Beijing

Sunday, April 3, 2011
On Tuesday, March 29, I woke up well rested in our hotel in Beijing in time to have breakfast and head out for another long day of touring. Laura had a stomach problem during the night and wanted to stay in the room to rest for the day which turned out to be a good idea. Two things she really wanted to see on this trip around the world was The Taj Mahal and The Great Wall of China. She had already seen the Taj and I really wanted her to see the Great Wall too. We had another day before that was scheduled for us to see on our itinerary.

This morning we went to visit Tiananmen Square which is considered the “Window of China” according to our guide. He said it is the largest public square in the world and can hold a million people. Looking over the square from the Tiananmen Gate is a portrait of Chairman Mao which our guide said everyone still admires. This is where the balcony is located where he proclaimed the founding of the People’s Republic of China. On the left side of the balcony it is written in Chinese “Long Life of Peoples Republic of China” and on the right side it says “Reunification of Whole World People”. It was very crowded in the square with tourists from all over the world but mostly from China.

The Forbidden City or Imperial Palace is located right behind the square so that was our next adventure. It has been home to 24 emperors from 1420 to 1924. The palace covers 170 acres and has 8700 rooms. It is estimated that 8000 to 10,000 people lived here including 3000 concubines, 1000 eunuchs, maids and family. The Forbidden City is very well maintained and was repainted for the Olympics. The colors are vibrant. Yellow was the color reserved for only the emperor. Red means happiness and blue means heaven.

By the time we finished walking through Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City it was time for lunch. This time our guide took us to the Hutong area of Beijing where we got into trishaws for a ride through the narrow streets of this area. Thirty of us were dropped off two by two at a little house that is over 300 years old. The family that lives here now is the fourth generation of this family. The husband and his wife are the only ones living in this house as their daughter is married and has moved to her husband’s house. The furniture they normally had in the living area had been pushed to the walls to make room for 5 large round tables set up with little plastic stools around them for us to sit and enjoy the lunch. There must have been a bathroom and bedroom but we didn’t see them. The house was very tiny and was very crowded with all of us in there. We had a great experience and will always remember the hospitality of this unique family. The husband is an artist and had a studio set up for him to do his painting. One of the students on the trip with us bought one of the paintings. There was a very small kitchen where the wife and daughter (she came over to help her mother out) had prepared the meal. It was the best meal we had while in China (at least 10 different dishes). Home cooked is always best, isn’t it? Once lunch was over the wife and daughter gave us a demonstration on how to make dumplings. We learned that Chinese dumplings are traditional Chinese food and is essential during holidays in northern China. Members of families often get together on New Year’s Eve to make dumplings. Sometimes they hide a coin in one of the dumplings. The person who finds the coin is supposed to have good fortune in the New Year.

Next we were picked up again by our trishaw and driver and taken back to the bus and we then went to see the Bird Nest Stadium used in the Olympics. It was an amazing site to see and so much fun to realize we were really standing in the place we had all seen on TV. The swimming cube was across the parking lot but we didn’t have time to go in and look at that. I understand there is a great water park inside. That would have been fun to see. Instead we visited a government owned silk factory where we were shown cocoons of both single and double type. Few enjoyed this stop and wished we were still back looking over the Olympic stadium and swimming cube. But this was a government tour company we were dealing with and they wanted us to buy some of the very expensive items in their store. A lot of us went out to the bus to wait for our ride to dinner where we had Beijing duck for dinner. Nice dinner with all the dishes laid out on the lazy susan again but too much food.

On Wednesday, March 30, Laura was feeling better. She got up, dressed and had breakfast. She was a little weak but had slept most of the day before and all night long. She was a good sport still feeling a little weak and hopped on the bus with the rest of us for another long day of touring with the Great Wall ahead of us. On the way to the wall we stopped at the Beijing International Kong-fu School. Another name for Kong-fu is kung-fu or martial arts. It is sometimes called meditation of energy. This school has 250 girl students and about 900 students in total but we didn’t see any girls. They come from all around China and also different countries and live at the school for 3 to 5 years until they graduate. They have one student who has been there 7 years. Some students from this school performed at the Olympics in 2008. I didn’t know that kung-fu was developed by Buddhist monks in temples long ago as a form of meditation. It is a sport that uses both brawn and brain. The men and women are able to direct all their energy to the part of the body where they need it. The men are very strong but don’t have the look of a body builder with huge muscles. In fact, most of the men weren’t very big at all. But what body power they have. We watched an amazing show. One of the men was able to jump rope lying flat on his back. The master of the school took a long piece of rebar and held one end at his neck while three or four other men at the other end held the bar still. After making some loud strange noise the master began to wrap the bar around his neck one time after the other. What an amazing feat. He unwrapped the bar the same way. I asked our guide what a student would do with a degree in Kong-fu and he said that would either compete and perform or go back to where they came from to teach.

After lunch and a stop at a government owned and expensive jade shop, we finally made our way to the Great Wall. We learned that the first sections of the wall were built as early as the fifth century BC. It wasn’t until 221 BC that the various sections of the Wall were linked up. At one time the wall stretched 4700 miles across mountain tops from the China Sea NW to the Gobi Desert on the other side of China. Today only 1/3 is left. It really is a wonder of the world. We went to a different section of wall than Dave and I went to in 1997. This time there was a cable car to take us up even though there was still quite a walk up very steep and uneven steps to reach the top of the actual wall. It is an amazing view from the top to see the wall snaking across the mountain tops. Carol, John, Joe and I walked on the wall and up and down steps for an hour before riding an alpine slide back to the bottom. The rest of the group took the cable car back down.

After another lazy susan dinner we went to a fantastic Chinese acrobatic show. The women who do contortions are amazing and are always my favorite part of the show. The positions they take look impossible. Their mothers must start putting them in these poses when they are babies and never stop. The last act was eleven ladies riding around the stage on one bicycle stacked up on top of each other. It was a great show to top off the long day of touring.

The next day, March 31, we headed back to the airport for a flight to Shanghai where our ship was now waiting for us. After 6 days and 5 nights in hotels it was great to get back to our home on the ship. This night I woke up with an upset stomach and didn’t feel very good for a few days. It must have been the same bug that Laura caught. Now I’m as good as new again.

Tony who was our tour guide belongs to the Communist Party and he works for a government owned tour company. He doesn’t have a choice in changing any of the itinerary such as skipping the jade or silk shops that we might have enjoyed missing. Here are some facts about China he hold us.

- China’s total population is about 1.3 billion.

- Between 18 and 19 million people live in Beijing and there are 12 million bicycles in the city.
(I felt like we saw hardly any bicycles compared to when we visited in 1997. Maybe the tour didn’t take us to areas of the real Beijing.)

- There are 4 ½ million private cars and there are 200 miles of subways around the city. If a person wants to buy a car they first have to register with the government and then wait in line until their time comes up as only 20,000 cars are permitted to be sold each month.

- The city of Beijing has sunny days but no clear days and we sure did notice the pollution.

- It is against the law to gamble in China and there are no casinos.

- Beijing is the cultural and political center of China

- Shanghai is the financial center

- Burials aren’t allowed. Cremation has been the law since 1949

- The people are not encouraged to buy motor scooters as they are too dangerous.

- Four inventions of China are: 1. Paper 2. Gun Powder 3. Printing 4. Compass

Tony said this is an example of how fast things have been changing in China. In each of the following years this is what the people have wanted.

1970’s - Watch - Bike - Sewing Machine
1980’s - Washing Machine - Refrigerator - Color TV
1990’s – Cell Phone – Air conditioning – Home Video
2000’s – Computer – Car – Private House
2011 – Travel (Europe-Paris, Germany, Italy) – Health – Education

I can’t believe how far China has come since we visited in 1997. There are high rises everywhere and the roads are filling up with cars. The people have smiles are their faces and are living a better life. There has been lots of progress and they are trying to reduce the gap between the rich and poor.