Now We Can Check It Off Our List

We finally made it to the Forbidden City and Tiannanmen Square. It's only in our backyard... literally, we can ride our bikes to both places. I have been sick for the last two days. I ate something bad... it seems like Chase and I exchange being sick. One of us is always under the weather since coming to China. But I pushed through because we didn't want to return to America for Christmas having not gone to these two wonderful historic sites.

We ate lunch at a rotating sushi bar, where the sushi is plated and placed on a conveyor belt and is priced by the color of the plate it's on. Chase seems to love this idea and it was "a good value" he would say.

Then we walked to the Eastern (where civilians would enter) and then Southern (where the Emperor would enter) gate of the Forbidden City, also known as the Palace Museum. There's an outer ring where the Emperor would give speeches, watch his armies, punish criminals, and hold festivals. There are several great halls with expansive courtyards. These are the huge buildings you see in the movies.



You can see the crowds in China. Most of them are Chinese tourists. I expected to see a lot more foreigners but I guess that might be the case in the summer time.

As you walked further through the city, the halls were smaller and more intimate. And the buildings are closer together. Even though the outer ring is magnificent, I especially enjoyed the palace where you can see where the Emperor actually lived, slept, changed clothes, etc. It really felt like a home. The inside of the all the halls house some of the original furniture and artifacts.

Finally, we made it to the Imperial Garden where the concubines were selected and the Empress spent much of her time. The Emperor would make a lot of decisions and hold meetings there as well. Let me remind you that's it's not just one Emperor who lived here but housed the royal family for 5 centuries from the Mid Ming through the Qing Dynasty. It was damaged during the revolution in 1949 until Zhou En Lai sent guards to protect it. A Starbucks opened outside the walls of the city but had to close in 2007 because the government didn't like the way it stood out from the rest of the architecture of the area.

Here's Chase and I at beautiful spot in the rock garden.



We chose the coldest day in Beijing, so far, to be out walking around for five hours or so. My toes were numb by this point. I looked up the weather this morning and it got down to 32 degrees!

Anyways, we went back through the side alleys of the city. There are so many buildings on the sides and are symetrical. It's like a maze. So it was fun to take turns, walk down alleys, and run into amazing courtyards. We would love to go back and just walk around the sides one day. Here's one such alleyway we walked down.



And here's a door I would love to make into my formal dining table. I'll explain. I would like to find an old wooden door from a palace in India or somewhere in Asia made from solid wood and put glass on the top of it and place a pedestal under to make into my formal dining table. Most Asian palace doors are so ornate with carvings, gold plated, etc. So it would be historic and rustic, just the way I would like my formal dining space to be. Anyways, it's a dream of mine in my dream home.....



As we made our way back down south, we left the gates and right onto Tiannanmen Square. We just stood around, looked at Mao's picture hung on the south wall of the Forbidden City and vowed to come back another day to spend time at the three huge museums in the vicinity.

Then we met some friends for dinner and pool. I had a great time talking with some new girls that we met, Roma (from Australia) and Beatrice (from Spain).

It's Sunday now and I am going shopping with BeiBei. Don't know what I will buy yet. Maybe a short jacket. But it will be exciting to shop with her because then I know I won't get ripped off because she's Chinese.