Beijing Day 2

The day started with a bus pick up to all the famous sites in Beijing (excluding the Great Wall). We began the tour at Tiananmen Square.

Our lovely group consisted of our tour guide, Song (English name Forrest), us Canadians, an older Australian Couple whom provided great comic relief, an English couple who had just quit their jobs and will be travelling around the world for a year, and a gorgeous Indian couple who were both going to University in China studying Medicine. We were a great ecclectic little family.

Tiananmen Square was just like any Square in the world. A square of stone road leading up to a gianormous recangular building. The history of the place is what makes it with the cultural revolution and the protesting of the University students but to look at it was not that spectacular in my humble opinion. Large with Mao Zedong in charge. Sadly too I did not get any refresher on the signifigance and history of any of the people's republic of China which made this square more "just squarish" than as signficant as it could of / should have been... I suppose when I have a moment i should go back and brush up on this history.

From here we literally crossed the street (albeit underground) and made it to the Forbidden City. The Forbidden city is really a palace built to hold the Emperors of China thus "forbidden" to the public. This place was incredible! Built in 1406 (but since destroyed numerous times by fire and rebuilt) the enormity of it was unbelievable. There are 9 999 rooms in it all perfectly symmetrically built. 9 999 rooms because the 10000 room was for God (whom the Emperor was just beneath of Course!) All the buildings were also summetrically built with a middle axis. This was for good Fein Shui depicting harmony and balance. The whole palace screamed ROYALTY! It was enormous, there were various levels (all aligned with marble stairs/gaurd rails), the middle buildings were obviously more important due to their position. The reds, blues, greens with gold accents heightened the visual feast. There were incredible details in the ceiling paintings but also in the roof top gargoyles. Each building had a different number of tiny animal figurines on them the higher the number the greater importance of the room and who occupied it. The Emperor that lived here truly had the Royal life. For breakfast each morning he ate 100 different dishes.. though I am not sure if we can call him a glutton because he only ate two bites from each bowl for fear that it may be poisoned.

It seems the threat of death was always a worry to the Chinese Emperors. I was told that unlike most monarchs China's rulers were not decided upon bloodline. Essentially, any common man with enough power backing him could take over. Interestingly, for 2 generations of great Emperors one Empress "The Dragon lady" (the Dragon actually represents the Emperor (most powerful one) and the Pheonix the Empress) ruled the land and used these men as her figure heads. She was actually a concubine of lower status (there were about 7 levels- princesses from other lands would have had a higher rank) This dragon lady had a son and reared him/trained him to be Emperor. A Chinese rags to riches story. This Emperor in return gave his mother "The Summer Palace"

The Summer Palace was another stop on this day tour. We took a dragon boat across a beautiful lake to an almost island like paradise. There were similar style homes in square symmetirical syle floor plans. What was interesting was that the whole thing was man made. The lake was dug up and the dirt used to build the hill in which the compound was housed. THen trees from all over the world were planted to decorate the island. Naturally stunning! Stautes of the pheonix and dragon also flanked some of the more important buildings. Cheekily though the queen had the statues position switched so that the pheonix actually stood where the ruling Dragon statue should stand. Cheeky Cheeky woman... I think we could have been friends... he he.

Somewhere between all of this we also saw the Temple of Heaven. It is a huge dome shaped blue painted building. The blue signifying the heavens vs the green Earth/red royalty. The emperor came here twice a year to pray fro good harvest. Otherwise I believe it wasn't used.

The path that lead to the temple was one of the strangest experiences I have ever encountered. Chinese people lined both sides of a partly enclosed walkway (roof) enjoying a lesiurely day in the park. Only every 8 steps somehting new was happening... one woman was signing...8 steps... men were playing Asian checkerlike board game... 8 steps.. trumpet players.. 8 steps men slapping cards on to a pile and yelling... 8 steps one sixty year old man doing a ballet type of dance. It was like a strange dream where things quickly flip into a new situation.

This whole day ended at 6 where we sadly said goodbye to our new friends.. funny how much you can learn about people in a day.

That evening we went on a walk to find somehting to eat. We wound up at an outdoor street food market... ASSSAHHHH... street food is one of my favorite things to check out. I had heard that CHina would not dissappoint. Centipedes on sticks, snakes, starfish, and seahorses... all for you to try. Too bad my tummy was empty and I just couldn't do it... Spencer and I will choke somthing down before the trip is over though. The funniest part of the experience was that there was an odd ball non Chinese man behind one of the booths (think big Grecian)... we made eye contact... and he yelled at me "TESTICLES for you!" haha sorry buddy I don't want your testicles. We finally settled in a chinese restuarant ate some ridiculously oily food (I have decided I am not a fan of Chinese food-- but who knew?? ) Then on the way to the hotel we got a little lost... but no big blow outs.. and we made it home safe and sound. Finally it was bed time... gawd i am tired recapping only 43 more days to go.. haha