1769 Diana with the Doorperson at the Peninsula Grand Hotel, Beijing
1778 Tian’an Men Square, Beijing, China. The giant flower basket in the foreground and the Tian’an Men, the gate where Mao announced the formation of the PRC, is in the background.
1793 This is Mao’s mausoleum. You can see the line of people stretching across the whole picture. They are at least 6 deep and go around the whole building.
1801 The Wu Men, the entrance gate to the Forbidden City
1815 Diana in front of the Gate of Supreme Harmony at the marble fence bordering the Golden Water.
Oct 13 - Xingang (Beijing), China. The second day started at about 6:30am when Diana and I went down to breakfast. This was truly a first class buffet. Actually it was three buffets, each one with several stations and a serving line. There were continental, British, Oriental and vegetarian areas. The British area could have been American except for the dead giveaway, baked beans, sautéed mushrooms and Cumberland sausages; all part of a truly rounded British breakfast. As part of each there were stations where you could order custom items like waffles, omelets, etc. The food was excellent and the service was a little overwhelming. You could hardly put down your fork on an empty plate before it was whisked out of sight and replaced. When I left the table to get some items at the Oriental buffet (they had rice, all manner of pickled veggies, and several types of fish) I returned to the table to find a fresh napkin folded in the boat design at my place. If this were a Mexican restaurant I don’t think you could violate the ‘no double dipping’ rule because by the time you nibbled away the results of the first dip some attentive server would have snatched the chip from your hand and replaced it with another fresh chip.
After breakfast it was up to the room to get our belongings gathered up and then down to the bus. They had a really nice wooden shoehorn with the name of the hotel on it hanging in the closet and I decided I had to have it. When I checked out I told the girl that I hadn’t used the mini-bar but I had to have the shoehorn. She looked puzzled at first and then said, “Sir, they are complimentary.” I almost asked for my key back so I could go up and clean out the rest of the items I found there. Just kidding, but not by much.
The day is sunny, cool and windy. It’s nippy for most of my fellow travelers but fine for me. The major benefit is that, just like SoCal, the wind blows the smog away and it’s very bright and clear. Kind of wish we were at the wall today.
Our first stop was at Tian’an Men Square. Unfortunately we adopted our methods of dealing with foreign places and names from the British. If they couldn’t pronounce something or just didn’t like it they changed it. Tiananmen Square is it an example of the least objectionable of these habits, running together foreign names into one word, like Vietnam or Hanoi. How hard is it to write Viet Nam or Ha Noi? You pronounce them the same way no matter how you write them. I guess I shouldn’t be too hard on the Brits, they do the same thing in their own language. Around WWII the phrase “Ta ta for now.” became “TTFN”, a closing I use myself in writing. But when you pronounce it you have to form the same amount of syllables no matter which you pick. Usually a shorthand expression saves you something. Not necessarily so with the Brits.
Tian’an Men Square has several important monuments the most revered of which is Mao’s Mausoleum. Despite the fact that Mao is very likely responsible for more human deaths than any other single individual in history and his political and economic policies were finally and completely renounced, he remains a revered figure to most Chinese.
Short Political Note: Right behind Mao in the human deaths department is Joseph Stalin. Some have Adolf Hitler in third place but I’m not so sure that’s correct. Hard to tell at that point because compared to Mao and Stalin, everyone else is definitely in the minor leagues. Here’s my assignment for tomorrow. Ask 10 people tomorrow who is responsible for the most human deaths in history and see what you get for answers. As usual, if you or any of your operatives are killed or captured I will definitely disavow any knowledge of you mission.
Mao’s remains are in a crystal casket that is lowered into a refrigerated chamber every night and only raised for public viewing in the morning and afternoon. I’ll never get to see it because the lines to get in are huge. Today being Saturday it’s especially long. The lines are 4-6 people across and wrap around the whole building. It will take hours to get in.
Even though it’s the largest public square in the world it’s always crowded. One odd fact is that it’s flanked on the ends and the sides by artifacts of the two great periods of Chinese history. At the ends are the Zhengyang Men, a remaining gate from the long gone Imperial wall, and Tian’an Men, the Ming dynasty gate from which Mao announced the founding of the People’s Republic of China, oddly enough built by our old friend Emperor Yongle of Ming Tomb fame. Along the sides of the square are the Great Hall of the People, the Chinese legislature and the Museum of the Revolution, now the Museum of Chinese History, both fine examples of 1950s style Communist buildings.
Both times we’ve been here the northern end of the square has been decorated with flowers. Last time it was Rose Parade float like displays of various Chinese landmarks done in flowers. This time it’s a huge floral basket with flanking floral displays along the sides of the square. The previous ones were more elaborate but these are very pretty as well.
After some free time to wonder around the square and admire the Monument to the People’s Heroes and the revolutionary statues flanking the mausoleum it was time to head to the Forbidden City.
Actually the Forbidden City is just on the other side of the Tian’an Men Gate but across a very wide and busy street. Our bus was parked at the China National Museum so we boarded for the drive over and were dropped off just across the street from the Tian’an Men Gate in front of the Meridian Gate (Wu Men), the southern entrance to the Forbidden City. As we arrived it was very clear that we were not the only people wanting to see this site. There were so many guide’s flags in the sea of people that it look a little like a flower field.
Fortunately our guide, Mr. Lee, had one of his assistants arrive early and procure tickets for the group so after a short phone call to him we had our tickets and were through the Meridian Gate and inside the Forbidden City. As you know the compound gets its name from the fact that no one but the emperor, his family, servants, and high officials of the empire could go there. The emperor would appear on the top of the Meridian Gate wall to address his subjects. It was built by our old buddy Emperor Yongle in 1406 it’s the largest and best preserved ancient wooden architectural group in the world and is another UNESCO World Heritage Site. It covers 720,000 square meters of space and has 8,707 rooms. They call it the Palace Museum here but everyone else knows it as the Forbidden City.
Just inside the gate is a large stone covered courtyard bisected by a flowing stream in a marble channel that’s crossed by 5 marble bridges. There are no plants or flowers in this large space as it was considered unlucky to have them there. The water channel is the Golden Water and it curves as it crosses the courtyard in the shape of the jade belt that the empire’s dignitaries wore as a sign of office. The five bridges represent the five basic tenants of Buddhism, which I can’t seem to remember at the moment. I can recall harmony, rites and meditation but that’s a far as I can get.
Across the courtyard is the Gate of Supreme Harmony. It’s a two eaved structure with staircases on either side of a sloping ramp of ornately carved granite. This center section was for the emperor’s carriage and could only be used by him. Large bronze lions guard the staircases from either side of the stairs, one male and one female. The female, to the left of the stairs, has her left paw on a lion cub, the male, to the right of the stairs, has his right paw on a ball that represents the world. Their job is to deter evil spirits from getting through the gate. Each gate, of course, has the obligatory six-inch high sill running across it to prevent the same spirits from crossing the threshold because they’re not able to cross the wooden beam laid across the gate.
Through the Gate of Supreme Harmony you enter another huge stone paved courtyard that is also completely without plant life. It doesn’t even have a water feature, it’s just a massive area covered in cobble stones. Across the courtyard is the Hall of Supreme Harmony. This large building is where the emperor held audiences with people he wanted to see. The throne room is probably a good analogy to Western architecture. I think it was optimistically named in the hope that it would have some effect on the people meeting there. This large building also has two staircases but this time each has three flights of stairs. Again there’s a ramp going up the middle that’s ornately carved and for use only the emperor’s carriage.
Once you are through the Hall of Supreme Harmony you are not yet completely in tune because next is the very small Hall of Middle Harmony followed by the larger, yet small by comparison to the Supreme Hall, Hall of Preserving Harmony. These last two buildings are on the same level as the Supreme Hall and are not separated by any courtyard or gate. Since height has importance in the Chinese architectural system, they appear to have been used in some connected fashion. Maybe the emperor’s advisors stayed in the small Hall of Middle Harmony so they could be summoned if needed or the emperor could meet privately with them there. I have no hard information on their connection.
After the Hall of Preserving Harmony you descend to ground level once again and approach the Gate of Heavenly Purity. Inside this gate is the emperor’s living quarters as well as the empress and all his concubines. It is said that he could have had as many as 3,000 of the latter. Yikes!! You better be the all-powerful emperor if you want to live in a house with that many women.
The empress lived in the Palace of Earthly Tranquility just inside the Purity Gate. It’s a fair sized building with plenty of room for her servants. We didn’t get to see the rest of the compound as time is running short so we headed out the north entrance through the palace gardens and onto the bus.
Our lunch was at the Capital Garden Restaurant. It’s a very up-scale place and the food was totally up to the standard. Once again it was the round tables with food bearing carousel in the center. The food came fast and furious. The only disappointment was that they only served fried rice, no plane steamed rice. However the food that was served was terrific. I think there’s a memo out saying that North Americans must be served sweet and sour shrimp because here it was again accompanied by sautéed mushrooms and baby bok choi, beef and broccoli (US kind), Cantonese style pork with onions, chicken with peanuts and water chestnuts. All this was topped off with small dumplings with a mildly sweet sauce and the regular watermelon, cantaloupe and tomatoes.
A wedding party was sharing the lower part of the restaurant with us on the other side of a wide walkway, almost like a separate room. Some of the overflow guests were sitting very close to us. Pretty soon the bride came over to those guests carrying a tray and accompanied by her maid-of-honor. She approached the men and offered them a cigarette from the tray and then lit it for them. Some of the men would blow out the match just as she was about to light their cigarette. Apparently this is to see if the bride’s humility is up to par. Of course, the strange Americans had to get some photos of this procedure. She seemed to genuinely enjoy the attention so I discretely took a few photos from a distance.
She was wearing a silk dress in orangey-red with dark blue flowers embroidered at the hem and top of the bodice. Actually the entire hem was covered with the flowers which moved up the dress getting scarcer as they moved up. The seemed to be connected to peacock eye feathers instead of a stem and leaves. The dress was strapless and had a border of the blue silk at the top of the bodice with a corsage of blue silk flowers attached at the right. Extending up from these flowers was a feathery arrangement that seemed to be jewels. She was wearing a very pretty necklace with stones about the same color as the dress and long earrings of diamonds and sapphires the same color as the blue on her dress.
Our next destination was the Tian Tan, often called the Temple of Heaven. It’s one of the largest temple complexes in China and also an UNESCO World Heritage Site. It has several widely spaced structures and we are only visiting the Qinian Dian, the circular temple where the emperor made sacrifices and prayers to heaven and his ancestors for a good harvest in the coming year. These rites were held on the winter solstice each year. It was also built in the Ming dynasty and was strictly off limits to common people in the Ming and Qing (pronounced ching, as in ka-ching) dynasties. It was reserved for the emperor’s private use.
The Qinian Dian (Hall of Prayer for a Good Year) is obviously where emperor prayed for good harvest. The blue circular roof represents the sky. The dragon represents the emperor and the phoenix represents the empress. Four huge internal pillars represent the seasons while 12 of the smaller pillars represent the months in a year and an additional 12 added to them represent the 24 hours in a day. Hall is constructed completely of wood with no nails. They used pegs to hold it together, just like the Amish do and my Pennsylvania Dutch ancestors did. My grandmother’s barn, pig sty and chicken coop were all constructed using wooden pegs, not nails.
Another interesting structure is the Long Hall. It’s 5 meters wide and 350 meters long. It’s an enclosed passageway connecting the Animal Killing Pavilion with the Devine Kitchen and the Divine Warehouse. On the eve of the Winter Solstice rites the Long Hall was alight with lanterns as the sacrifices, which also included jade, silk, grains and fruits were transported to the altars. However, today the scene is different. The hall is lined with older Chinese men and women playing cards and a strange game that looks a little like checkers at first but is way more complicated. In the courtyard a group of children were busily sketching temple and its surroundings.
After leaving Tian Tan it was the long drive back to the ship. We arrived too late to report to the dining room so it was up to the Lido for dinner and then off to bed after two long days of touring in Beijing.
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