The Terracotta Army Museum is one of the must-visit attractions for all travelers to China. The attraction is located in Xi'an, in west China's Shanxi Province.

    What's special?

    The terracotta Army is the buried army of Qin Shi Huang, an ancient Chinese emperor. These ancient sculptures were built and buried over two thousand years ago near the city of Xi'an. They were discovered in 1974 by farmers digging a well looking for underground water. Over a thousand terracotta warriors and horses have been uncovered since then. Each warrior is made of clay (泥土). They are around two meters tall. The sculptures are so detailed that it is possible to guess the age, rank and personality of each one. None of the soldiers are the same.

    The best time to visit

    The Terracotta Army is an indoor attraction, which is not likely to be affected by weather, so it can be visited all year round.

    As the Terracotta Army Museum is one of the must-visit attractions in China, it is crowded most of the time. We advise our customers to avoid the following periods when the museum is particularly crowded:

    National Day holiday(October 1-7), when it is fully packed.

    Labour Day holiday(May 1-3)

    Weather in winter is dry, cold and the least comfortable, and it's also the worst season for air quality, but it's also low season.

    Travel style: private, group or independent?

    A private tour means a lot of flexibility and you will be well taken care of by a private guide and driver. The museum is crowded most of the time, but our guides know how to escape the crowds, and help our customers to enjoy more in the museum. See our 3-Day Terracotta Warriors Private Tour.

Going with a group you won't get lost, but i lacks flexibility and personal service.

    Travelling on your own you may meet a lot of trouble, such as wasting time on finding a taxi or public bus to the attraction, lining up for tickets, reading maps, making sense of Chinese signs, etc.

    Asking a patient to hum(哼唱)piano tunes and play fin instrument while undergoing brain surgery(手术)may sound like a strange request from a doctor．However，that is exactly what a team of brain specialists，led by Pilcher，requested Dan Fabbio to do．

    In 2015，the then 25-year-old musician was diagnosed with a brain tumor(肿瘤)，which was located in the part of the brain known to be active when people listen to and make music．“Removing a tumor from the brain can have significant consequences depending on its location，”Pilcher says．“Both the tumor and the operation can damage tissue and affect communication between different parts of the brain．”

    Fabbio，therefore，feared the surgery would cause him to lose his musical ability．To prevent that from happening，Pilcher and his colleague designed many tests，including asking Fabbio to listen to piano tunes and hum back during MRI scans．This enabled the physicians to locate the area that is vital for music and language processing and create a 3-D map of Fabbio's brain．

    Despite the great starting point，it was not a perfect way to prevent possible damage to the．The only way was to keep the patient awake and ask him to hum piano tunes during the surgery so that the surgeons could identify the areas to avoid．While the surgery went smoothly，the real test came when Fabbio was asked to play a song on his saxophone．The tunehad been simplified to ensure that it would not require too much strength and cause harm to the stitches(缝线)in the brain．He played it faultlessly，and when he finished，the entire operating room erupted in applause．

    The researchers say that a year after the groundbreaking surgery，the young musician can once again hear tunes in everything—even his electric toothbrush．

    Lagoon Bar, Iceland

    Blue Lagoon in Iceland is truly the place where you can get rid of all troubles. Here the warmth of hot springs gets you close to nature. A wonderful bar is opened among the hot springs. While you're sitting in the hot water, waitresses bring you a range of cocktails.

    What to order: cocktail “Blue Lagoon” and white wine.

    Baobab Tree Bar Wine Cellar, South Africa

    In the hollow (洞) of a huge 6,000-year-old baobab tree you can not only drink a cocktail, but also rest from the heat of Limpopo Province. Once this safe heaven was known only to the Bushmen, but now this ancient tree is the tourist destination for all kinds of tourists.

    What to order: anything in a glass.

    The Birdsville Hotel and Pub, Australia

    At the edge of the Simpson Desert, among the sand dunes (沙丘), which are the favorite spot for the mice, there is a hotel and a pub. The walls of this bar are decorated with old hats and posters of beer, the oldest of which dates from 1884. Most visitors of this building are the amateurs of racing. They come to this village for the September competition. However, the pub is not empty also on other months: the airstrip (飞机跑道) is located nearby, so those who get off the plane are going to have a glass or two of beer first.

    What to order: a pint of beer.

    Floyd's Pelican Bar, Jamaica

    It appears that these huge palm leaves and trunks fell into the ocean long time ago. They floated on the waves and then piled up year by year, sticking out of the ocean. That's probably how the Pelican Bar, located about a mile from the southwest coast of Jamaica, is built on. Some of its visitors have no room to be fitted inside the bar, and they just drink standing in waist-deep water.

    What to order: cocktail “Pelican Perfection”.

    Chinese researchers say they have come up with a simple way to find out a person's biological age —how much the body has aged physically – through a urine (尿) test.

    Their findings will help researchers conduct numbers of ageing studies and even predict a person's risk of age-related diseases, according to a paper published in the journal Frontiers in Ageing Neuroscience.

    Another paper by researchers at the Beijing Hospital and the West China Hospital in Chengdu, Sichuan province, said on Tuesday that people aged at different rates due to changes in their genetic make-up and their environment.

    Chronological age – which is based on one's birth date —was not an exact measure of biological age so a more exact method was needed, the team said.

    Ageing is driven by the lifelong gradual accumulation(积累) of a broad variety of molecular (分子) faults in the body's cells. The team said they had identified a matter 8-oxoGsn that indicated increases in oxidative (氧化性) damage in urine as people's bodies aged.

    Cai Jianping, a co-author at the Beijing Hospital, said: “As we age, we suffer increasing oxidative damage and so the levels of oxidative matters increase in our body.” The team tested the levels of 8-oxoGsn in urine samples from 1,228 Chinese people aged two to 90 and concluded the marker helped accurately determine the stage of biological ageing in adults.

    They had previously found that 8-oxoGsn levels also increased with age in the urine of animals such as mice.

    The team has also developed a rapid analysis technique called ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography(层析法), which can process up to 10 urine samples an hour, according to the study.

    More and more people in America are celebrating the Indian holiday Diwali. Diwali is Hindi for "row of lights". It is the most important holiday in India.

    Many people around the world are beginning to celebrate it as well. The United States is one of the places where the festival is becoming more common. Diwali celebrations can now be found at American landmarks like Disneyland in California and New York City's Times Square. They are also held in many parks and museums.

    Neeta Bhasin created the Times Square event. She said Indian immigrants have found great success in America. But, she said, many Americans still do not know much about India. So, she decided to act." I felt it's about time that we should take India to mainstream America and show India's rich culture, heritage, arts and variety to the world," she said, "and I couldn't find a better place than Times Square."

    Bhasin came to the United States from India 40 years ago. She is president of ASB Communications, the marketing firm behind Diwali at Times Square. Tens of thousands of people attend the event, now in its fourth year.

    In India, Diwali is a five-day harvest festival held just before the Hindu New Year. The exact dates change from year to year but Diwali is always in the fall. Celebrations include lighting oil lamps or candles called "diyas".

    A Diwali celebration will light up Disney California Adventure Park in Anaheim this year. Visitors can watch performances of traditional Indian dances and take part in a Bollywood dance party. The event is part of a Festival of Holidays program at the theme park to show cultural traditions from around the world. The program takes place on November 10th through January 7th.

    San Antonio, Texas, also holds a Diwali celebration. And it is one of the nation's largest celebrations, with more than 15,000 people in attendance each year. Visitors can enjoy Indian dance，food and fireworks. Organizers also plan to float hundreds of lighted candles in the San Antonio River, along the city's famous River Walk.