Beijing
I guess it's about time I give another update. What follows are a couple separate posts on my most recent travels. First is Beijing.
In late April we went to Beijing for a class field trip. We left on the train at about 10 pm and arrived in Beijing at about 9am. We first went to Tiananmen square which a large open space directly in front of the Forbidden City. At Tiananmen square is also Mao Zedong's Mausoleum. The Mausoleum is a large square building. It's not particularly ornate and it was a more modern in architecture. When you first enter there is a large statue of Mao and then some tables for placing flowers. We then went around the statue to another room where Mao's body was located. Mao was a large sealed glass case with his head sticking out of the coffin and a "hammer and sickle" flag draped over his body. After the room with Mao's body we went to a third small room in the back of the Mausoleum where they had a gift shop. China has apparently whole hearted accepted capitalism and now even the Mausoleum of the founding father is not to sacred to set up shops.
After seeing Mao we headed to the Forbidden City, which was the massive palace for emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties (1407 - 1911). Folklore says the Forbidden City has 9999 rooms because only "heaven" has 10,000. The palace very interesting with many large traditional Chinese buildings most of which were painted red and had gold roofs. I was slightly disappointed in the fact we were not allowed to go into any of the buildings. Instead we had to stand at the front door and look jostle for position to look inside. Another point of interest was the Starbucks located in the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City was very interesting but wasn't quite as spectacular as I had built it up in my own mind. The buildings seemed all the same and were of the same style I had seen many times before and since we couldn't go inside it became very repetitive.
The next day we went to see the Great Wall of China. The Great Wall was created in 220 B.C. then later in the Ming dynasty it was renovated. The renovated part is the part we see now. The original wall was made of dirt or rocks or stone or whatever wa s available where as the new part is made of most the large stone we see today. The Wall is about 30 feet tall and 15 feet wide at the top with towers every couple hundred yards. The We took a bus to about an hour north of Beijing. But to get to the wall we first had to climb 1000 steps us the side of a mountain/hill. The Wall Once on the wall we had a wonderful view. The Great wall appears to have been built from one mountain top to the next. I assume so that fires at the warning towers could be seen from greater distances. This design led to dramatic views of the Wall climbing up and down the mountain sides. Also surprising to me was how many branches the Wall had. We normally think of the Great Wall as being one continuous wall where in reality it's several separate walls that were joined together. Because of this, at parts the Wall split into 2 or 3 branches. While at the Wall me and the guys decided to climb out the window and go see a part of the Wall that branched off and had not been restored. That was the best part because we new we were seeing the original wall and not some recreation. This section of the wall was in surprisingly good condition. At some parts the wall had deteriorated so that only the outer skin and not the center which had been mad of dirt remained. But all along the section we traveled the Wall was continuous and never completely disintegrated. After reaching the first tower on the original wall section we took a break and some pictures before heading back.
After the Great Wall we saw "Temple of Heaven" which was where the Emperor went every year to pray to Heaven. This temple was basically like every other temple we have been to with traditional style buildings. One thing that set this one apart from other was the large round temple. Most temple are square but because the circle is associated with heaven they decided to make this temple round. Another point of interest was the large empty platform that looks as though it was made of marble. The emperor used stand at the center of this platform and it is here he would talk to heaven.
While in Beijing we also saw a Daoist temple and the "Dali Llama Temple" but these temples were basically the same as any other r temple in China.
Also while in Beijing we had roast Beijing Duck which is extremely famous in China. With Beijing duck they give you a tortilla looking thing. Then you place the duck skin in the tortilla with a little duck sauce and onions and eat up. The interesting thing is they don't give you much meat they only give you the skin and a little meat that hangs off the skin. With your duck they also give you the head of the duck because the brain and meat in the head are supposed to be good. But a couple of guys in our group convinced John that real men in China eat the head whole. And wanting to impress us John actually ate one and a half heads whole including the bones and the beak. I was a little surprised our teacher didn't say anything. Afterwards John seemed very proud of himself.
That pretty much covers Beijing.
That's all for now. I'll right about Hainan soon.
~Aaron Yates
In late April we went to Beijing for a class field trip. We left on the train at about 10 pm and arrived in Beijing at about 9am. We first went to Tiananmen square which a large open space directly in front of the Forbidden City. At Tiananmen square is also Mao Zedong's Mausoleum. The Mausoleum is a large square building. It's not particularly ornate and it was a more modern in architecture. When you first enter there is a large statue of Mao and then some tables for placing flowers. We then went around the statue to another room where Mao's body was located. Mao was a large sealed glass case with his head sticking out of the coffin and a "hammer and sickle" flag draped over his body. After the room with Mao's body we went to a third small room in the back of the Mausoleum where they had a gift shop. China has apparently whole hearted accepted capitalism and now even the Mausoleum of the founding father is not to sacred to set up shops.
After seeing Mao we headed to the Forbidden City, which was the massive palace for emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties (1407 - 1911). Folklore says the Forbidden City has 9999 rooms because only "heaven" has 10,000. The palace very interesting with many large traditional Chinese buildings most of which were painted red and had gold roofs. I was slightly disappointed in the fact we were not allowed to go into any of the buildings. Instead we had to stand at the front door and look jostle for position to look inside. Another point of interest was the Starbucks located in the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City was very interesting but wasn't quite as spectacular as I had built it up in my own mind. The buildings seemed all the same and were of the same style I had seen many times before and since we couldn't go inside it became very repetitive.
The next day we went to see the Great Wall of China. The Great Wall was created in 220 B.C. then later in the Ming dynasty it was renovated. The renovated part is the part we see now. The original wall was made of dirt or rocks or stone or whatever wa s available where as the new part is made of most the large stone we see today. The Wall is about 30 feet tall and 15 feet wide at the top with towers every couple hundred yards. The We took a bus to about an hour north of Beijing. But to get to the wall we first had to climb 1000 steps us the side of a mountain/hill. The Wall Once on the wall we had a wonderful view. The Great wall appears to have been built from one mountain top to the next. I assume so that fires at the warning towers could be seen from greater distances. This design led to dramatic views of the Wall climbing up and down the mountain sides. Also surprising to me was how many branches the Wall had. We normally think of the Great Wall as being one continuous wall where in reality it's several separate walls that were joined together. Because of this, at parts the Wall split into 2 or 3 branches. While at the Wall me and the guys decided to climb out the window and go see a part of the Wall that branched off and had not been restored. That was the best part because we new we were seeing the original wall and not some recreation. This section of the wall was in surprisingly good condition. At some parts the wall had deteriorated so that only the outer skin and not the center which had been mad of dirt remained. But all along the section we traveled the Wall was continuous and never completely disintegrated. After reaching the first tower on the original wall section we took a break and some pictures before heading back.
After the Great Wall we saw "Temple of Heaven" which was where the Emperor went every year to pray to Heaven. This temple was basically like every other temple we have been to with traditional style buildings. One thing that set this one apart from other was the large round temple. Most temple are square but because the circle is associated with heaven they decided to make this temple round. Another point of interest was the large empty platform that looks as though it was made of marble. The emperor used stand at the center of this platform and it is here he would talk to heaven.
While in Beijing we also saw a Daoist temple and the "Dali Llama Temple" but these temples were basically the same as any other r temple in China.
Also while in Beijing we had roast Beijing Duck which is extremely famous in China. With Beijing duck they give you a tortilla looking thing. Then you place the duck skin in the tortilla with a little duck sauce and onions and eat up. The interesting thing is they don't give you much meat they only give you the skin and a little meat that hangs off the skin. With your duck they also give you the head of the duck because the brain and meat in the head are supposed to be good. But a couple of guys in our group convinced John that real men in China eat the head whole. And wanting to impress us John actually ate one and a half heads whole including the bones and the beak. I was a little surprised our teacher didn't say anything. Afterwards John seemed very proud of himself.
That pretty much covers Beijing.
That's all for now. I'll right about Hainan soon.
~Aaron Yates
posted by Aaron at 6:00 PM
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