Forbidden City and HuTong in Beijing

Tony and Carrie Enjoying the Forbidden City
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We arrived in Beijing after traveling for 15+ hours and being awake for 20+ hours.  Even at 10:00 pm in Beijing it was 80+ degrees outside and muggy too.   Although we were excited about finally reaching our destination and were tempted to head outside to the busy market street upon which our hostel was located, we opted for bed instead.  There was plenty of time to explore after sleeping.

2:30 am . . . "honey what time is it?"   2:30 . . . okay.   4:30 am . . . "honey what time is it?"  4:30 . . . damn jet lag.  6:30 am . . . "honey what time is it?"  Time to get up and start our day.  The agenda for today was to visit the Forbidden City and Tienamens Square.  Both were within walking distance of our hostel.  I'm not sure what I expected.  The lonely planet book had describe how big these places actually were but to see it for yourself is amazing.  Although there were no actual sites in Tienamens Square (the largest public square in the world), there were plenty of people including annoying street vendors, cute kids with kites similar to the line of flags flying over a used car dealership and huge tour groups.  Lots and Lots of tour groups.  The Forbidden City was no different.  Beijing is a very crowded.  The Forbidden City is called this because it was off limits to the public for over 500 years during the Ming and Qing dynasties.  It was home to 24 emperors during the time.  The city was so large that all 24 could have lived there and not been required to see each other.  We were told the city is 950 meters long and 750 meters wide.  It was filled with gates and halls and the largest courtyards.  There is an enormous stone carving (check out the pictures).  The stone is a single piece and was dragged into the city in the winter on ice.  They actually poured water on the roads to make it freeze and allow this stone to be dragged.  Our favorite part of the city was the Imperial Garden in the very back near the residence halls.  It wasn't that the buildings aren't beautiful but they all look very similar after awhile.  The garden had 300+ year old cypress trees, stone formations and smaller open air buildings.  Of course we couldn't pass up having our picture taken in front of the love tree (a cypress and pine which have been grated together).  During our tour we wandered through the residences of the empresses and learned that the most powerful empress wore a new pair of white silk socks every day.  It took 3000 seamstresses to make enough socks for her for one year.  Talk about high maintenance :)

Tony in Tienamens Square
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After our tour of the city we arranged for train tickets to Xian and Lhasa.  The lessons learned yesterday included "money talks" and "everything always works out if you just let it"  If you are willing to pay a higher commission, things happen.  We had previously been told (even by the same hostel) that there was nothing available on the trains except hard seats and the idea of spending 11.5 hours on a hard seat overnight was not appealing.  We were anxious about this all day and looked into other options such as flying.  We even considered skipping Xian (the home of the Terra Cotta soldiers).  Then we found someone who knew someone and for a small commission we were able to reserve sleepers.

Entrance to Forbidden City across Tienamens Square
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Today, the lesson learned was flexibility.  This morning we were drinking beer before 8am (not our intention when we got out of bed).  We had booked a tour to see an original unrestored section of the Great Wall.  However, there was mix up at the hostel and someone had reserved a spot but not paid.  Long story short he couldn't go tomorrow and we could.  So we gracefully opted to go tomorrow rather than today.  In exchange we receive a drink of our choice.  Whose to say beer doesn't go with breakfast?  Especially when breakfast is pot stickers from the local street vender.  In China they don't have eggs and toast!  The pot stickers however are much better than the karaoke Chinese bars serve at 1am.  Plus you can get 8 for less than $1.  Instead of the Great Wall, we decided to tour the HuTong area of Beijing.  This area is still in its original form.  In other words, it hasn't been modernized.  In order to get there, we took subway.  Lucky for us there were no tour groups on the subway.  After getting our bearings we headed toward HuTong.  Before long we stumbled on the Bell Tower and Drum Tower which are directly North (actually in a line) with the Forbidden City.  These devices were used to tell time in ancient China.  The drums would sound and the bell would ring in accordance with a rythm every so often.  It was so loud that people from a distance could hear.  The loudness didn't surprise us given the size of the bell.  To give you an idea, it weighed 256 tons.  Both towers were reached by climbing very steep stairs.  However, they provided a view of all of Beijing.  Its very flat here.  After the towers, we hired a rickshaw (bicycle powered) to drive us through the HuTong alleyways.  We learned that the number of posts above the door declared your heierarchy in society.  Additionally the shape of the stones beside your door indicated whether your job was military (square) or political (round) based.  The tour ended at a man-made lake where we enjoyed lunch.

Vast Courtyard looking at one of 7 halls in the Forbidden City. All are lined up north to south in a row.
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So far the food has been fantastic.  The noodle dishes are bland and the stir-fry dishes are very, very spicy.  The best food however has come from the street vendors.  We have tried a pancake type item.  Its like bread fried in a garlic chili oil.   We also tried pot stickers and sticky buns.  All of these fed us a single meal for less than $1.  We've heard a separate market provides fried scorpions, cock roaches, sea horses, etc.  We plan to check it out soon.  Tonight we have dinner plans with a couple of people we met at the hostel.

Massive stone carving
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Stay tuned for information about the Great Wall, our trip to Xian (Saturday through Thursday next week) and our voyage on the mile high train to Lhasa, Tiber (the following Saturday).