Day 15

Day 15 - Tuesday, April 15 2008

Navigation is easier in daytime, and the light thrown off by a city the size of Beijing makes celestial observation well-nigh impossible. That’s the only explanation for the England football fans’ failure to find their mark last night. Especially as they were so close. The Forbidden City was down the road a wee bit and the sought-after hotel just a block away. Still, I hadn’t been consulted at the time so it seemed hardly fair now to say ‘I could have told you so!’ Better to help than to criticise, so I offered to provide a brief course in map-reading when back on board Tosca.

It must have been the chilly night on the brick bed that was making Linda so tetchy. She somehow contrived to think that was all my fault, so I fell back on my counselling experience to ease the tension. Who was it that found a hotel? And so what if I couldn’t figure out how to adjust the aircon that unfortunately was stuck on 15C all night? Would she have been warmer sleeping in the car as poor Mr & Mrs Fan appeared to have done? They don’t seem to have found a place at all, so stop girning and get on with it. These thoughtful words appeared to do the trick, for silence prevailed apart from some mutterings about an ignorant peasant who should hiccough. I thought that a bit harsh. Mr Fan may be Chinese and wearing England insignia, but he’s no ignorant peasant. He’s been exceptionally kind and helpful, and living in such a smoggy atmosphere, it’s not surprising he should have a cough, far less a hic to go with it. Hasn’t Haile Gebrselassie pulled out of the Beijing Olympics because he’s worried about his asthma being exacerbated by the pollution?

But without so much as even a standard hiccup (must remember to ask Linda why she uses the hiccough variation), Mr Fan had found parking quite close to the main entrance to the Forbidden City. Mrs Fan would be our guide, as he thought it better to stay and keep an eye on the car. Good idea. There was a sign saying ‘Tow Away Zone’ and I definitely didn’t want to walk back to Tianjin. It would be a long hike, especially with Linda being so strangely uncommunicative.

The hike to the main gate was only fractionally shorter. And with what seemed to be half the population of China heading in the same direction, it felt as if we’d got caught up in a re-staging of the famous Long March. This must have been like the crowds in Dumfries on Saturday when Queen of the South beat Aberdeen 4-3 in the Scottish Cup semi-final. (Sorry about that, Bob, but the news made headlines even here.)

Forbidden City opening time was not until 0830, but already we were part of a human rainbow of baseball caps, colour-coded to tour leaders’ flags, presumably so all the matching ones could be rounded up in the right groups and afterwards despatched on the right buses or trains back to China’s hinterland. Aha! Inspiration for ideal present for Linda. Maybe I’d be able to buy (or steal) a bright yellow baseball cap and then she wouldn’t feel left out because we’re the only ones bare-headed. On second thoughts, maybe just get one for myself. The leader of the bright yellow group looked a very comely shepherdess. Potential for a very entertaining journey to the hinterland.

An elbow in the ribs interrupted such pleasant musings. We were at the turnstiles and Mrs Fan had bought the tickets and was pointing at her wrist. Meet back here when the little hand’s at 10 and the big hand at 12. Whatever happened to the land that pioneered digital watches? Just over an hour to cover what the guide-book recommended should take a whole day. Maybe two. (Must stop all these digressions. I’ve already taken more than a page of today’s allocated space and we’re just getting inside.) And like me, the inside goes on and on. The whole site covers roughly 800,000 square metres in a rectangular configuration. That’s about 10 football pitches, laid five up and two across. We follow the long axis, across vast flagstoned courtyards flanked by a labyrinth of alleys and siderooms. The roofs are the most striking feature. An infinite number of yellow-gold ceramic ribs, resembling tightly-packed lengths of bamboo, with gilded ridge cappings topped by ornate dragons and roosters, above mosaic friezes intricately-rendered in a blaze of colour. Each courtyard is dominated by a themed hall - the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the Hall of Military Prowess, the Hall of Mental Cultivation etc. Most are undergoing renovation to compensate for neglect during Mao’s Cultural Revolution and to present a good face for the Olympics, so all we could do was peer hopefully through shadowy windows at indeterminate contents and keep walking to the next lot.

Got into the Literary Glory Hall, though. Do I hear Cassie saying “Bollocks, not on the strength of the shite I’ve had to read here for the past fortnight!” C’mon, Bob, no need to get all bitter and twisted just because you lost to the Doonhamers. If the Forces of Darkness hadn’t intervened on Sunday, we’d have thumped you in the final anyway, and that would have been even more painful. Cheer up, loon. Remember when you do the Aberdeen Rolling Stones karaoke, it’s ‘Hey, MacLeod, get offa me ewe’. The MacDonalds had nothing to do with it, promise, so don’t take it out on me.

There was no corresponding Horticultural Glory Hall for Linda, so the Imperial Garden had to do. The sign-posts kept pointing forward and we kept on walking. This could be a new Olympics event: the Imperial Garden marathon walk, but without even a watering point on the way (we chose to forgo the Starbucks that has somehow inveigled its way into China’s preserved 15th century heritage). We eventually crossed the finishing line to a spectacular display of magnolia, lilac, and other green and flowery things without names on them. The footpaths here were surfaced with ancient mosaic tiles, each containing thousands of tiny pebbles arranged to depict birds, trees, dragons, and flowers. Each one - about a foot square - must have taken half a lifetime to create, and there were countless numbers of them. The mind boggles at the thought. Geriatric, gnarled cypresses were backed by towering rockeries of coral, so old they had to be propped up with metal braces, the arboreal equivalent of a Zimmer frame. Could have done with one of these. The cypresses didn’t have to walk all the way back to the entrance, and it was time to retrace our steps and meet Mrs Fan at the appointed hour.

We were now going in the opposite direction to the teeming millions that had multiplied 10-fold from the time we entered. The tourist-tat kiosks were doing a roaring trade, so much so that I couldn’t even get close enough to buy a bright-yellow baseball cap. The Hall of Domestic Tranquility must have worked its influence, as by now that idea didn’t appeal quite so much as it did originally. A fake Olympics gold medal might have made a good souvenir, but that too had to be forgone. Can’t keep Mr & Mrs Fan waiting and can’t risk missing the ship in Tianjin. We were on the road again by 1030, and this time we could take in our surroundings.

We passed Tiananmen Square, instantly recognisable from TV exposure and overlooked by a giant portrait of the Great Helmsman; a huge silvery dome that looked new enough to be Olympics-related but with no external identification; and the predicable mix of ancient and modern architecture. Time in Beijing was too short for anything but a snapshot impression, probably from the wrong angle, and at the wrong exposure, but it will have to do. An abiding memory is the amount of city greenery, tree-lined streets and a profusion of hedges and shrubberies. These trees have been around a long time and are obviously well-tended; definitely not an exercise in Olympics cosmetics. Trees and agriculture were also the dominant features on the road back. Mile after mile of uniformly planted forest, interspersed with irrigation canals, and clearly not just natural random growth. The trees seemed too tall, spindly, and delicate-looking to be of any commercial value for pulp mills or lumber. Purely aesthetic? Maybe, but it seemed a huge exercise in replacing the rain forest with a Chinese equivalent. The only other explanation that arose is orchards - and it’s too early in the year to see fruit or flowering. The forests were punctuated by tunnel farms and grass plantations. We passed dozens of trucks carrying rolls of turf, so this could well be part of the make-ready process for Olympics pitches.

This landscape continued uninterrupted to the outskirts of Tianjin, where urbanisation took over. Mr & Mrs Fan arranged a few stops for essentials - with Tsingtao top of the list. Ship’s stores won’t reopen till tomorrow and the cupboard is dry. An interesting back-street shop selling everything from Ming vases to mobile phones yielded some souvenir bargains. Another produced an appropriate gift for the Buddha who presides over the wardroom. Sailors tend to be a superstitious bunch, even French Catholics, and when you’re working Chinese waters the local deities must be propitiated. We didn’t feel compromised in adding our atheists’ offering to Buddha’s growing mound of gifts - a jar of green tea.

We made it back on board comfortably for the 1330 deadline, after fond farewells to Mr & Mrs Fan. Actually Yang and Hue as we had got to know them, who presented us with a large and unidentifiable fruit as a good luck parting gift. It’s about the size and colour of a ripe pa-paw, but with a firmer skin. Chef cuisinier Monsieur Fady will know what to do with it.

The whole trip had cost about $350, including the hotel, $100 each way to Mr & Mrs Fan for the travelling costs, reimbursement for their yuan spend on our behalf in the shops and Forbidden City tickets, and a wee tip for putting up with Linda. Was it worth it? Despite all the buggeration at the time, a resounding ‘yes’. Despite only two hours in the Forbidden City, it was an unforgettable experience. Life would be boring if it all went uneventfully to plan. If nothing else, I’d be forced to start inventing things to fill the daily bulletin, and if you’ve read this far, you’ll know that my professional standards would never countenance such editorial fakery.

Still, it was good to be back home on board Tosca. Odd how we have come to think of this as ‘home’ so quickly, but that’s exactly how it feels. Familiar, comfortable, and welcoming. After a huge feed and many slurps of Les Cayolles to compensate for the lack of rations during the Beijing excursion, it was early too bed. We didn’t even notice the departure from Tjianin, which didn’t happen till the early hours of today, despite the 1330 curfew. We’re due in Shangai tomorrow and another shoreside trip is planned. Maybe this one will be less acrimonious. Better be. Shanghai doesn’t seem to have a Hall of Domestic Tranquility.

Noon position 36◦22.93 N - 123◦10.39 E
Day’s run to noon - 343 miles
6,687 miles out from Khor Fakkan
Heading 179◦
Local time GMT+8
Average speed - 14.3 knots

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