FROM BEIJING, CHINA

City of Fog, Smog and Sand

BEIJING, Oct 14, 2006 - I was beginning to wonder if I would ever see the sun and blue sky here.  After two days in the Chinese capital, for which the weather service officially reported "clear skies," I was yet to see either.  The sun tried hard yesterday afternoon to break through the fog or smog or sand or clog or whatever the stuff is that's clogging up the atmosphere here, but the best it could do is show its faint outline.  As for the blue skies, one had to look for them at billboards advertising distant vacationlands.

Take a look, for example, at the views of the city from my hotel window.  

"This is nothing," an American businessman unwittingly made a disconcerting comment last night while trying to comfort me.  "I have been here two months, and this is one of the clearest days we've had."  

"Yukh," I thought but did not say anything.  "So that's what you get when you cross globalism with communism - emphysema or lung cancer."  This is the worse case of air pollution I have ever seen.  And I have seen some pretty bad chokers in summertime Belgrade, in  Bangkok, in L.A., and even on balmy Phoenix winter days (followed by cold nights, creating a temperature inversion).

Later on, a Chinese travel guide confirmed to me that this was indeed the best time of the year to visit Beijing.  Winters are cold and harsh, with temperatures often dipping down to -15C (5F).  Springtime brings horrific sandstorms from the northwest deserts (Mongolia) that sometimes reduce visibility to just a few feet.  Summers are hot and humid.  "So this is the best time of the year for us," the guide summed it up cheerfully.

"Poor people," I thought again, but did not say anything.  "Glad I don't have to live here year round."

"But we prefer to think of this smog as fog rather than pollution," the guide added as if reading my mind.  "Otherwise we would get too depressed."

That's why, she said, Beijing is now the fog capital of the world, having wrested this dubious title from a spruced up London.

The Great Wall

On our 1.5-hour drive to the Great Wall this morning, our driver Li, a quite man, navigated silently yet skillfully through the traffic maze of this city of 15 million (some even say 30 million) people.  The guide, who goes by the name Alexandra (not her real name... she picked it for use with western visitors because she liked Princess Alexandra of Denmark), used the time to give me a quick Chinese history lesson, with the Great Wall as its centerpiece.

The wall was first built in the 7th century B.C., when China was still divided into many small states - seven kingdoms that each built their own wall to protect themselves from "barbarians" to the north.  After the unification of China in 221 B.C., the first emperor of Qin Dynasty (who also built his terracotta army - left), linked the walls of the three states in the north, and formed the first "Great Wall". Since then, the Great Wall was rebuilt, modified or extended throughout Chinese history for over 2,000 years.  Most of the Great Wall we see today was built in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). In some areas, two walls built in two different dynasties can be seen running side by side.  It stretches for nearly 4,000 miles.  

The section nearest Beijing, that we were heading toward, is called Badaling (right).  The word "bada" stands for a "convenient" place, meaning a good observation point from which to monitor the would be invaders from the north.  The wall fulfilled that purpose until 1644, when the Manchurians managed to break through it at Badaling, and eventually establish a new Qing (Manchu) dynasty in Beijing that ruled China until 1912 (see Aisin-Gioro Puyi, the last Emperor of China).

While Alexandra was talking about China's distant past, I kept observing a little red icon that kept dangling from the driver's rear view mirror.

"Wasn't this actually your last emperor?", I said pointing to it.

"This?" Alexandra said looking at the picture, seemingly startled.  "You mean Mao Zedong?"

I nodded.

She finally got it.  "You're right," she said smiling.  "As you can see, some people (like our driver Li) still think of him as God and protector."

"I gotta take a picture of this," I said, fumbling to get my camera out of the bag.  As I took the above shot, a ray of sunshine illuminated Mao's face.  It was as if God had heard Alexandra and turned on a floodlight for my photo.  I felt annoyed at God for honoring Mao so.

"I never cared much for Communists," I said.  It seemed incredible to me that someone as murderous as Mao would still be regarded by some as near deity.  "This is the first time ever that I have stepped my foot in a communist country" (except, of course, for the country in which I was born... but I had no choice in that.  And when I did, I left).

Then I realized that this was also the first time since I came to Beijing that I have seen sunshine.  

"Was there an omen in all this?" I wondered.  The Chinese would have probably found one.  Or ten.  I've never heard more superstitions and mystical beliefs than during the seven hours I spent today with Alexandra and Li.

Finally we were there... at the Great Wall of China.  Location Badaling.  And we were also seeing blue skies for the first time.  The mountains were still bathed in blue haze, but there was also plenty of sunshine to light up the morning.

"It's a good thing we started so early," Alexandra said, as she lined up to buy a ticket for me.  "There are not many people now."

"Really?  It seems pretty crowded to me," I said, looking around.

"Wait till you see the crowds later in the day," she said.  She added that on October 2, when she was last at Badaling, some 78,000 visitors were here on that day alone.

She was right.  It was elbow-to-elbow by the time we were ready to go back to the city, an hour and a half later.  

Just as Alexandra was about to take a picture of me next to that big stone tablet, there was a lot of commotion in the crowd.  The soldiers and plainclothes bodyguards pushed the people out of the way to clear the patio for this guy, seen here shaking hands with some Chinese official.  

"That's China for you," Alexandra grumbled.  "They push the people around as they please.  This must be some sort of a foreign dignitary."

While we waited for them to leave, Alexandra explained the meaning of the inscription on the stone tablet.  It was a quote from Mao... something about every Chinese who climbs the Wall is a hero.  "So today you're also a hero of the Great Wall," she joked.

"Yeah, right," I said laughing.  "And did Mao actually ever climb the wall?"

"Of course not," she replied.  "He was carried by some soldiers up the steep slopes."

"A hypocrite just like the emperors he loathed," I said.  "Never practice what you preach."

By that stage, the Middle Eastern-looking "dignitary" and his entourage had cleared the deck, providing a rare opportunity for a picture without dozens of people milling around.

My guide then explained to me my climbing options.  I could take a less steep, but longer and more crowded route (seen above over my shoulders), or I could head in the opposite direction, taking a steeper and harder, but shorter and less crowded way to the nearest observation tower (she called it a "beacon tower").  You can probably guess what I decided to do... [see NOTE if unsure].

"I take it you're not coming?" I asked Alexandra as she made no preparations to leave.

"Of course not," she replied.  "That's way too hard.  Especially that steep route.  I'd expire if I had to do it every day.  I'll just wait in the coffee shop till you get back."

We exchanged cell phone numbers just in case something untoward happened, and off I went, up the Great Wall...

Here's a view looking back after just the first couple of hundred yards on the wall.  The parking lot from which I started the climb is just below that red Chinese flag in the middle of the trees.

This is where one could also see some pretty autumn colors already reddening the landscape around the wall.  If you look carefully up at the top of the picture, just to the right of the wall, you can see a gigantic billboard.  It was erected by the Chinese government for the 2008 Olympics.  "One world, one dream," it read.  Globalism 101.

Now, fast-forwarding through a tortuous climb to the highest "beacon" tower, more than a thousand vertical feet higher...

... this is a panoramic view of the wall with which the climber is rewarded at the top.  The point at which I started the climb is way down in the valley, where that cluster of white roofs is.  As you can also see, I am now also way above that Olympic billboard still visible on the mountain across the valley.

Here are the views in all four directions through the openings in the "beacon" tower, starting with the northern panorama (above)...

...the west...

...the east...

... and finally the south.  I stayed at the top for a few minutes to cool off, watching other people that had made it there.  They seemed in various stages of despair, some sprawled out on the stony ground.

"How are you doing?" a young American woman asked a middle-aged man, possibly her father.  "Do you think you'll be able to make it back down there?"

"What choice do I have?" the man replied philosophically, reconciled to his fate, whatever it turns out to be.  (He did make it, I saw him in the coffee shop after I had gone down).

As I headed down, actually a much harder challenge for your leg muscles, if not for the heart and lungs, the views were spectacular...

This was the steepest point of descent...

...as you can clearly see now looking down the steps that disappear from view...

And now a look up at the same steep slope from the bottom of it.  What made the descent especially hard was that the steps are of uneven heights, ranging from four inches to two feet.  So you constantly have to watch your step (instead of enjoying the scenery), lest you want to tumble down the stairs.

And that's all she wrote... as far as the Great Wall is concerned.  After washing my hands thoroughly in that coffee shop (having touched the rail that millions of people had touched before me), we moved on... toward lunch and the Ming Tomb.

The Lunch

This was a picturesque gate in the town of Badaling through which we drove before heading back toward Beijing.  During the drive, I seem to shock Alexandra and Li when I said that I don't usually eat lunch; that I use the time to work out on a bike or swim or hike.  I could just see my guide and the driver thinking, "Oh, shucks, just our bad luck... having to go hungry today because of this stupid American."

"But don't worry," I said.  "That's what I do at home.  I will buy you lunch, of course, and keep you company and eat a little something, too.  But it will have to be something light."

They seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.

After about a 45-minute drive, we stopped at this "traditional" Chinese restaurant for lunch.  The golden lions guarding a Chinese house are also a tradition.  One is a male and one is female.  "Can you tell the difference?" Alexandra challenged me.  I resisted a temptation to look behind.

"The one farther away has his paw on a globe," I noted.

"That's the male," she explained.  "The round ball symbolizes the male's dominance."  ("Tell it to the North American feminists," I chuckled silently, but did not say anything).

"The female on the left, has her paw on a cup," she continued.  "According to Chinese mythology, a lioness gives milk to the cup through her claws."

"Strange," I thought.  But the Greek mythology can be even more weird.

Here's a view of the restaurant's interior.  This picture was taken around 11:30.  By the time we left, about an hour later, the place was packed.

Ming Tomb

After lunch, we drove for about half an hour to the Ming Tomb, the place where 13 Ming Dynasty emperors were buried.  By this time, we were back on the outskirts of Beijing, and the sunshine was gone, as you can see.

The tomb was built at about the same time as the Forbidden City (circa 1420) and has similar architecture, according to my guide.

Here's Alexandra in front of the flowers that line the entrance to the tomb.

Rather than give you a long narration about the history of this mausoleum, I took a picture of this plaque in English so you can read for yourself.  As you can see, the place dates back to the early 15th century.

The first major interior building.

Another building to the side, that houses a large stone tablet that the Qing (Manchurian) rulers inscribed in the 17th century.

There is some pretty gory history associated with this site.  The two yellow tombs that I highlighted on the above map mark the spot where 16 wives of the deceased emperor were buried - live! (eight in each tomb).  After the emperor died, his son, the new emperor, believed that a human sacrifice like that would rejuvenate the emperor's soul.

By the way, the Chinese emperors had dozens of wives and about 3,000 concubines.

Alexandra also told me that the site we were on, the burial ground of emperor Judi [sic], was the only one that was spared during Mao's Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), when many of the country's most precious historical artifacts were destroyed.

What saved this Ming Tomb was this photo of Mao sitting next to the tree (that's still there).  The "cultural revolutionaries" did not dare destroy a place that even the "great chairman Mao" venerated with his presence.

But they did manage to deface this marble tablet that was originally green (the same as the color of marble walls).  They painted it red, the color of the communist revolution.  And the paint has seeped into the stone so it could not be washed off despite hardy efforts to do so.

The descendents of the Chinese emperor believed that they could communicate with its soul by placing a special silk cloth bearing a message to him inside this cute little house, and then setting it on fire.  The smoke, they believed, would carry the message to him, and he would be pleased that he is still remembered.  "It was like a postcard to heaven," Alexandra remarked.  Which would make this a Mailbox to Heaven.  :-)

And this is the final resting place for the emperor's soul.  Another Chinese superstition is that a common person who enters this tomb would have his life shortened.  Sort of like "curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought him back"-saying we have in America.  Except that here, in China, "satisfaction" is bought by cash.  People pay the emperor's soul to ensure their lives don't get shortened.

Nor is this some sort of an ancient myth.  Take a look at all these people, including some young "red" army recruits, dropping money into this compound, one of many cash collection points on the Ming Tomb grounds.  "The guards here have it easy," Alexandra remarked sarcastically, implying that that's where the cash eventually ends up.

The entrance to the great hall where the emperor's soul rests.  I highlighted the emperor's statue in the middle of it.

And here's a close-up of the statue.  You can see heaps of cash lying at emperor's feet even here.

Finally, here are my admission tickets to the Great Wall and the Ming Tomb.  Which is all she wrote today.

NOTE: Steeper and shorter, of course.

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