Beijing: In and of Itself
~
2004.01.25 20:15 KST (EST + 15 hrs): Beijing, People's Republic of China
China. Home to centuries of cultural, technological, social and economic progresses, this nation remained strides ahead of others, only to be mired in muting political ideologies, poor diplomacy and civil unrest. Yet north of the Yellow River floodplain, sprawled somewhere quietly between Mongolia, the Gobi Desert and the Yellow Sea lies an urban melting pot of history and culture: the Chinese capital city, Beijing. I landed at Capital International, eager to follow the throngs of pedestrians along closed streets, past hawkers and vendors, acrobats and locals, all shuffling and mingling, enjoying crisp winter breezes and the noon sun warming cheeks, hearts and smiles. The lunar new year had been rung in: the year of the monkey was well under way.
Without power steering, my nodding taxi driver darted through the hutong (alleyways), past weather-worn doors, dogs and tattered flags, all but scraping the walls on each turn, trading horn-blowing for braking. I had been in Beijing for less than an hour and my end seemed imminent. Then, after an unnecessarily long hunt and having circled it twice on foot, I found the Far East International Youth Hostel, checked in, dropped my bags and made for Tiananmen Square.
It was nearly three in the afternoon and the wind was remarkably cold, but tourists abounded on the impressive space -- it seemingly meaning something different to each of them. And so like a king passing under his palace's front gates, I walked neath the arches of Arrow Tower entering the Square from the south, circling Qianmen to slowly pierce the center of the concrete heartland amid families flying kites and soldiers looking sternly about, all of us surrounded by the monuments of days gone past, immersed in the inescapable slogans and feet that had trod before. Onward, I soon found myself in the centre of the Square, halted, letting the centrifuge of history spin me around, letting the four points seep in: the Museum of the Revolution to the west, the Mao Zedong Mausoleum and Monument to the People's Heroes to the south, the Great Hall of the People to the east, and further north -- past the ubiquitous towering red flag with its dancing yellow stars -- the Gate of Heavenly Peace and the iconic, larger-than-life portrait of the leader of the Cultural Revolution: Chairman Mao. An impressive sight for any eyes, I stopped only metres below the effigy, letting the vestiges of its near-century old message seep in and gawked, bright-eyed, at the innocent smiles of a thousand passers-by.
After a brief evening of exploring the Underground Dragon subway system and local culinary haunts, I ventured back to the hostel to explore its warming traditional courtyard, covered by a web of classic Chinese lattice off which hung six bulbous red lanterns, casting their soft calligraphic beams of light on the craggy cobblestone floor at dusk. Soon enough, I befriended a group of British weekend wanderers up from Shanghai and made plans to collectively conquer Beijing the next day. And so, later that first night, we sauntered out together along 'Bar Street', drinking $1.50 gin and tonics, playing pool and trading travel tales and memories of a time and place called home.
The following day, filled and warmed with complimentary eggs and coffee, we set off at noon to tour the ancient imperial court's escape from sweltering Beijing, The Summer Palace. Set in the northeast reaches of Beijing proper, these gardens, pavilions and palace temples rise from the shores of Kunming Lake and straddle the adjacent hillside to envelop the visitor in a world away from the realities of a world outside. We walked through snaking, covered wooden walkways with each overhead beam carrying a different painted scene of blue and green, red, yellow, pink and white. Venturing mid-way across the frozen lake only to be turned back ashore by slicing winds, we sought refuge in the lofty, glazed parapets of Longevity Hill. Gliding past towering doorways, under majestic archways, we moved onto the Cloud-Dispelling Gate, the Second Palace Gate and the Cloud-Dispelling Hall, ending at the Pavilion of the Fragrance of Buddha (as the Sea of Wisdom was closed to visitors). At impressive heights, outside the octagon temple of the (Fragrance of the) Buddha, perched above the totality of this summertide haven, the sun shone exclusively down upon us, as black birds with white bellies hopped out of sight, across grassy hillocks littered with peach and willow trees growing along its entire sloping length.
By late afternoon, the wind having tried to shuck our cheeks and nose-ends long enough, we all plunged back into the heart of Beijing to warm ourselves with evening showers and I, a late meal with my two lovely Danish roommates treating them to Peking duck, spicy slivers of shallots and cucumbers, bowls of cherry tomatoes and marinated turnip. Back at the hostel, the three of us washed down the night with $0.30 quarts of Nanjing Beer and relaxed, sharing each other's tastes in music as we smoked strawberry and apple cigarettes, I learning to uncap the green bottles with a lighter.
My final full day in Beijing, I rushed awake to a 7:40 mini-bus departure, packing nearly twenty tourists destined for an excursion to one of the world's most precious and renowned heritages: The Great Wall of China. Our goal was the unreconstructed -- and thus perilous -- stretches of the Wall at Simatai. (En route, still in the throws of Beijing morning traffic, our bus decided to break down in the second lane of an expressway. Nervous but curious, what followed was a rush of twenty-four male hands shoving the dead and dirty mass through lanes of passing traffic, cars zinging our sides. After what seemed like an eternity, we finally gained enough push to veer it off the expressway onto a side road, leaving the driver to tinker with its mechanical secrets. Et comme on dit en bon francais: 'jamais un sans deux'. Translation: this happened twice). Nevertheless, three hours and 110 kilometres later, we made our objective and hobbled out into the warmth of the lot at the mountain's base.
Therefrom, we hiked its inclines stretching westward from its first fortification straddling the edge of a mountain slope overlooking its twin structure across a river (known as 'Two Dragons Playing in the Water'). Slowly, we climbed steeply over the stones and mortar of the blood and sweat of labour past. Said to be the most authentic due to its state of disrepair, this is the structure as the Ming meant it to be, 500 years ago. From atop the Wall, looking out across the surrounding topography -- more of its sections snaking toward the horizon -- one wonders if, in fact, the mountains were the ones built for it, as they fall below the bricks and parade it perfect and solemn and high for all to gaze and marvel. Like a delicate stony icing strung aloft frozen waves of brown ridges draped in velvet foliage, the hills fold green and dusty yellow into a melting skyscape. The scene was majestic yet quiet and incredible, but remained unpresumptuous. It was, after all, The Great Wall of China.
Worn, but exhilarated, the sum of us dragged back into Beijing, slunk into our hostel and reinvigorated with showers, warm food and cold beers. This being the last night for many, we readied to properly pounce on the city, and did so, not returning until breakfast the next morning. Having shut my eyes for less than three hours, I nearly overslept and offset my departure timeline, but finally managed to find a taxi, find a shuttle, and find my way through the labyrinthine airport to my flight, returning safely to Seoul's Incheon International.
In the end, it was altogether an excellent three-day venture into a city that has witnessed some of the century's considerable upheavals and atrocities, but that is slowly ceding to a world outside its own, and will, ultimately, host Olympics in less than four years. This was a red-letter journey into a land once encapsulated, but enrapturing, in and of itself.
S*
Fave current track(s): "Dub Chill Out" - Augustus Pablo, "Nothing Man" - Bruce Springsteen
Current read(s) in progress: Farenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury, "Beijing" - Lonely Planet, "Q" magazine
2004.01.25 20:15 KST (EST + 15 hrs): Beijing, People's Republic of China
China. Home to centuries of cultural, technological, social and economic progresses, this nation remained strides ahead of others, only to be mired in muting political ideologies, poor diplomacy and civil unrest. Yet north of the Yellow River floodplain, sprawled somewhere quietly between Mongolia, the Gobi Desert and the Yellow Sea lies an urban melting pot of history and culture: the Chinese capital city, Beijing. I landed at Capital International, eager to follow the throngs of pedestrians along closed streets, past hawkers and vendors, acrobats and locals, all shuffling and mingling, enjoying crisp winter breezes and the noon sun warming cheeks, hearts and smiles. The lunar new year had been rung in: the year of the monkey was well under way.
Without power steering, my nodding taxi driver darted through the hutong (alleyways), past weather-worn doors, dogs and tattered flags, all but scraping the walls on each turn, trading horn-blowing for braking. I had been in Beijing for less than an hour and my end seemed imminent. Then, after an unnecessarily long hunt and having circled it twice on foot, I found the Far East International Youth Hostel, checked in, dropped my bags and made for Tiananmen Square.
It was nearly three in the afternoon and the wind was remarkably cold, but tourists abounded on the impressive space -- it seemingly meaning something different to each of them. And so like a king passing under his palace's front gates, I walked neath the arches of Arrow Tower entering the Square from the south, circling Qianmen to slowly pierce the center of the concrete heartland amid families flying kites and soldiers looking sternly about, all of us surrounded by the monuments of days gone past, immersed in the inescapable slogans and feet that had trod before. Onward, I soon found myself in the centre of the Square, halted, letting the centrifuge of history spin me around, letting the four points seep in: the Museum of the Revolution to the west, the Mao Zedong Mausoleum and Monument to the People's Heroes to the south, the Great Hall of the People to the east, and further north -- past the ubiquitous towering red flag with its dancing yellow stars -- the Gate of Heavenly Peace and the iconic, larger-than-life portrait of the leader of the Cultural Revolution: Chairman Mao. An impressive sight for any eyes, I stopped only metres below the effigy, letting the vestiges of its near-century old message seep in and gawked, bright-eyed, at the innocent smiles of a thousand passers-by.
After a brief evening of exploring the Underground Dragon subway system and local culinary haunts, I ventured back to the hostel to explore its warming traditional courtyard, covered by a web of classic Chinese lattice off which hung six bulbous red lanterns, casting their soft calligraphic beams of light on the craggy cobblestone floor at dusk. Soon enough, I befriended a group of British weekend wanderers up from Shanghai and made plans to collectively conquer Beijing the next day. And so, later that first night, we sauntered out together along 'Bar Street', drinking $1.50 gin and tonics, playing pool and trading travel tales and memories of a time and place called home.
The following day, filled and warmed with complimentary eggs and coffee, we set off at noon to tour the ancient imperial court's escape from sweltering Beijing, The Summer Palace. Set in the northeast reaches of Beijing proper, these gardens, pavilions and palace temples rise from the shores of Kunming Lake and straddle the adjacent hillside to envelop the visitor in a world away from the realities of a world outside. We walked through snaking, covered wooden walkways with each overhead beam carrying a different painted scene of blue and green, red, yellow, pink and white. Venturing mid-way across the frozen lake only to be turned back ashore by slicing winds, we sought refuge in the lofty, glazed parapets of Longevity Hill. Gliding past towering doorways, under majestic archways, we moved onto the Cloud-Dispelling Gate, the Second Palace Gate and the Cloud-Dispelling Hall, ending at the Pavilion of the Fragrance of Buddha (as the Sea of Wisdom was closed to visitors). At impressive heights, outside the octagon temple of the (Fragrance of the) Buddha, perched above the totality of this summertide haven, the sun shone exclusively down upon us, as black birds with white bellies hopped out of sight, across grassy hillocks littered with peach and willow trees growing along its entire sloping length.
By late afternoon, the wind having tried to shuck our cheeks and nose-ends long enough, we all plunged back into the heart of Beijing to warm ourselves with evening showers and I, a late meal with my two lovely Danish roommates treating them to Peking duck, spicy slivers of shallots and cucumbers, bowls of cherry tomatoes and marinated turnip. Back at the hostel, the three of us washed down the night with $0.30 quarts of Nanjing Beer and relaxed, sharing each other's tastes in music as we smoked strawberry and apple cigarettes, I learning to uncap the green bottles with a lighter.
My final full day in Beijing, I rushed awake to a 7:40 mini-bus departure, packing nearly twenty tourists destined for an excursion to one of the world's most precious and renowned heritages: The Great Wall of China. Our goal was the unreconstructed -- and thus perilous -- stretches of the Wall at Simatai. (En route, still in the throws of Beijing morning traffic, our bus decided to break down in the second lane of an expressway. Nervous but curious, what followed was a rush of twenty-four male hands shoving the dead and dirty mass through lanes of passing traffic, cars zinging our sides. After what seemed like an eternity, we finally gained enough push to veer it off the expressway onto a side road, leaving the driver to tinker with its mechanical secrets. Et comme on dit en bon francais: 'jamais un sans deux'. Translation: this happened twice). Nevertheless, three hours and 110 kilometres later, we made our objective and hobbled out into the warmth of the lot at the mountain's base.
Therefrom, we hiked its inclines stretching westward from its first fortification straddling the edge of a mountain slope overlooking its twin structure across a river (known as 'Two Dragons Playing in the Water'). Slowly, we climbed steeply over the stones and mortar of the blood and sweat of labour past. Said to be the most authentic due to its state of disrepair, this is the structure as the Ming meant it to be, 500 years ago. From atop the Wall, looking out across the surrounding topography -- more of its sections snaking toward the horizon -- one wonders if, in fact, the mountains were the ones built for it, as they fall below the bricks and parade it perfect and solemn and high for all to gaze and marvel. Like a delicate stony icing strung aloft frozen waves of brown ridges draped in velvet foliage, the hills fold green and dusty yellow into a melting skyscape. The scene was majestic yet quiet and incredible, but remained unpresumptuous. It was, after all, The Great Wall of China.
Worn, but exhilarated, the sum of us dragged back into Beijing, slunk into our hostel and reinvigorated with showers, warm food and cold beers. This being the last night for many, we readied to properly pounce on the city, and did so, not returning until breakfast the next morning. Having shut my eyes for less than three hours, I nearly overslept and offset my departure timeline, but finally managed to find a taxi, find a shuttle, and find my way through the labyrinthine airport to my flight, returning safely to Seoul's Incheon International.
In the end, it was altogether an excellent three-day venture into a city that has witnessed some of the century's considerable upheavals and atrocities, but that is slowly ceding to a world outside its own, and will, ultimately, host Olympics in less than four years. This was a red-letter journey into a land once encapsulated, but enrapturing, in and of itself.
S*
Fave current track(s): "Dub Chill Out" - Augustus Pablo, "Nothing Man" - Bruce Springsteen
Current read(s) in progress: Farenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury, "Beijing" - Lonely Planet, "Q" magazine
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