Shanxi Museum in Taiyuan

Hello Everyone!

Before I posted more pictures today, I wanted to just give a map of China, Shanxi, and Taiyuan to kind of show where were spent most of out time!

So, Shanxi is one of the provinces(states) of China towards the north east. The translation of 'Shanxi' is Mountain West or The West of the Mountain. The image on the right is of Shanxi and the highlighted yellow is of the capital city Taiyuan. The translation of 'Taiyuan' means Great Plains. Taiyuan is a city of industry, producing the majority of coal in all of China. They are also home to the largest steel company in all of Asia.
Taiyuan makes the best vinegar in the country and some of the best noodles!

One of the 'touristy' places we visited in Taiyuan is the Shanxi Museum. I'll post a few pictures of the outside and some of the cooler things inside, only if you want to see more comment below and I will make a post just with those pictures! I don't want to bore you too much! haha.

This is the outside of the museum and its shaped like an upside down pyramid! Lol

The side of the walkway had a few pillars on the way to the entrance.

This was on their temporary display. It is a headpiece for on of the indigenous tribes of China.

This is a centuries old bowl for food! It is also one of the first bowls to have been decorated with paint!

This little piggy looks really cute! Its secret is that it will hold your wine for you!

This is a set of Chinese bells. Yes, a musical instrument. It had little dots all over it to give it that unique Chinese bell sound.

This painting is of the misty mountains in Shanxi. Done with ink and lots of water. 

If you can believe this, I will tell you this is an ancient pillow. The Chinese used these ceramic pillows to keep their head off the ground at night

These are some of the earliest painted bowls using multiple colors. Most other pottery used only one color.

This piece is such a pretty blue color. If you notice on the bottom there are only three legs. This was seen as the most stable leg formation.

This bowl was one of my favorites. Its very simple white but on the sides there are little orange goldfish painted on the sides. There was a mirror set up for us to see the bottom stamp, proof it was made in China.

The next few pictures are figures, bottles, and cups made from some of the finest jade in China. These pieces took long hours to craft and are really amazing to look at the detail!

I hope you enjoyed these pictures and some of my stories! I will post more on Sunday!