Oct 10, 2014, Friday – Xining China




Great Mosque - Xining China

The first stop was the Great Mosque.  Xining has a very large Muslim population and the Mosque is the center of their religious activity.  We toured the Mosque but could not enter the prayer rooms. 

Prayer Rugs

The crowd at 1:00 prayers

Later in the day we came back to the Mosque in time for 1:00 prayers.  The crowd had overflowed from the Mosque onto the front plaza, along the sidewalks and took over an entire lane in the street. 

There was a huge market in the adjacent streets with some shops with clothing and housewares but most were selling various foods with large numbers of fruit and veggie stands, nuts, seeds, and mushrooms. 

Also lots of chickens (dead and alive).  The dead ones came in three skin colors, blue/gray, orange and the kind we get in the US.  We watched a shopkeeper corral a chicken for a patron but we didn’t stay around for the end.  There were also several shop keepers de-feathering dead birds using a blow torch to singe off the feathers.  They are a lot closer to their food sources than we are. 



There were also a number of stalls with large slabs of meat.  Best guess is that most were sheep or goats.  The last is based on watching several small boys (around 3 or 4 years old), playing with goat heads.  They held the heads in front of themselves by the horns and then butted the heads together.  (A lot closer to their food.)

Next was a trip to the Tibetan Medicine Museum of China.  It was generally very interesting with our guide interpreting and explaining various exhibits.  We observed several very old Thangkas (pronounces tanka).  These are paintings on panels and depict scenes or, in this case, describe information about Tibetan medicine.  Several showed skeletal details (the skulls looked funny - smiley and happy).

The most impressive exhibit was “The Great Thangka”.  It was started in 1996 and took four years and 400 craftsmen to complete.  It is 8.25 feet high and almost 2030 feet long (not allowed to take photos, sorry).  It was displayed in one long very windy case that covered most of a floor of the museum.  The thangka pictures included (partial list) information on the world's formation, human creation, Tibetan origins, Tibetan monarchs, the origin and development of Tibetan Buddhist sects, the sciences of linguistics, medicine, astronomy, poetry, and drama, Tibetan scenic and historical sites, festivals, daily necessities, weapons, houses, tents, castles patterns, and pictures beseeching luck and fortune.

For a change of pace we went to a riverside park and watched kite flying ...   

... and dancing.  Every day an impromptu dance session occurs at the park with someone bringing a music device and everyone dropping purses and briefcases in the middle and dancing round in a circle.  Some people have masks on.  The masks help keep the moisture in.  Tibet is very dry.

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