Xian is best-known as the fount of Chinese Civilization. It is the home of the Qin Dynasty, the dynasty that unified China in 221 B.C. It was here that the Qin Emperor was buried, along with thousands of his Terra-cotta Warriors. The Tang Dynasty was the height of Chinese Civilization and they made Xian into the center of the world, the Manhattan of the seventh century. People from all over the old world gathered within Xian’s walls to partake in the goods and glories of the world’s largest empire. For a thousand years, Xian was the center of Chinese Civilization.

Muslim Quarter Streetview

However, Xian has another side; it is where China stops being so Chinese. In Xian, people’s faces begin to change. The change was most pronounced in the city’s large Muslim Quarter. Though the Quarter has been made tacky by so much pandering to tourists, it is largely populated by Muslim Chinese and, as we moved farther from the touristy area, seemed genuinely Muslim. Walking through the Quarter, we noticed a significant increase in facial hair. Most Chinese grow facial hair like twelve year old boys , but, here in Xian, there is a plethora of mustaches and a sprinkling of the long white beards of devout Muslim men.

Behind the Flame

Shishkabob Man

Beyond the facial hair, the Muslims of Xian just look different. They have a stronger jawline and more pronounced cheekbones. Their eyes are less almond-shaped and their faces less round than most Chinese people. Unlike most Chinese, they have a much wider variety of skin tones, some a dark, sun-baked brown, some a pale white, all more like Turkish than Chinese.

Selling Dates

Sexy

The Muslims of Xian are classified ethnically as “Hui” by the Communist apparatchiks who decide these things. It is too simplistic to call them an ethnic group. Although many of them are descended from Muslim traders coming along the Silk Road from Central Asia, some of them are almost certainly descended from Chinese people who converted to Islam.

Noodle Making

Shishkabobs

We wander outside the tourist section. Tucked in a corner is a small mosque. I wander in. Inside the mosque, there is nothing to suggest any Arab influence. The mosque looks almost exactly like a Chinese temple, though there is Arabic script hung from a few places. Clocks list the prayer times in the prayer hall, but the hall is flanked by two small, Chinese-style pavilions, each with a stone-carved stele, just like any other Chinese temple.

Is this a Mosque or a Chinese Temple?

Mosque

In an odd way, Xian is both the end and the beginning of Chinese Civilization. It was here that Chinese civilization began, and it was here that Chinese Civilization flourished, but it is also here that Chinese Civilization shows its first signs of giving way to the Central Asian Civilization that, along the Silk Road, made all the world their marketplace and occasionally, from atop the horse, made all the world their empire. The mosque embodies this fusion of the Chinese and Muslim worlds that is Xian.

One Last Look at You