1510 Diana at the entrance to the Chang ling Tomb in the Ming Tomb area.
1517 The Gate of Eminent Favor, with the Hall of Eminent Favor, the best preserved Ming Dynasty structures.
1540 Zhu Di, Emperor Yongle, the third Ming Emperor. You can see the pile of cash at his feet.
1547 The phoenix crown of the Empress, the most beautiful exhibit in the Hall of Eminent Favor.
Oct 11 – At Sea. Tomorrow we will leave the ship for an overnight trip to Beijing. It’s a long drive and alternative to staying there is two days of exhausting bus trips. Not to mention that you lose a lot of touring time because you’re not there in the evening and the following morning you’re on the bus coming back instead of touring. Staying over costs a little extra because you are staying in a nice hotel and have the guide for 2 days but it’s definitely worth it. We did the same thing last time we were here and it was great.
Today was a typical day at sea for me, I didn’t do anything out of the ordinary.
We’re having a Variety Show this evening. This is what HAL does when several performers are leaving the ship. We’re going to see Peter Neighbour on the clarinet, Max Dolcelli, comedian and The Divas of Motown. I enjoyed all of them so it promises to be a good show. Notice that they are arranged in order of increasing energy. Very wise. The show was excellent. It’s an early morning tomorrow. Chinese immigration check starts at 7AM on the pier to breakfast will be at 6AM and then it’s off to Beijing for two days. Last time we did this 10 years ago it was fun. We’ll have to see how much difference 10 years has made.
Oct 12 - Xingang (Beijing), China. The past 10 years has made a lot of difference but more on that later. We have to clear the Chinese officials face to face, just like we did the Japanese. Difference is that the Chinese immigration will be in the pier terminal and not on the ship. Tom Mullen, our Cruise Specialists escort, had us gather in the Ocean Bar on board at 7:30am so breakfast was at 6am.
Most of us were on time but it didn’t matter. Some SNAFU with the Chinese officials had us sitting around until about 8:30am. They called one set of numbers for disembarkation and then didn’t call any more for about 40 minutes. With the Japanese we were almost all through in that much time and they were taking fingerprints. Efficiency is definitely at a lower level here.
We were cleared and on the bus by 9:20am, almost an hour behind schedule. When we were here in 2002 they were preparing for the 2008 Olympics. The road from the port was being upgraded to freeway but none of the interchanges were done. That meant whenever we got to what is now an interchange we had to wait for a traffic director to tell us when it was our turn. Now, with the interchanges completed, we zipped along at max speed until we were on the outskirts of Beijing. There the freeway started to crawl. Beijing is a large city in every aspect you can name, population, area, etc. It’s about like LA, very spread out, only larger and with much worse traffic. It could be better but the mix of busses, cars, trucks, motorcycles, mopeds, bicycles, pedestrians, push carts, rickshaws, tuc-tucs and other assorted vehicles, all of which seem to be following different rules-of-the-road creates a chaos that would be disaster anywhere else. Here it seems to work out although very slowly.
The drive in was about 2.5 hours and that gave our guide a lot of time to fill us in on China, some history, some culture and some recent events.
Questionable Note: I’ve heard it a million times and I’m sure you have too. An instructor will begin a class with the statements, “Don’t be afraid to ask questions. If you have a question, others probably have the same one. There’s no such thing as a stupid question, so ask.” I know why this is done. The instructor want’s to establish an atmosphere conducive to communication and asking questions of the instructor is a part of that process. However, THERE ARE SUCH THINGS AS STUPID QUESTIONS!!!! But then you know that because as an intelligent person you’ve probably heard much more than one of them in your lifetime. I’ve done my share of teaching and there’s nothing I like more than give and take in the classroom. Straight lecture bores me. The trick is, how do you discourage the people who ask the stupid questions without hurting their feelings or stifling discourse? It’s hard, especially with the absolutely moronic. They are too mentally challenged to understand how dumb they really are.
Here’s the interchange that sparked this little tirade. Our guide was explaining how the system works in China. In his next statement he said that you can now own a home but no one in China can own the land. You lease that from the state because the state owns all the land. Next our guide told us that the price of housing has gone up a lot in the last 8 years in China due to increases in construction costs and the cost of land. One of my fellow travelers yelled out, “If the government owns the land why does the cost go up?” The guide was so baffled by this question that he didn’t know what to say. It was obvious that he understood economics and its various realities much better than the passenger. Our fellow guest is laboring under the delusion that if it’s from the government it’s free or should be free. The assumption necessary to ask that question is that the government doesn’t participate in the realities of the nation’s economy. Our government raises the price of many things all the time (grazing rights leases, National Park admissions, ad nauseum) but apparently that fact is lost on him. One of the most insidious prices that a government can raise is taxes. The economic reality is that taxes are an expenditure for many of us (50% of adults in the US did not file a taxable 1040 last year.) just like food and clothing. The thing that makes taxes insidious is that we have little say in whether or not we ‘consume’ them. We can buy fewer or less expensive clothes, or stretch our food budget by buying in quantity or selecting less expensive alternatives. Just try telling our government that you are choosing to pay fewer and less expensive taxes.
Our founding fathers had it exactly right. The power to tax is the power to control or destroy. Frivolous spending of the people’s money should be a serious crime. Unfortunately, we are at the tipping point where more people get money from the government than give money to it. Every society that has reached that point in the past has decayed and died. Some quickly, some slowly, but the end result has always been the same. Whatever happened to the idea first expressed by Abraham Lincoln and repeated by John Kennedy, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country!” The current attitude seems to be ‘Let the government do for me what I am unwilling to do for myself.’
One thing about travel is that it gives you a big dose of reality. People on welfare in the US would be in the ‘middle class’ most places in the world. Instead of gratitude, the despise and hold in contempt the very people paying the taxes that allows the government to support them. Amazing!!
All right! My longest rant to date. Back to the trip. Much like the DFW Metroplex or Los Angeles, there is no good traffic time in Beijing. Beijing is surrounded by multiple ‘ring roads’, I think 5 of them. The inner three are packed with traffic 24/7 (or 31 as Jake Harper would say). From the 3rd ring in, about 8 miles, took longer than the 57 miles it took to reach that point. Our coach commander, Mr. Wong, was as skillful as any driver with which I’ve ever ridden. If you tied some thread to the back bumper of our bus, he would have gotten it through the needle on the first swipe.
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Our first stop was at the Ming Tombs. This 15 square mile area is the burial place for 13 of the 16 emperors of the Ming Dynasty. Of the 13, 3 have been restored to some extent. We are visiting the Chang Ling Tomb of the third Ming emperor Zhu Di (1360-1424) because it was the first to be built and the most impressive. Things can get a little confusing when you are talking about Chinese emperors. Interred here are Zhu Di, his wife and 16 concubines. Or at least they think so as the actual burial site has never been excavated although images have been made of the underground complex. He is referred to in various documents as both Emperor Yongle and Zhu Di. The real confusion is that he has three names as emperor, Emperor Yongle, his temple title is Emperor Chengzu and his posthumous title is Emperor Wen.
After entering walled compound through the fore gate you are across a square from the Gate of Eminent Favor. It’s here that sacrifices to the Imperial Tombs were brought and the blessings received from heaven. After passing through this gate you are in the courtyard of the Hall of Eminent Favor. This double-eaved building was used for the display of memorial tablets and costumes of the dead emperor as well as the performance of religious rites. It’s one of the most impressive surviving Ming buildings. This hall and the Gate of Eminent Favor are made of Nanmu (fragrant cedar), a rare hardwood. They are the only surviving hall and gate structures from the Ming era. The massive 43-foot columns supporting the roof are of the same wood.
The hall currently serves as an interpretive center for the tomb and has displays explaining the history of Emperor Yongle and the construction of the tomb site as well as artifacts unearthed during the reconstruction. The most beautiful artifact in the hall is the crown of the empress. It’s mainly bright blue in color and adorned with dragons, pearls and other jewels. The design is a phoenix rising into the clouds and is constructed of many enameled silver pieces attached to a mesh net of silver wires.
The largest exhibit in the hall is the statue of a seated Emperor Yongle that’s much larger than life-size. There must have been a celebration not too long ago as there’s a large pile of cash on the floor at his feet. One of the reasons he’s the first to be buried here is that he moved the capital of China from Nanjing to Beijing. He supervised the construction of the Forbidden City that we’ll visit tomorrow.
The Chinese are very proud of the toilets at this site. The sign at the door to them proudly exclaims “4-Star Rated Toilet, Issued by Beijing Tourism Administration.” It was nice and it was clean but most of the stalls were the ‘bombs away’ type that most of the women hate. They do have a few ‘western’ toilets and you can easily tell which ones they are by the lines leading to the doors.
It is an impressive place (the tomb, not the toilet) and no less so for seeing it the second time.
It’s now about 1pm and since breakfast was at 6am everyone is getting pretty hungry. Something about being on the ship makes you want to eat on a certain schedule. We are eating lunch at a place the guide called the ‘Jade Factory’. I’m a little concerned that we’re going to have to endure a sales pitch before we actually sit down to eat. Well, it wasn’t as bad as I suspected it might be, the talk was informative and interesting but the natives were pretty restless during most of it. Most were paying polite attention to the attractive girl making the presentation.
As is usually the custom, lunch was at round tables with a large lazy-Susan in the center and the hits just keep on coming. It usually starts slow but then dishes keep arriving until there’s no more room on the table for them. The servings are so large that all but the most popular items have a lot still on them when everyone is full. Most of the time the entrees that disappear are those most recognizable from Chinese restaurants in the US. Sweet and sour shrimp always winds up a clean plate and that’s ok because it’s not significantly different from the offerings I can find all over SoCal. The more unusual, and I think authentic, dishes are often not recognizable as their US counterparts because they use Chinese vegetables here where as in the US our vegetables are substituted. For example, Chinese broccoli does not look like US broccoli, they use different mushrooms (the ones they use here in China would be much more expensive than the common button mushrooms we use in the US), and some of the vegetables are just not used back home also because of cost. It’s nice traveling with picky eaters because you can always get plenty to eat and it’s usually the good stuff that they avoid. Lunch was good, but not great.
Next stop, the Great Wall. The wall started out as a set of earthen ramparts built by each of the separate kingdoms that would eventually be brought into a unified China by Qin Shi Haungdi in the late 200s BC. These early walls were connected and rebuilt as the Great Wall shortly thereafter. Reaching over 4,000 miles from the Gobi Desert to the sea the most prolific builders were once again our friends of the Ming dynasty. I guess that’s not surprising as it was one of the longest and most stable periods in Chinese history.
We are visiting at the JuYong Pass, one of the three areas near Beijing that have been restored. It’s a good place to see the wall as it ascends the hills on both sides of the river so whether you’re early of late in the day one way or the other will be ok for pictures. Today, with the sun in the west the eastern side of the wall had the good light. Like last time we climbed the wall to the west so that we could look back to the east. It was a good plan but the day is so smoggy that the pictures will need some work to make them even marginally presentable.
Last time we were here we climbed to the third tower on the west bank. This time we only made it to the second. Between the second and third towers the ridgeline the wall follows becomes significantly steeper. At one point near the third tower the stairs average about 12-16 inches in rise and only about 5-6 inches in depth. This results in a rather disturbing illusion. When a person is standing on the fourth step down from the tower landing his feet are 4-5 feet below it yet he’s only 15-18 inches away from it. When you stand about 5 feet back from the top step and look at him you can only see his head and shoulders and he’s only 6 feet from you. It gives the illusion that he’s floating on air right next to the tower’s platform. Very weird. Getting up those steps is a challenge but going down is worse. It’s difficult to get low enough to prevent having your foot free fall trying to get it onto the lower step because as you step down you tend to lean forward. If you lose your balance there’s nothing to grab but air or a stone wall. My solution was the same one you should use on a ladder or steep stairway on a ship. You go down facing the stairs. Much easier. Didn’t need that trick today because, while they are uneven and irregular, the stairs where we were are not that steep.
Back at the base where the wall crosses the river there’s a garrison to house the troops and in the courtyard is a small Buddhist temple. They were having a service of some kind because bells or chimes were ringing and chanting was echoing out of the temple and up the courtyard wall to us.
Back at the base Diana had to get in some shopping. Her purchase, a set of five 4- inch long Mongolian Empress fingernails, each one different. Yikes!! These things will make a splash in Texas.
We drove back to downtown Beijing, through the usual terrible traffic, to check into our hotel, the Peninsula Grand. Grand is somewhat of an understatement. I certainly don’t stay at this type of hotel when I’m paying the bill. Well, we may have on some special occasions, but very rarely. This place is nice. They have two black Rolls Royce Silver Clouds our front for you to hire, with driver of course, to whisk (now that’s funny) off to whatever hot spot you may be heading to as the Beijing snail’s pace. Two young ladies in white on white bellman’s uniforms complete with pillbox hat (picture ‘Paging Mr. Morris, Mr. Phillip Morris) are posted at the entrances to greet you and point to whatever destination you desire in the hotel. Inside, actual bellmen in the same style uniform but in more traditional colors await your request for assistance.
Our room was very nice. Huge bathroom with marble shower and separate tub. There were two light buttons, ‘regular’ and ‘mood’. The mood button had three light levels. Not sure what mood they expect you to be in in the bathroom but then the tub is big enough for two. It has a fully stocked mini-fridge and liquor cabinet complete with snacks. Just so you have an idea, a standard size Toblerone chocolate bar converted to $10US. I know Belgian chocolate is nice but that’s a bit much. Lord only knows what that mini-bottle of Remy-Martin cost. I didn’t have the nerve to look.
We had some time to freshen up before heading out to our Peking Duck dinner. In Imperial times this dish was reserved for the emperor only. When the head chef for Emperor Tongzhi retired in 1864 he was allowed to open the Qianmen Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant, featuring this dish for common people. It is the oldest restaurant continuously open in Beijing. It is superb! When we were here ten years ago we also went to a duck dinner and both Diana and I agree that this one is orders of magnitude better than that one.
Once again we are all seated around a large round table with a lazy susan in the center. The initial servings were cha shu style sliced duck breast, some tiny dates (just larger than a normal raisin, white walnuts (not nearly a bitter as English or Black walnuts), some sliced green seaweed, duck leg in clear aspic and duck shoulder in red aspic. I have to admit that anything is aspic is not my favorite but I ate some of each and it was fine. The dates, walnuts and duck shoulder were great. Beer, wine, soda and water were offered for drinks.
After we had an opportunity to snack on the appetizers, the ducks were brought in and a chef stationed at each table carved the duck for serving. They served duck about 5 different ways. In addition to the two aspic and BBQ duck in the appetizers, they served the carved duck thinly sliced and pieces of the very crisp and delicious duck skin. You put the thinly sliced duck on the same thin Chinese pancakes you use to eat moo shu pork, with some thick, dark, semi-sweet and savory hoisin sauce and a few sliced green onion slices, wrap it up to make a duck mini-burrito. Excellent! Of course many other dishes accompanied the duck, mushrooms and bok choi in lobster sauce, the ubiquitous sweet and sour shrimp, sautéed pork with vegetables, sautéed Chinese broccoli and some other dishes I don’t remember. Once the eating begins I forget to take pictures so I remember the dishes.
It was 10:30pm before we got back to the hotel and we have an early start in the morning so it was sleepy-by time.
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