There are a lot of people in China and most of them were in Tiananmen Square!

This is the first gate at the Forbidden City. It has a big picture of Chairman Mao on it.
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Last night we went out in the pouring rain to go the acrobats. They were amazing. The group that we saw were the number 1 Acrobat Class and it was mostly children, some of whom could only have been 8 or 9 years old. They demonstrated all the major types of acrobatics that are practiced in China. I was most impressed by the young boy who balanced on a rope strung up in the air. He did impressive things to start with like walking backwards and doing handstands but then moved onto even more impressive things like riding a unicycle with his hands and walking on the rope while it was swinging back and forth. The other children were also very good and I now know that you can get 12 Chinese girls onto a single bicycle while it is moving. Big thumbs up to the girl who was doing the pedalling. That was definitely impressive.

You can see just how many people there were in the Forbidden City. All my photos look like this.
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After the acrobats we were going to go for dinner somewhere nearby but couldn't see any restaurants near us in the dark, and then it started to rain again. We couldn't see any taxis either so we were very brave and took to the subway. It's only 50 cents to go anywhere in the city and there are two lines that intersect at two stations. We only had to go three stations to come out at the main station across the road from the hotel. The train was really very easy to use as long as you knew which station you wanted to get off at as all the signs were in English as well as Mandarin. We ended up going to the same restaurant as the night before for dinner and again it was really really good. They had been about to close for the night when we arrived, but the manager realised that 10 hungry people were going to spend a lot of money so it would be worth staying open. We ordered a lot of food because we were really hungry and somehow we managed to eat most of it. We had the most amazing chicken that I think had been rubbed in salt and then deep fried. It was so good and crispy. After dinner we all waddled back to the hotel and went to bed.

Cranky looking lion in the Forbidden City. There used to be real lions but one of the Emperors was frightened of them and let them go. He then got worried about robbers and his Feng Shui expert told him to get some big gold ones instead (probably from his uncle!)
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Today we went on a tour of the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. We caught the train there with our tour guide for the day, Boris. There were so many people when we got out into the Square. It is one of the major bus stations for the city so there are people everywhere. We couldn't go near Mao's Mausoleum or the Government Buildings around it because there was some dignitary visiting and the whole area was blocked off for the day. So we walked along the other side of the Square towards the Forbidden City. There were thousands of people around. There are 3 million visitors to the Forbidden City every day. And it definitely felt like it. Luckily because we were a tour group we didn't have to queue for ages to get tickets and we got a separate entrance to get into the first square. Because you actually walk for nearly 2 km before you reach any of the imperial buildings. You just go through gate after gate and large open paved squares to get there.

The ceiling in one of the gates in the Forbidden City. Most of the ceilings were very ornate.
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Once you finally get to the Imperial Palace it is amazing. There are hundreds upon hundreds of buildings and they are all in really good repair. We wandered around with most of the population of a small country and looked at all the major ones. The Chinese have been working really hard on making it look good but I hate to think how many people a day will be going through when the Olympics are on. Most of the tourists were Asian but there was a good contingent of Westerners around. Far more than I had seen elsewhere in Beijing so I'm not sure where they were all staying.

Just something little to put on the sideboard.
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Many of the buildings still have their original fittings and furniture. Unfortunately because there are so many people going through each day you can't see many of them through the glass because of all the fingerprints. It really was an advance if you were tall here.

There are no gardens or trees in the front section of the imperial city because the emperors were a little bit paranoid about being assassinated and didn't want people to have anywhere to hide. There is a lovely garden at the back that he used to go and sit in sometimes which does have trees and stuff. Obviously the wall around it was lined with soldiers to protect him from the assassins or he wouldn't have had a relaxing time.

After we finished the tour we had to walk all the way back to the front of the building (about 3km) to get out in the place that we wanted to. We then walked into the city and had some lunch before going back to the hotel for a rest and some internet time. In the evening we went to the Night Market which was good fun. It's a place that mainly sells food and knick-knacks and lots of locals go there. We sat and had drinks and listened to the free Chinese Opera ( I have a sneaking suspicion that it is a matter of bringing your own music and having a go!). It was bad to begin with but then the woman started and it became awful. We had some food from the street stalls which was delicious. They sell lots of kebab like things and spring rolls and fruit kebabs. We then caught taxis back to the hotel and went out for dinner. We all had an early night because of our early start for the train to Ulaan Baatar in the morning.