3:45am....

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At 3.45am the alarm went off, although it felt like we had barely slept. In a sleepy daze we threw clothes on in our dark dorm room and stumbled out into those hours that are neither night nor morning. Despite the darkness as we rounded the corner onto the huge avenue leading on to Tiananmen we could instantly see the flashing police lights, hoards of people already behind the barracades and yes the dreaded Chinese tour buses, and it had barely passed 4am.
As our taxi crept up to where we could be let our it appeared as though the worlds largest public square was filling in the dark before our eyes. After passing security we did the Chinese shuffle to squeeze as close as we could to the front barrier, foolishly thinking that getting up at 3.45 would be adequate for a 5.10 ceremony. It was an uncomfortable and anxious wait standing on concrete, rammed in from all sides with sweat rolling down the back and pushy mums trying to ram their small child to the front of the que.

The painful wait had been worth it as the crowd livened up to the first of the soldiers emerging from the red gates of Tiananmen under the giant portrait of Chairman Mao, of course to some particuarly patriotic communist tunes while slowly but perfectly goosestepping their way across the road into the square to raise the flag.
Every single soldier appeared the same height and size with their movements timed to perfection.

After the flag reached the top and the crowd was released from the roped cage it was phenomenal to see the crowd that had amassed behind rushing off in every direction. After a few happy snaps of our own we were off to the only place open at such an ungodly hour, McDonalds.

After a rest and some breakfast we arrived at the Forbidden City a meagre 40 minutes before opening time. For centuries having been inaccessible to the average Chinese citizen it appeared as though they had all decided to come at once blocking the entrance with the matching hat wearing, flag waving, microphone blaring tour groups. (Although to ensure we dont lose each other in the crowds, and to be truely Chinese we have purchased matching hats for this trip).

Rounding off the morning we had planned to pay our respects to Chairman Mao's preserved body laying in a hall in the centre of the square and after weaving up and down flights of stairs and through security after security to get back on the square we finally joined the biggest que either of us had ever seen, including Shanghai Expo.
Happily doing the Chinese run-shuffle to progress forward as rapidly as possible we were eventually stopped by a security guard who shouted in Chinese, English and Chinglish that our bags were not premitted whilst offering no help as to where we could put them. Of course the surrounding crowd kept repeating in all three languages the same information and despite saying again in all 3 languages that yes we know but WHERE can we leave them, we simply got 'maybe you could find someone to leave them with.'
Laughing at this suggestion and surrouned by literally thousands of people scurrying around a seemingly impossible large space, we bailed and it was a B-line to the nearest coffee shop.

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