the traditional Chinese roof, retaining some traces of their culture. Emerging country? For us it really looks like a developed country!

We stayed at Alex’s home, an Italian we met in Lausanne that is living there for five years already. One night we went for dining and drinking with the Italian “mafia” of his friends at a Chinese restaurant and a night club. Fun night!

On Sunday we walked around the nice Houhai Lake, which is the local favorite attraction of the weekend, and of course the place was pretty busy.

We visited the famous Forbidden City, which is impressive by its size but not so much by its form, that seems a simple and repetitive architecture. The most interesting part are the roofs, with each tile carved differently.

Then we went to visited the so expected Great Wall of China, a must for our trip! It was a sunny day and the view with the mountains around was really beautiful. We did a 2 hour walk from one point to the other. Some parts were super inclined and it is amazing to think how it was built in the middle of nowhere, in the mountain.

From Beijing we did 12 hours by train to Xi-an. We thought it was a small town. Ahahaha … Small town of 4, 5 million people! We went there just to visit one of the most impressive historical sites in the world: The Terracotta Warriors. About 6000 warriors statues carved in terracotta in full human size, each with a different face and in war position. Madness of an emperor who wanted to take his army with him when he died. It’s been 38 years that was discovered and so far only 2000 warriors have been unearthed. Really impressive!