The Forbidden City and Pandas!

Blue skies exist in Beijing!!!!! Saturday morning, July 12! A perfectly blue sky!!!! I ran up to the highest floor in our dorm and took pictures out the windows. Our campus is surrounded by MOUNTAINS!!! I had no idea! This was the first time I had ever seen them! What a beautiful day! 

Since it was so pretty, Caroline, Gabby, and I tried to take the subway to the Olympic Green to take pictures with the Water Cube and the Bird's Nest, but the new subway lines aren't open yet. Uh oh, Beijing better step it up. The Olympics are in less than a month! So I attempted to flag down some taxis, but all six taxis that I asked didn't understand where we wanted to go. I was sad, but we're going to try again later in the week.

I decided to stay in Beijing this weekend because of school work. We have a group paper and presentation due on Monday, and our final is on Tuesday. But no worries, I still had plenty of fun this weekend :)

On Friday, I went with Caroline, Hannah, Kristi, Jen, Sara, Gabby, Zach, and Josh to the Forbidden City! The Forbidden City served as the imperial palace for the emperor and his court from the Ming dynasty beginning in 1406 until the Qing dynasty was overthrown by Sun Yat-Sen in 1911. The Forbidden City covers 720,000 square meters and consists of over 980 surviving buildings. It is surrounded by an eight-meter high wall and a 52-meter wide moat! How cool! 

The Forbidden City is basically a line of gates and halls that you walk through right down the center. There are outer halls and courts, but the main walkway in the center is where all of the big, beautiful, and important buildings are located. All of the ground in the city is laid with bricks, except for a white marble pathway running right through the center. Only the emperor was allowed to walk on this pathway, but of course, today anybody can step foot on it and take pictures in a place only the emperor was allowed to touch. 

All of the main buildings in the Forbidden City were uniform in design. They were all crimson red with gold arching roofs. There were blue, green, and gold painted beams across the ceilings. The roofs swooped outward, and at the curved end there were a number of beasts (little statues of lions, dragons, etc.). The number of beasts on the ends of the roofs were used to distinguish one building from another, like a ranking system. There are 11 main halls, and the Hall of Supreme Harmony is the biggest and grandest. Thus, it has all 11 beasts. The rest of the halls had 10, then 9, then 8, based on their size and importance. The beasts were also placed at the ends of the roofs to keep the tiles from sliding off! How interesting! 

I also liked all of the names of everything in the Forbidden City. The main theme was harmon between heaven and earth. We entered the Forbidden City through the Meridian Gate, and then passed through the Gate of Supreme Harmony that opens up into the big and wide-open Supreme Harmony Square. Across the Square, we could see the largest surviving wooden structure in China- the Hall of Supreme Harmony that was used to host ceremonies, such as the emperors' enthronement and imperial weddings. It is built above three levels of marble stone base, and it is surrounded by huge bronze basins. In fact, these bronze basins were all over the city! Since there was no running water in the city, the basins were kept filled with water in case there was a fire. 

Behind the Hall of Supreme Harmony is the Hall of Central Harmony, which was where the emperor could prepare for and rest during ceremonies, and the Hall of Preserving Harmony, which was used for rehearsing ceremonies. Beyond these halls is the Palace of Heavenly Purity where the emperor lived and the Palace of Earthly Tranquility where the empress lived. The emperor represented Yang (the heavens), and the empress represented Yin (the Earth). The Hall of Union was located between their two residences, and it was considered the place where Yang and Yin mixed to produce harmony.

Behind the residences is the Imperial Garden. The garden was huge, and there were so many people there! There were tall and arching trees, and many of their branches were being held up by tall wooden posts. There is a 10-meter high rick hill called the Hill of Accumulated Elegance toward the back of the garden, and at the top of the rock mountain lies the Pavilion of Imperial Scenery. Once a year during the Double Ninth festival, the emperor, his wife, and his concubines all climb the hill to the top to reach the pavilion. Also, an awesome translation of a sign in the Imperial garden: "A single act of carelessness leads to eternal loss of beauty." I think an easier translation would be "Please stay off of the flowers."

While we were in the Imperial Garden, some of the Chinese troops came into the garden and started clearing it out. We got pushed to the outer edges of the garden, and a local explained to us that we had to wait there for thirty minutes because there was a special visitor touring the Forbidden City. It turns out that the Mexican president was in Beijing because China and Mexico were in the process of signing a friendship agreement. A few minutes later, we got to watch the whole delegation from Mexico, and I assume that I saw the president, tour through the garden and take pictures. How awesome would you feel if you were able to clear out the entire Forbidden City when you went to see it? I was so pumped, and I wished the US President was there too. But then we realized that if the US President was in the Forbidden City, we definitely would not be allowed to be standing there watching.

After seeing as much of the Forbidden City as possible, we shopped around at the Olympic merchandise store at Tiananmen Square. It is becoming very difficult to find Olympic merchandise. None of the stores are restocking their inventory. For example, the Beijing 08 store on campus has run out of all size small T-shirts, and they are not ordering any more. So I've been searching for other stores that have small T-shirts in stock, and it seems that all of the stores are running out. This is becoming a problem, so every time that I see a Beijing 08 store, I run inside to check out what they have because I may never find it again in another store.

Oh, a side note: China (and Singapore too) do not practice the idea of quantity discounts. For example, I buy bottled water at the supermarket. Which would be cheaper, to buy 6 individual little bottles of water or to buy one gallon of water (and refill a water bottle)? In the US, of course buying the gallon would be cheaper than buying 6 individual bottles. This is not the case in China. Buying six small bottles of water is the same price as buying one gallon of the same volume. I don't understand. There are also no deals like buying one granola bar for 3 yuan, but buying a box of 6 bars for 15 yuan. Instead, China sells one granola bar for 3 yuan, and a box of six granola bars for 18 yuan. I suppose China is making more money that way, but it does not make the customer very happy.

On Saturday (our awesome blue sky day), Caroline, Gabby, and I went to the Silk Market and Pearl Market to do more shopping. I went back to the same Pearl lady that I had visited a few weeks before, and I bought so much from her that she gave each of us a free gold chain! I also bought a ridiculous number of purses and wallets, and I need to go back to the market to buy a suit case so I can bring all of my souvenirs and gifts home!

My group and I spent a good bit of Saturday night and Sunday morning working on our paper, and when we finished it, Kristi and I went to the Beijing Zoo to see the pandas!!! It was so worth it! The pandas were so incredibly adorable! I was afraid they would all be napping, but they were being really active! Some were climbing all over a playground structure that they had, and others were laying on their backs eating bamboo.  It was all so cute!

News from home:

-My friend Kathleen made the US Olympic Team for swimming!!!! She placed 2nd in the 200 Butterfly at US Olympic Trials! Right now she at the US swimming training camp in Palo Alto, California. Then the team moves on to train in Singapore (!!!!!) before arriving in Beijing at the start of the Olympics! It is so neat thinking about the things that Kathleen will get to do! She is not only a part of the USA Swim Team, but the USA Olympic Team, all of the sports! I wonder how much free stuff she is going to get and how many awesome people she is going to meet?? How amazing! I can't wait to see her on TV, especially at the opening ceremony!

-My teammate Onur Uras made the Turkey Olympic Team for swimming! He made his cut in the 100 fly, and his swim was so fast that it set a new Turkish National Record!! He's coming to Beijing, and hopefully Caroline and I will get to see him!

-Shout out to my brother Ben and his friend Garrett! They are both at Basic Cadet Training at the Air Force Academy right now. Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers. USAFA Class of 2012: Never Falter, Never Fail!

Things I miss about home the most:

-My family: Tay, Ben, Mom, Dad, and my puppy

-My teammates!! I BELIEVE!!!!!!! 

-Twice-Baked Potatoes

-Being able to read a menu in a restaurant. Being able to read anything really

-Real bathrooms (with an actual toilet, toilet paper, soap, and paper towels)

-Blue skies and the sun

-The pool

-Drinking water from the tap

-Taking a shower whenever I want to

Things I will miss about China the most:

-Beijing 2008 Olympics!!

-Being taller than everybody else

-Being an American. The Chinese LOVE taking pictures of Americans!

-Meeting 28 awesome GT students and sharing once-in-a-lifetime experiences with them

-The Great Wall of China

-Public transportation

-Cheap food, an entire meal for 75 cents!

The next two days are going to be jam packed with school work, but after our final on Tuesday, we will get out and have some fun. I am planning on visiting the Olympic Green and seeing the venues. We are also trying to buy tickets to an acrobat show, and of course I will return to the Silk Market. This weekend, we have a four night trip planned to Inner Mongolia!! We will ride horses across the grasslands just like the Mongols, ride camels through the Gobi Desert, sleep in yurts (similar to Native American tipis), learn all about Genghis Khan, and see stars for the first time all summer!

However, as it is written, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him." 

1 Corinthians 2:9