Down and out in Beijing

So having been sick for most of last week with the help of Mixie-san I dragged myself on to a plane Thursday afternoon and jetted off to Beijing. I really could have done with some R&R however theres just so much to see and do that I felt obliged to cram in as much as possible, and besides, with the sub-zero temperatures and biting cold winds I had to keep moving in order to keep warm!

Friday was spent exploring the Forbidden City in the centre of Beijing. Home to the Ming & Qing dynasty at a mere 720,000 sq metres is makes my Parisian pad look pokey and the wealth and beauty in which the Emporers and Dowagers lived is stunning. The architecture of the buildings (all 800 of them) is stunning, with the attention to detail really making the difference.






On leaving the Forbidden City and heading South you enter Tiananmen Square, the largest public square in the world and one that its impossible to mention without conjuring images of tanks rolling towards students back in 1989. An extract from the Thirty-Eighth Group Army 'Accomplish the mission, conscientiously complete the Martial Law task' report to the Central Military Commission in June 1989 states:

'Before they cleared the square the various movements of the group army's 10,800 officers and soliders and 45 armoured vehicles crushed the blazing arrogance of the riot elements, smashed their lines of defense on the west and struck fear into the hearts of the diehards who were entrenched in the square'

Today the square is calm although still a mass of people although now they're taking photos, flying sites, waiting for friends or queuing to see the body of Chairman Mao and whose photo overlooks the space. Personally I didn't want to be photographed with the man but Mixie saw this as a perfect opportunity and insisted...




Friday, much to Mixie's disgust, I dragged her out of bed at 6am and we bundled ourselves into a mini-bus headed NE out of the city. The Great Wall of China is only 110km away from the city however with the bad traffic conditions it takes over 4 hours to reach it but its definitly worth the trip. I was expecting the place to be pretty crowded with tourists however upon arriving there was practically no one there, in fact I was luck that there were an Italian and an American on the bus planning on walking the same section of the wall as me otherwise i'd have been all alone (Mixie can be distant at times).





The Wall truely is awesome. Its big, strong and very long and yes, can be seen from space. Try it, look on Google Earth! For me the thing that made the wall impressive was the surrounding scenery. The area is tree-less with hundreds of small hills and peaks, that like the wall go for as far as the eye can see. Along with the Italian and American we followed the wall on foot for about 20km, at times having to scramble and climb un steep steps or carefully tread over broken sections of lose stones. Building it truely was an enormous project and i'd question the logic behind it ('a wall is only as strong as the people that guard it' remarked Ghengis Khan...) however it is remarkable and even though parts of it are tumbledown the fact that so much is still standing demonstrates its brute force.