Silly Meiguo ren...Trix are for kids

Okay, More adventures from Phil (whoo-hoo).

Well, today I went to the Temple of Heaven and Forbidden City.

After breakfest, we headed out to the Temple of Heaven. On that note, I should make it clear that driving in China can only be explained in one word...Craziness. If yor worried about safty, good news! There is a stock pile of seat belts....however they're not in any taxis, I don't know where they are but they must be someplace. Anyways, in America, it is generally assumed that th road is for cars and trucks But so far in China it seems if you have wheels, you have claim to the pavement. Even a little bike staring down a truck at an intersection...that bike is not backing down. I have been in Beijing only a couple days, and I have had so many instances where I was in a taxi thinking to myself, "eh, that was close." It is pretty fun for me though...I feel like I'm in a Bond movie, weaving through the traffic at high speeds, with the exception that I am not ruggedly good-looking (I could possibly squeeze by with just a simple rugged looking), I don't have any suave remarks, and I am clumsy like no other.

Back to the Temple of Haven; which is set in a very nice park. It was about 9 o'clock in the morning and a bit chilly when we got there. Surprisingly, there were alot of people (non-tourists) in the park just doing activities. I would have to say that majority of them were atleast in there 40s and up. They were doing excersices and playing games. Well, as we got closer to the entrance to the Temple area, we came upon a group playing a game that looked alot like hacky-sack, except the hacky is more like a shuttlecock and on the end are rings of aluminum and plastic toped of with a flat, studded rubber tip. Anyways, some how I got drawn in to a game ("lets kick it to the dumb American"), so me and Guolin started playing the game (called jian zi) with two older gentlemen. For those not firmilliar with the concept of hacky-sack or jian zi, in both games you try to keep the ball or shuttlecock from landing on the ground, using any part of your body except your hands. To be quite frank with everyone...I did suck at it and a group slowly formed around to laugh at my misfortunes in the realm of jian zi. After my pride was ruined, Guolin told me that jian zi use to be a game mainly played by younger kids, but in recent years it has become increasingly popular with older adults (Just a little fun tidbit).

Continuing on to the Temple, it was so cool (wow phil, could you be more discriptive....oh geez, now I'm writing in third person and I didn't even capitalize my own name, dammit) Getting back on topic, the first place we went was probably the most iconic building in China, the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvest. Since it is the Temple of Heaven, this is where the Emperor would pray to the Heavens, mainly for a good harvest. Guolin told me that the shape of the Hall is unique, because it is a shape remanisent of a the harvest crop (I am assuming the shape of a bundle of wheat or else a grain silo)..but nevertheless, cilinder shape.

The other two main attractions at the temple are worth mentioning too. The Echo Wall is a wall (duh) encircling three buildings, it is said that if you wisper at on side of the wall, on the opposite side (i.e. west-east) you can hear the wisper...I regret that I did not try that. The main reason I did not do it was because I didn't want to get all excited (crazy excited) and persist Guolin to wisper to him (I have to work with him for the next few months...Trying not to freak him out is a top priority for me). Although I will test it out when Taylor (girlfriend) comes to visit...since I am sure everyone is going to lose sleep over this, I will find out if it works.

Okay, the Circular Mound Altar was also really interesting. It is where the Emperor would sacrifice to the Heavens. In the top tier, is a stone mound in the middle, it is here where you can talk to Heaven (by the way, God told me that everything is going good, Martha and him are going out to the vineyard next weekend, its fabulace this time of season...Um, I like to assume God is married to a middle aged women named Martha, she's sassy but you got'da love her). On a seious note, there are nine stone tiles encircling the middle, with 18 in the next row out...with a total of nine rows going out of the center. On that note, there are also nine studs per row on the Imperial doors. So as you can tell nine was a important number to the Emperor...because the number ten represented purity, therefore it represnted the Heavens. Since the Emperor was the son of Heaven and the closest being on Earth to Heaven, nine becomes a significant number for the Emperor (as it is the closest to ten).

After the Temple, we went on to Tienamen Square. It is huge, obviously as it is the worlds largest open square (I really wanted to see Mao's body...not that I am morbid or anything...but alas, we didn't have time for it). After walking around the square for a bit, we went on to the Forbidden City. It was really huge...and we got lost a few times. The Palace also is a museum, so alot of the rooms had displays of items used by the Ming and Qing dynasties. There were also other rooms made up to look as they did for their former proprietors. Needless to say, I could have spent along time there exploring.

Oh, someone tried to con me when when we were leaving the Forbidden City (an easier feat them most would think). But I was approached by a young lady who spoke pretty good English (a tell-tale sign to be cautious). She asked me to go see a student art show in an unknown direction. After telling no to her a few times Guolin had to chase her off. How they con you is taking you to this "art show" and trying to get you to pay a huge amount of money for a piece of work.

They were also doing renovations of part of the Forbidden City, but you could still get a sense of what you were missing. But that is what happens when the world turns a spotlight on Beijing for the Olympics. It is not just buffing up tourist attractions, it is all of the city. You see people riding bikes with barrels or boxes being towed behind them, or simply walking around the city with a bucket...and all they are doing is picking up garbage. I noticed these people everywhere just picking up garbage, but once I noticed this, I started to pay attention to the ground...and I saw hardly any trash. Of course I am writing this part after I left Beijing...But the train ride out of the city makes these observations very clear. I have never seen so much trash and garbage just lining the ditches in my life. So it is obvious that the government is trying to clean up Beijing for the Summer Olympics.


Thats it for now...Tomorrow we are going down to Xinxiang, so that would be nice. I can settle in a little. Unitl then, thanks for reading.


Important Note
I would like to apologize...at the moment I can't add any pictures. I am in Xinxiang right now, however, my laptop can't connect to the internet in my room. So until I can get my laptop connected, I can't add any pictures I take.
I do have access to the internet through the crappy old computer that is in Chinese that the school provides to me, but I can't get my pictures on the Crappy Chinese computer. So hopefully my internet gets fixed soon, until then no more pictures.

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