China
CHINA | Friday, 30 November 2007 | Views [340] | Comments [12]
Day 6 and 7: Tianenmen square and The Forbidden City
The huge framed portrait of the Chinese Revolutionary Leader Mao Ze Dong hangs forebodingly over the entrance of the Forbidden City. Underneath and around Tiananmen Square touts flog everything from Mao Ze Dong watches with a waving hand that ticks away the minutes to Mao Ze Dong little red books. I paid for the audio guide for the Forbidden City because I had read that it was the voice of 007's Roger Moore but was disappointed to hear a woman's voice. Still, it was interesting to learn about the incredible history of this ancient city as I walked through its maze of palaces, courtyards, corridors and high brick walls. The secret garden was particularly impressive. Here people enclosed inside the walls could go to relax among pavilions, ponds, pines and craggy, twisted rocks. Standing above the courtyard where Mao Ze Dong addressed the masses I could sense the power of the place. Over the loudspeaker they announced the city was closing. The guards began ushering everyone out through the doors that were slowly being closed. I slipped through just as the doors banged shut, looking back just in time to see the terror on the faces of the couple of dozen people who didn't make it through. I don't know what happened to them, but I like to imagine that they were all executed. The guards continued to herd us out to the street with such efficiency that the elderly were hobbling along like crazy to keep up.
Day 8: A Temple of Heaven and food from Hell
It was said that when the Emperor stood in the center of the Altar of Heaven within the Temple of Heaven, he was the closest any mortal could get to God. Like ripples in a pond, circular stones spread out from the center, each ring a multiple of 9. The number 9, being the highest value digit, synbolically represented the emperor. Tim and I walked lazily through the temple grounds, where each building is based on elaborate symbolism and numerology. The buildings reflect ancient Chinese beliefs that imagine heaven as round and earth as flat with blue domed roofs that symbolize earth and sky. We stopped for awhile to watch a group of women with large red fans performing a hypnotic dance to Chinese folk music before arriving at the famous Echo Wall that surrounds the Imperial Vault. It was decided a test of it's acoustic properties - a spoken word at one end can be heard from the other - should be made. Standing at the opposite side of the wall I strained my ears for Tim's voice and was surprised to clearly hear my name come rolling around the corner. "CAMM"!
"WHAT"? I called back.
Afterwards, we went to a food market, where all manner of foods could be sampled. A firm believer of trying everything once, I pointed at the skewered scorpions, their pincers still pinching, tails twitching, and ordered a stick. First it was fried then handed to me with a mischievious smile. It was a strange feeling, to put scorpions into my mouth, to feel the spike of the tail dig into my lip and the legs stuck between my teeth. It was crunchy. Next on the menu was centipede. Plenty of legs to get stuck between teeth. "Tastes like poison" Tim stated in disgust. And indeed it did.
Day 9 - 14: A Cold
I haven't been sick for a long time so I guess I was overdue. Perhaps the cold weather contributed to me catching the cold. Calling it a cold though, doesn't really do justice to how bad I've been feeling. I've been stuck in the house for a week, too sick to do anything but sleep. But I feel fortunate that it happened now, while I have a house to stay in, rather then while I was on the road.
In China I find myself again contemplating currency. The Chinese RMB has 3 different levels. The Yuan, the Jiao and the fen. This means you can have a 1 Yuan a 1 Jiao and a 1 fen which is like 1, 0.1 and 0.01 respectively. Things get confusing when your looking at a handful of 1's trying to work out if it's a dollar, a 10 cent or a 1 cent. It's made more confusing by the fact that it can be both a note and a coin. The biggest Chinese denomination is the 100 which is only about $15, so getting a couple of hundred dollars changed gives a great big wad of cash that makes one feel rich. And one kind of is rich in this country where a bag of tomatoes can be bought for 15 cents.
Day 15: Duck and Cover
Tonight Tim took me to a restaurant that served Peking Duck. After all, you can't go to Beijing and not eat Peking Duck. First the cook brought the duck out on a table and sliced it carefully in front of us. Apparently they need a special duck slicing licence, it's quite technical. On our plates was placed the different cuts and the head. The waitress showed us how to place the duck into the crepe then cover it with sauce and fold it with chopstix. The skin was sliced very thin and literally melted in our mouths. I asked Tim why they say both Peking and Beijing. He said the early Westerner's pronounced Beijing wrong saying Peking instead because it was easier. So to be politically correct we should perhaps call it Beijing duck.
Day 17: A Great Big Wall
Today was the day I'd been looking foward to. Today I would visit the wall. I had booked a tour through a hostel I knew. It was called the Secret Wall Tour and they gauranteed that apart from the others tour members, there would be no other people on the wall. A pretty easy promise to keep, I imagine, on a 6400km long wall that runs mostly through uninhabited lands. After so many unusually (for Beijing) fine, sunny days in a row, I was disapointed to notice a light rain falling as I left the house; but when my clothes failed to get wet I realised it was snow. The snow caused the usually terrible Beijing traffic to become even worse. Stuck in this traffic as my deadline grew nearer I thought about the differences between Beijing's traffic and Shanghai's, that I experienced on a different trip. Shanghai's traffic is chaotic, psychotic and intense; but the traffic here is just a bloody great big crawling metal centipede. I much prefer the traffic in Shanghai. It's more fun. While stuck in this traffic and worrying about the time, unbeknownst to me, the hostel had called the number I'd given them, Tim's phone, and, thinking it was me who answered, asked if I was coming. Half asleep but thinking quick Tim responded with "Yeah, I'll be there in 10 minutes." His ETA was spot on.
It was the first snow of the winter and while driving to our destination, peering through the foggy van windows at the white-washed wall set in a snow-scaped wonderland, I couldn't decide if I was happy or sad about that. The scenery was painted perfection but the visibility was very low. At a point along a dirt road, somewhere between 2 towns, the van pulled over and we all got out to start the ascent to the wall we could see above us, snaking along the ridge tops. Once on the wall it was obvious that this was truly original. In most parts the wall was nothing but piles of rubble with weeds and bushes growing through the cracks. The walls of the wall often partially or fully collapsed. But in other parts it had stood up remarkably well to its 2000 year test of time and one could get a real sense of the age, history and greatness of this wall. At the peak of each ridge stood a sentry post where the Chinese guards would have stood watching for any rebel invasions. It was possible to stand on these posts and look out over the same rocky, treeless landscape. If a rebel army was going to attack, now would be a good time to do it, I thought to myself as I squinted to see a few hundred meters through the falling snow. I was really surprised at how steep the wall was. I was expecting to be walking along a fairly flat surface but instead found myself climbing up sharp inclines and slipping down slippery slopes. Up and down, up and down, until we went all the way down to a small village where they served us a traditional Chinese meal before taking us back to the city. The wall, winding over mountains and out of sight, is often compared to a giant, lazing dragon. Today, elegantly draped in a layer of snow, it could be the white Luckdragon from the Neverending Story. Still, I hope to return in the future to see it on a clear day, when its vast length can be more easily appreciated.
Tags: Adventures
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