We left early. We had an hour drive out of the city to do one last ticketed activity. That hour went fast as our guide gave us a history lesson and taught us how to count in Chinese. Everyone had their cameras out and were excited to get to the front row of the crowds to see this.
And, man, they’re worth seeing. 70,000 men worked for decades in order to complete thousands of these clay statues which were for the purpose of scaring off potential threatening intruders and for accompanying the emperor into the afterlife. As soon as the emperor died, all 70,000 of those workers were killed themselves so that they didn’t share any secrets about the tomb. All that effort, all that time, all those lives lost for no good reason. They all were smashed and weapons taken by either the general or the emperor’s own son.
All that was left of decades of labor and 70,000 lives to ensure eternal life for one emperor was this.
broken pieces.
It’s dark outside now. The light of my screen is the only one on. My roommate is already sleeping soundly. I’m hoping the rest of the team is already sleeping as well after a long travel day. And, I’m sitting here thinking about broken clay pieces and all the people who we’ll meet tomorrow–the woman who loves Audrey Hepburn, the foster mom who fed me a lunch feast last year, the kindergarten teacher who grew up there, the director who hugged me today when he met our van, and the children…all the children. And, I’m thinking about how I want more for them than broken pieces. I want them to know that they don’t have to try so hard. Someone has already taken care of it all. I want them to see that in us from the moment we enter those gates tomorrow until after we leave on Friday evening.
Here we go.