{"id":5163,"date":"2019-07-09T05:41:15","date_gmt":"2019-07-09T12:41:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=5163"},"modified":"2022-12-13T08:48:14","modified_gmt":"2022-12-13T16:48:14","slug":"indiana-jones-part-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2019\/07\/09\/indiana-jones-part-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Indiana Jones: Part I"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Yes, it really was like that. Somewhere along the Silk Road (the actual Silk Road) in China. I parked my RX3 when I saw the double rainbow, thinking someday I might use the shot in a blog about this adventure.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Almost 40 years ago, I saw my first Indiana Jones movie and it affected me profoundly.\u00a0 I started traveling the world stumbling upon lost empires. Things that have been swallowed by time, as they say.\u00a0 My motorcycle ride through Colombia had some of that.\u00a0 The Baja adventures have a bit of it, too.\u00a0 But none of the rides had more of an Indiana Jones flavor than did the ride across China.\u00a0 That ride was three years ago this month, and I still think about it every day.\u00a0 There were several things we saw in China that would have been right at home in an Indiana Jones movie.\u00a0 One was Liqian. \u00a0 I can best tell you about it with an excerpt from Riding China<\/em>, the story of the ride with Joe Gresh across the Ancient Kingdom.<\/p>\n

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Gobi Gresh, aka Arjiu, stopping to smell the sunflowers in China.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The ride in the morning was just like yesterday. We rode the Silk Road at high speed, making great time in magnificent weather. I knew we were going to Wuwei (you could have a lot of fun with that name; it\u2019s pronounced \u201cwoo wee\u201d), but that was really all I knew about that day as we started out that morning. Boy, would this day ever be an interesting one!<\/p>\n

It was to be a very full day, and Wuwei would be another one of those cities of several million people that seem to pop up in China every 50 to 100 miles. It was a huge city I had never heard of. China is an amazing place, and I was going to learn today it is more amazing than I could have imagined, and for a reason I would have never guessed. I\u2019ve mentioned Indiana Jones movies a lot in this book. Today, we came upon something that could easily be\u2026well, read on. This is going to be good.<\/p>\n

After riding for a couple of hours, we left the freeway and entered a city called Yongchang. It seemed to be pretty much a regular Chinese city until we stopped. I needed to find a bathroom and Wong helped me. Wong is a big, imposing guy. He\u2019s a corrections officer supervisor in Xi\u2019an. He has a friendly look, but he can turn that off in a New York minute and become an extremely imposing figure. I saw him do that once on this trip, and I\u2019ll tell you about that episode when we get to it.<\/p>\n

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Corrections Officer Supervisor Wong. He looks like a mischievous guy. This guy’s command presence was amazing. I saw him stop a car just by looking at it. Here, he’s enjoying the attention in Yongchang.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Anyway, I followed Wong through a couple of alleys and businesses until we came to an empty restaurant (it was mid-morning, and it had no customers). Wong spoke to the lady there, she nodded her head and smiled at me, and pointed to the bathroom.\u00a0When I rejoined the guys back on the street, several women at a tailor shop (we had coincidentally stopped in front of a tailor shop) were fussing over Wong. He needed a button sewn on his jacket and it was obvious they were flirting with him. Wong seemed to be enjoying it. Like I said, Wong is a big guy, and I guess you could say he\u2019s good looking. I think the women who were sewing his button on were thinking the same thing.<\/p>\n

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Beautiful young Chinese ladies. Mostly Chinese, anyway.\u00a0 The one on the left is entering my phone number in her contacts list.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Three teenage girls approached us and wanted to know about our bikes. Like many young Chinese, they spoke English (in China, you learn English as a second language in grade school; it is a strong advantage in Chinese society if you can speak English well). They wanted to practice with us. It was the routine stuff (\u201chow are you?\u201d \u201chello,\u201d and things like that) until one of the teenaged girls looked directly at me and asked, \u201cCan I have your phone number?\u201d Gresh and I both had a good laugh over that. I actually gave her my phone number and she carefully entered it into her phone (and no, she hasn\u2019t called me yet).<\/p>\n

I was enjoying all of this immensely, taking photos of the girls, the seamstresses flirting with Wong, and the rest of China all around me. There was something different about one of those teenage girls. I couldn\u2019t quite recognize what it was, but to me she definitely looked, well, different.<\/p>\n

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Yongchang statues. They don’t look as Chinese as you might think they should. There’s a reason for that.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was at about that time that Sean approached me and said, \u201cDajiu<\/em>, do you see those three statues over there?\u201d He pointed to three tall statues that faced us, perhaps 300 yards away. I nodded yes. \u201cIf you look at their faces, you will see that they have Roman features.\u201d Truth be told, I couldn\u2019t really see it in the statues because they were too far away, but I grabbed a photo and later, on my computer, I could see something different. But before I looked at the photo, it all clicked for me. That\u2019s what had my attention with that girl. We were literally in the middle of China and she didn\u2019t look as Chinese as her two friends. She looked different.<\/p>\n

All right, my friends, I need to go tangential here for a minute or two and share this story with you. Hang on, because this is real Indiana Jones stuff. No, scratch that. I\u2019ve never seen an Indiana Jones movie with a story line this good (and I\u2019ve seen all of them).<\/p>\n

More than 2,000 years ago, before the birth of Christ, the two most powerful empires on the planet were the Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty. These two superpowers of their time enjoyed a brisk trade relationship along the Silk Road. Yep, the very same trail we had been riding for the last few days. Between them (in what became Iran and its surrounding regions) lay a smaller empire called Parthia. For reasons only the Romans understood, Rome thought it would be a good idea to attack Parthia. They sent several Roman Legions to war (and to put this in perspective, a Roman Legion consisted of about 5,000 men). To everyone\u2019s surprise (including, I would imagine, the Romans), the Parthians kicked Rome\u2019s butt.<\/p>\n

Wow, imagine that. Rome, defeated on the field of battle by the much smaller Parthian Empire. To put it mildly, things did not quite go the way the Romans thought they would.<\/p>\n

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All of this severely disrupted trade between the Han Dynasty and the Romans, and nobody liked that. \u201cWhy the hell did you do that?\u201d the Han Dynasty asked Rome. \u201cWe had a good thing going and you screwed it up.\u201d\u00a0 At least that’s what I’m guessing the conversation went like.\u00a0 You get the idea.<\/p>\n

Cooler minds prevailed and the Romans\u00a0 realized, yeah, that was a dumb move.\u00a0 The Romans told the Parthians, hey, it\u2019s over, let\u2019s be friends again. The war ended, the Chinese were happy, the Romans were happy, the Parthians were happy, and trade resumed. All\u2019s well that ends well.<\/p>\n

Well, sort of. There was still that matter of those pesky Roman legions that had invaded Parthia. They didn\u2019t come back from that war, and for two thousand years, no one knew what happened to them. The Romans probably assumed their Legionnaires had all been slaughtered.\u00a0 No one knew until an Australian dude and a Chinese guy, both University archeologist types (starting to sound a little like Indiana Jones yet?) put a theory together in 1957. Hmmm, maybe those Romans had not been killed after all.<\/p>\n

The Parthians, being bright enough to defeat the Romans, were not about to let the Legionnaires go home and perhaps attack them again in some future war. They didn\u2019t want to kill the Romans, either. I guess they were kinder, gentler Parthians.\u00a0 Here\u2019s where those two Aussie and Chinese archeologists enter the picture. They hypothesized that the Parthians told the errant Legionnaires, \u201cLook, we don\u2019t want to kill all you guys, but there\u2019s no way we\u2019re going to let you go back to Rome. And there\u2019s no room for you here, either. Your only option is to keep heading east. Go to China. Maybe you crazy warmongering Italians will find nice Chinese girls and settle down.” \u00a0 With that, and as one might imagine, a hearty arrivederci<\/em>, the Romans continued their eastward march straight into the middle of China.<\/p>\n

And folks, the prevailing wisdom today is that is exactly what happened (although the prevailing wisdom evidently hasn\u2019t prevailed very far, as I had never heard the story until that morning in Yongchang). In fact, prior to this theory surfacing, folks wondered why the Chinese referred to the area around Yongchang as Liqian<\/em>. That\u2019s not a Chinese word, and it’s unlike the name of any other Chinese town.\u00a0 The folks who know about these things tell me it is an unusual word in the Chinese language.<\/p>\n

Liqian<\/em> is\u00a0 pronounced \u201cLee Chee On.\u201d<\/p>\n

Get it yet?<\/p>\n

Lee Chee On? Liqian<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Doesn\u2019t it sound like \u201clegion?\u201d As in Roman legion?<\/p>\n

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A Chinese man in Liqian. This guy could be the Marlboro Man for a Chinese cigarette company!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I found all of this fascinating. I saw more than a few people around the Liqian<\/em> area that had a distinct western appearance, and they all consented to my taking their photos when I asked. They recognize just how special their story is. The Chinese government is taking note of this area, too. They are developing a large theme park just outside of Yongchang with a Roman motif. We visited that theme park, and while we were there, Sergeant Zuo gave a book to me (printed in both English and Chinese) about the place. It is one of the two books I brought back from China, and that book is now one of my most prized possessions.<\/p>\n

Imagine that:\u00a0 Roman legions, resettled in the middle of China, in a town called Liqian<\/em>.\u00a0 And I rode there.\u00a0 On an RX3.<\/p>\n

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Watch for our next Indiana Jones episode in China.\u00a0 It’s about the lost Buddhist grottos at Mo Gao in the Gobi Desert.\u00a0 There’s more good stuff coming your way.\u00a0 Stay tuned!<\/p>\n

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Want to read more about the ride across China?\u00a0 Pick up a copy of Riding China<\/em><\/a>!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Almost 40 years ago, I saw my first Indiana Jones movie and it affected me profoundly.\u00a0 I started traveling the world stumbling upon lost empires. Things that have been swallowed by time, as they say.\u00a0 My motorcycle ride through Colombia had some of that.\u00a0 The Baja adventures have a bit of it, too.\u00a0 But none … Continue reading “Indiana Jones: Part I”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[654,66,89,369],"tags":[77,162,787],"class_list":["post-5163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventure-motorcycle-books","category-joe-gresh","category-motorcycle-adventure-ride","category-zongshen","tag-adventure-riding-in-china","tag-china","tag-liqian"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5163"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20234,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5163\/revisions\/20234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}