May 11 - Beijing

Mar. 11 –Friday – Beijing


We had an early start to our day as we had to have an early breakfast, and vacate our stateroom by 8:00 a.m., gather in the waiting areas until the ship had been cleared, and then disembark. We got through Chinese immigration and customs, and headed out into the cold weather of Tianjin to be met by Ms. Lee and Mr. Lu. Most of our fellow travelers were heading directly for the airports or were on ship-planned tours for the next days. We had arranged to have our own private guide for four days in Beijing, and this was considered day one. We drove for three hours, in our lovely new van, from the port to the heart of Beijing through vast flat steppes of brown, dry rice fields. There was nothing on either side but farming, or periodically industrial centers, so we took the time to get to know our guide, and to plan out the next days.

We arrived at the Marriott, unpacked the van and went to the reception desk, only to discover that we were at the wrong Marriott…so we called back Mr. Lu and the van, repacked the luggage and headed to the J.W. Marriott located in the busy financial district of the city. Here we were welcomed and taken to our elegant suite, where we collapsed.

While unpacking, we turned on our television to be struck by the instantly breaking news of an enormous earthquake and tsunami on the east coast of Japan, which had occurred only hours ago during our drive. The news was that this was at least an 8.5 tremor located off shore, and that the tsunami that was striking the shore would be almost as devastating as the earthquake. As the day progressed the rolling tsunami was destined to hit many Pacific coastlines as far as California, and all communities were being warned to get to high ground. The immediate issue was that there were also a series of nuclear reactors along the coastline of Japan which were in danger as well. For the rest of the day we were glued to the television as the news seemed to get worse and worse. Japan is a country that is prone to earthquakes, but nothing this large had ever hit them. As the news men tried to fill the air with insufficient data, the projections of death and destruction mounted.

Knowing that many at home would be worried about us (remembering that we would have been in Japan during our cruise), I quickly sent an all-points bulletin via email to let everyone know we were safe and sound and quite a distance from the besieged area. But just as one remembers where you were when certain disasters occurred, I think Beijing, for us, will always be associated with the third worst earthquake since records have been kept.

Beijing is one of the cities which the boys enjoyed for a week, and we’ll have to try and see all that they did in four days. Since they were here in the ‘middle kingdom’, China has gone through times of despair, war, occupation, revolution, insular periods when they were totally cut off from Western influence and now to a period of boundless economical success and a certain level of freedom. It was quickly obvious that this is still a world where information is carefully managed, as I was unable to get access to my blog site. We could get Google news and email, but the blog which is run by Google (with whom China is having a few issues), was completely blocked.

Mar. 12 – Saturday

Just as daddy and Walter had their personal rickshaw that picked them up every day outside their hotel,…so we too have our own personal ‘rickshaw’ in the form of our van driven by our driver, Mr. Lu.

Our first stop was at Tiananmen Square, which we entered through a gantlet of security men who did a cursory check of our bags & coats. The National People’s Congress of China was in session at the Great Hall of the People, where they were laying out their five-year plan, and so security was quite visible. Having read Peter Hessler, I was sensitive to the level of security which would exist both in the form of visible policemen and police vans, as well as the less obvious security ‘disguised’ as tourists, but with shiny shoes and watchful eyes. At any point, as our guide pointed out, one might be ‘invited’ into one of the vans to be asked a few questions. The police were uninterested in us, the American tourists, and were more alert to other Asians who might carry signs or placards. At one point three security officers – one in plain clothes and two in uniform converged on a hapless tourist whom they thought had a sign he was displaying. It turned out to be his open map, and the three officers had a good laugh among each other. I found it less than amusing, wondering what would have happened had the paper been a sign rather than a map.

Like ourselves, our guide Lee had taken the time to read Daddy’s letters written from Beijing. I had also sent her the photographs which the boys had taken, and so she knew exactly where she wanted to take us to recreate the appropriate photographs. One of the key differences between then and now is that when the boys were visiting, the stone walls which surrounded Beijing were still in place, along with the gate houses. At this point only a few remnants of the wall or the gates remain, though names of streets still refer to these missing landmarks.

Our first stop was to walk past Mao’s Mausoleum ,with its very ‘Russian-style’ statues to the glories of the people and revolution…and then cross towards the Arrow Tower ,one of the last remaining city gates built during the Ming Dynasty. From here we were able to take pictures of the old railway station which the boys had spoken of and which is now a museum. We then walked the long walk through the square, past the simple Monument to the People’s Heroes which was erected in 1959 and from where many protestors have been ‘invited for questioning’ over the last fifty years. The square was filled with tourists, buskers, policemen and guards, and we were told that we could take any pictures we wanted except that of policemen and guards. This is China’s Washington D.C. – the center of the government – and it holds for all Chinese the same fascination as our capital does for us. My guess is that we have many guards in plain clothes all around the capital and White House areas as well, we may just be a wee bit kinder when we ‘invite‘people to answer questions.

Along with a few thousand other tourists, we worked our way to the entrance of Tian’an Men gate (Men meaning ‘gate’) which is the entrance to the Forbidden City, and from which Mao declared the beginning of the People’s Republic in 1949. Here there is hanging the famous painting of Mao, one of the last visible signs of the man anywhere in China. He has been pretty much purged from modern day China ,and his little red book, the drab green uniforms, the Mao-style hats, the large posters and other forms of required adulation have been removed. But here, near his mausoleum and at the gate, one still sees signs of him. As our guide pointed out, many people lived under his rule but had never seen him… so that is why, even to this day there is a curiosity about seeing his mummified remains and his portrait, which is periodically repainted to keep it bright in the haze and pollution which engulfs the city.

Both of us were fairly unaware of the details of the Forbidden City. We had seen the movie of The Last Emperor, we had taken our Chinese class at Dartmouth, and we had watched our Chinese history DVD course, but the level of detail associated with every part of the palace grounds was a mystery. We understood that everything was on a north-south axis with the main palace in the center. In addition there is the Palace of Heaven and its associated buildings at one end, and the Palace to Earth at the other. While Lee made a very strong attempt to fill our ignorant heads with knowledge about every palace, courtyard object, and symbol, after awhile it became one blur of data. The symbolism of certain animals (turtles, lions, unicorns, dragons, tigers, phoenix, etc), certain numbers, (mostly odd, and especially the number 9) and certain celestial bodies, all played a part in the infinite detail that makes up this amazing city. For us, it was just a wee bit overwhelming in its magnificence and its sheer size. We had been warned that it was large, but this was truly amazing. The levels of detail and ornamentation were overwhelming and so we sometimes just had to pause, take a picture, and hope that those memories would trigger us to remember some of the information when we looked at them in the future.

I kept looking at Daddy’s pictures taken when there was practically no one to be seen, and comparing it to the throngs whom we had to move through to see any of the sites. Of course, it is only in recent history that one was able to go through this city at all, and so for many Chinese it is somewhat of a pilgrimage.

There in the middle of all this, we ran into Peter and Ann Valentine (the man who had visited his home in Shanghai), and had our picture taken together. Throughout the day we kept seeing pairs of people from the ship, who like ourselves, were taking independent tours. There weren’t that many Caucasians so it was not hard to sort out those whom we might recognize and those who were total strangers.

We must have been in the Forbidden City for over three hours, and we only scratched the surface. Were we more knowledgeable, we could have taken days or even years to examine and understand the importance of every building and its relation to the whole, but as it was, we took a ‘survey course’ which was already way more information than we’d known walking in. [n.b.: It’s days like this that remind us how little we know of China and its history. It was an unknown topic in our education, and only now are we coming to appreciate the depth and length of this civilization.] One of our goals was to try and take pictures in the similar locations as those taken by ‘the boys’, and as the day went on our guide joined in the game of locating the exact spot where one of the boy-photographers had stood. That and finding places to pose our Peacham Library ‘Froggy’, made for a unique adventure both for us and for our guide. Ms. Lee was a fountain of knowledge, and I’m sure she could have entertained us with facts, figures, history, mythology and religion for days on end. She is used to ignorant American tourists, but when we stopped for some plum-honey tea, Ms. Lee complimented Bob on his knowledge of names and dates, and his grasp of the Imperial history. Thank you Ellen Frost, and our ILEAD course at Dartmouth.

I think, for me, the most delightful parts were the gardens in the center where flowering trees were just beginning to blossom. I could imagine being an Emperor, quietly sitting in my private garden enjoying the peace and beauty. During the time of Mao, all flowers and gardens were considered to be feudal and unnecessary and were totally destroyed, we didn’t ask if this was the fate of these lovely gardens but simply enjoyed what we saw. Trees that survived for many years are now lovingly tagged: red for ancient trees, green for newer ones and this seems to be done in many of the palaces and temples. The other interesting part for me in that same area was the limestone structure which was built out of many individual limestone contributions made by citizens who wanted to avoid taxes. To give a piece of limestone seemed to relieve one of certain tax responsibilities – if that were true in Peacham, we’d gladly contribute annual chunks of stone if that would help anything.

We were a little embarrassed, but charmed, when four young women, from a small village in South China, asked our guide for permission to have their picture taken with us. They each tried a few words in English, and never stopped grinning. It’s the first time we’ve been selected as interesting objects worthy of a stranger’s camera and we’re curious as to whether this will happen often on the trip.

Ultimately we landed at the opposite end of the Forbidden City, where our driver was waiting to whisk us off to the narrow-alley ways known as the Hutongs. This is the part of old Beijing where houses designed in courtyard fashion (Siheyuan), and protected by high walls, served in the past as the homes of fairly well-to-do people. This area is being preserved now, and many of the homes are being restored for current usage. We boarded our bicycle-driven-rickshaws to see this neighborhood, since no modern-day car would fit into the tight narrow lanes. It is obviously a tourist attraction and all the rickshaw drivers were part of the “Beijing Shichahai Traditional Feeling Hutong Cultural Co., Ltd.”

Unlike in Daddy’s time, when men literally pulled the rickshaw, the current day bicycle-driver is one step more ‘civilized’, but I still took pity on the man who had to pull the equivalent of 300+ pounds of American flesh as we meandered through the area. Legs of steel, that’s all I could think.

When the ride ended we were led down a narrow lane, ducking into a doorway, dipping our heads underneath the hanging laundry, and walking into a narrow hallway - our luncheon destination. Many Siheyuan owners make a living serving meals to ‘tourists’ in their homes. We were at the private home of a young couple with a very young chubby baby. We were in their ‘living room’ which was decked out with dining tables, but along the side walls were pictures of their life together along with their private possessions. It was as if we’d taken out most of the chairs in our livingroom to make room for some dining tables, but everything else remained in place. Slightly jarring. The meal was created in the smallest ‘galley’ kitchen I’ve ever seen, and served by the husband, wife and one of their mothers. Out of this tiny kitchen came a gourmet feast, including: fried shrimp; scrambled eggs with onion; chicken legs in hot sauce; pork meat balls; pot sticker dumplings, steamed broccoli; rice; dates,; tangerines, and peanuts roasted with hot chili peppers. Every bite was delicious and washed down with some fine Tsingtao beer. I had mixed feelings being an embarrassed tourist invading their space, but at the same time appreciating that this was just one way to make a living, and we were grateful that they allowed us into their home. We shared the room with a small tour group of Chinese from Hong Kong, all speaking Cantonese. The entire host family was very friendly and gracious, and brought the baby out to the alley to wave goodbye. It was our best lunch of the entire trip!

We were less than half way through our day of sites, so off we went next to the Lama Temple, which is still used by Buddhist monks. It is an entire complex with a series of halls, each one filled with statuary, symbolic objects and shrines, where many Asian tourists were lighting incense sticks and kowtowing to the shrine of the Buddha. Unfortunately there was no taking of pictures inside the temples so our minds had to remember the many beautiful details including a fifty-five foot Buddha carved out of one piece of wood. A big ol’ boy he was, and we had to crane our necks to see his head high above us in the rafters of the building. We snapped pictures outside the buildings , with my favorite sign being: “Don’t burn incense and film in the Hall”. I tried to explain to our guide the humor in this, but she didn’t quite get it. But as instructed we burned absolutely no film while visiting the site. All other signage above the doors which identified the buildings were shown in four languages: Mandarin, Tibetan, Han and Mogul. Again, if we understood more about Buddhism and its symbolism, and the conflicts between China and the Dalai Lama, we might have treasured this visit more. Instead, this was a relatively quick stop, and a little over-crowded ,so any sense of the peace and reflective quality of the temples were lost to the throngs of devout visitors.

Our next stop was a visit to an official Tea House. We were seated at a small table where a young lady in perfect English explained the importance of different teas and their medicinal qualities, and then instructed us in the proper way to serve tea. Let’s just say, we do it all wrong. We use tea bags, we heat the water too hot, and we have no sense of ceremony. Everything was heated at least once – the cups, the pot, and the tea, and then it was heated again. She did it with extreme grace and we sampled four different types of tea: Oolong, Green, Jasmine and flower. Flower was the most fun because she immersed a dried brown flower blossom in the hot water and over the next 20 minutes it unfolded to become a beautiful multi-colored flower. Once we had sampled our teas, learned the correct manner to serve tea and thanked our gracious hostess , we were encouraged to buy some tea – which we did. (I never knew tea could be so expensive, but I learned that true connoisseurs will spend many thousands of Yuan on tea (one Yuan = 15 cents) with the assumption that the higher the cost, the better its medicinal qualities.!)

With food as a theme, our next to last stop was a fresh food market where I went camera crazy. There were piles of strawberries, tomatoes, apples, oranges, eel, many fishes, broccoli, sugar cane and a million things I couldn’t identify. I thought of the markets in France and in Quebec, and enjoyed this one as much as any of them. We were the only Caucasians in the crowd, and naturally got a good deal of stares, but it was all friendly and we landed up with wonderful fruit for our hotel room: bananas, apples and dragon fruit.

The last event of the day was the Flying Acrobat show at the Beijing Chaoyang Theater. Our guide, having seen the show just one too many times, escorted us to our seat and took off. We found ourselves sitting next to a Canadian couple from the ship whom we’d never seen on board. After a few minutes of chit-chat the show began and it was truly an extravaganza of light, music, laser and amazing feats of acrobatics. Bob was impressed by the entire theatrical experience which he rated as very sophisticated; I simply enjoyed the pure agility and daring feats performed by the performers. There was one amazing act involving two large connected wheels (like a bicycle. In each ‘wheel’ was a male acrobat, and through the next minutes they did some amazing acts of juggling and blindfold walking on this spinning object where you were sure someone would die or get seriously injured. But they didn’t. I have been to Cirque de Soleil, and this compared as being as exciting, colorful, well performed and complex. We clapped like fools for the skills demonstrated, and left the theater elated with this fine conclusion to a very busy day.

We fell into bed early, having de-compressed with a beer in the hotel lobby. Dinner was out of the question since we were still stuffed from lunch. This was to be a pattern which would continuedfor the next days in Beijing.