Forbidden Gardens Terra Cotta Soldiers Replica. Katy, Texas. June 20, 2009

Forbidden Gardens is an amazing attraction in Katy, Texas near Houston that replicates the terra cotta army of Emperor Qin and the Forbidden City.
Here I am posing in front of the 1/3 scale replicas of the famous statues. Qin (pronounced "chin") was an emperor of a small part of what we now know as China. He managed to take over the other six provinces and unite them. Ye very name of the modern country comes from the pronounciation of the name Qin.

Like many cultures the king felt he needed an immense army to follow him into the afterlife. He considered having all of his soldiers killed and entombed with hime but the cooler heads of his advisers convinced him statuary likenesses would fulfill the same purpose.

It is believed that as many as 8,000 of these life-size sculptures are at the archeological site, every one of them with a unique face modeled after an actual warrior! Forbidden Gardens has over 6,000 replicas in varying sizes.

Emperor Qin surveys his army of thousands of figures. These replicas were crafted from fiberglass. The originals took twenty years to complete, the replicas only four.

Getting goofy with the kingly guy. I have read that in modern times in many countries it is an offensive gesture to give the thumbs up sign. Later in the pictures you will see that this was not always the case. Thumbs up King!

Lined up like the extras in a Bruce Lee epic! These statues are grey in color because one of the tombs experienced a fire and this area replicates that. Qin's tomb has yet to be opened as the historical documents claim that he installed rivers of mercury to emulate Chinese rivers and the site of his tomb is highly toxic. There are also rumors that the ceiling is plastered with gems simulating constellations.

An excellent job on these figures with lots of individual detail.

Oh what a happy warrior. Glad he had a statue buried rather than himself!

As you can see they were not averse to the old thumbs up. So American seeming. Any minute I expect them to start text messaging and discussing American Idol.

Even the Emperor's coachmen with a view of the horse's rear ends is all thumbs uppity.

The entire site is very quiet with many ralaxing spots. Lots of Saturday visitors but it had the feel of a slightly run-down tourist attraction, the kind of place I absolutely LOVE visiting.

Inside one of the buildings there is a huge diorama circling three walls with an amazing rendition of the city of Suzhou, China. This city is known worldwide for it's silk trade.

If you stop and contemplate the time that went into constructing just the diorama it is really astounding! So much detail everywhere.

Outside is a fantastic miniature Forbidden City with dozens of incredibly detailed models of palaces, homes, all of the buildings that were off limits for hundreds of years to the common folks. You can walk around alone but I reccomend the tour also. In an hour or so the guides shed a lot of light, history, and some good humor on the attraction and the real sites.

Every building is very realistic and well done. There are a lot of buildings. They say the real city takes full days of walking to visit. Here you can sum it up in an hour and fulfill all your fantasies of what it would be like to be as big as Godzilla!

People in the background give some scale as to the size of this display. All of the bulidings have incredibly romantic names like the Gate of Heavenly Love or something like that...

Last nut not least I was allowed to ascend the Chinese throne and become Emeror for a minute. The power was overwhelming and caused my face to clench in a super-serious regal grimace.

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