Marco Polo, Pt. 2

What greets them is an astonishing world like no other place on earth—one that the West could never even conceive of. Here they discover something called time pieces, learn the advantages of paper currency and an imperial postal system for exchanging messages. They enjoy such strange delicacies as ice cream and pasta, and witness the awesome implications of the advanced weaponry of an empire under draconian rule. From religion to war to culture, everything Marco believes about his world is challenged and proven wrong. So too are his rigid notions of Kublai Khan who accepts Marco as an envoy of his court, where he advances as a Mongol grandee, shares in the forbidden love of a Persian princess, and in a historically important and unprecedented move, chronicles his life over the next twenty years, marooned on the far side of the world.