Lost in Beijing

I got a call from Laura on the night of the 23rd, saying the bad news was that she couldn't get me a train ticket to Xi'an; there just isn't anything available. With the Chinese new year, everyone is busy travelling back to their home town and the trains are really busy. The good news was that she'd booked me on a plane instead. I nervously said OK, what are the details, knowing that the train cost RMB279 when her friend bought one recently and Paul's ticket to Yunan cost RMB2500 (although that may have been return). Anyway, Laura cheerily announced that it was discounted by 80% so cost me only RMB260! There are about 4 or 5 RMB (or Yuan, also colloquially known as Kwai) to the NZ dollar at the moment, so the ticket worked out at about $55 or 60. It was delivered to my door yesterday morning. I don't get how this sort of thing works but apparently picking up such heavily discounted tickets is not at all uncommon. Anyway, it means I'm flying to Xi'an at the very civilized hour of 2.40pm (so it's not even some sort of 'red eye special') but not until the 29th. That means I've got a few extra days in Beijing, which is fine because it's not like there's nothing to do here.

Paul left for his trip to Yunan yesterday morning so I'm home alone, sort of. Not really home but definitely alone in this city of 15 million, or however many it is. He doesn't get back until after I've gone, so I'm on my own until I see Laura's smiling face at Xi'an airport in about five days time.

I decided to dig out a couple more of Paul's 'Beijing by Foot' cards and do another walk. I know, my leg will never really recover if I'm walking on it for six or seven hours every day, but I'm really enjoying walking around the city and it is a bit better each day. I jumped on the subway and got off at the Lama Temple stop, which unsurprisingly, is located at the site of a Lama temple. That was to be the starting point for a walk around a different part of the city to what I've visited before, and which would connect, more or less, with the second card's walk, past the Ming Dynasty Drum and Bell Towers, but it turns out that that will be for another day, today probably.

I don't think I've raved about the subway yet. Basically, Paul's apartment, where I'm staying, is about a two minute walk from a subway station on the Number Two route. The Number Two is a ring route that runs under the number two ring road - the one that necessitated the dismantling of the city wall - so it forms a tight loop around the inner city and half the stations bear the names of the old city gates that once stood there. The Number Two route intersects with every other subway line in the city, so you just jump on and off at transfer stations to get to any part of the network, without paying any extra. You scan in your card as you enter the station and you transfer as often as you need to without ever needing to exit the system, then scan out again at the end of your journey. All for the princely sum of 2 Yuan, or about NZ50c. You could stay on it all day for that price although you wouldn't see much so that might be taking things a bit too far . . .

OK, so I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I took ages figuring out which way I was supposed to be facing before heading off, but I have finally figured out why I have been going wrong. The sun might still rise in the east in China but it doesn't sure track across the northern sky does it . . . I'm in a different hemisphere so the sun's in the south. Duh! Never fear, I managed to get tripped up by that little piece of information again later in the day. Fool me once, call me unaware, fool me twice, call me - well, let's not go there!

Ah, so there's the Lama Temple: that huge thing towering over me looking for all the world like a Ming Palace, which it would, since that's how it started out. In my defence, it was obscured by a flyover when I first got out of the subway. The place was built by an Emperor-to-be and his son gave it to the Buddhists as a Lamasery, a word I didn't know existed but that's why it gets called the Lama Temple. It's still a functioning temple complete with Lamas in saffron robes and those huge mohawk-shaped hats. I didn't take photos of any of them in their hats; I thought it might be a bit disrespectful, like I thought they looked funny or something. Actually . . .

Everywhere you looked there were people burning incense and praying to the Buddha, including the highest proportion of Western people I've seen in China yet. The Chines looked completely normal but most of the Westerners looked like hippies. The place is beautiful, as you would expect it to be, but seeing these places does reveal how inherently conservative the Ming were in their decorative art. The buildings do reveal experimentation with different shapes and to some extent styles, as the various pavilions in the park where the Heaven Temple is demonstrates. But they're all decorated the same way. The walls are all the same red, the decorations are all painted in the same colours and all feature the same motifs. I thought the Confucian and Buddhist temples might have significant differences, but to my untrained eye, they don't. One of the differences that does exist is the colour of the roofing tiles. The Lama Temple has gold roof tiles because it was originally a prince's palace and, by imperial decree, only Imperial palaces were allowed gold roof tiles. Other buildings tend to have glazed green or plain grey tiles.

Just across the road is the Confucian Temple and adjoining examination centre, where would be bureaucrats took their exams to become part of the imperial administration. Inside, there's an interesting and revealing exhibit about Confucius, who lived during the poetically named 'Spring and Autumn' period, about 2500 years ago. While the name 'Spring and Autumn' might conjure up idylic images of peace and harmony, it was actually a period of great turmoil and incessant war in China, named after the 'Spring and Autumn Annals of the Kingdom of Lu', and which led into the more prosaically named 'Warring States' period that ended with the Qin Emperor (of Terracotta army fame) defeating his rivals and uniting the country. Confucius was born into an aristocratic family but his father died when he was three and they fell on hard times. He worked as a labourer but educated himself and started the first private school in China, breaking the state monopoly on education and accepting students of non-aristocratic origins, also an inovation. He developed a theory of 'virtuous government' and 'fillial duty', which he tried to convince the various warlords to adopt, without success.

Interestingly, the Chinese Government has embarked on a programme of setting up Confucius Centres around the world. The map on the wall showed one in Auckland. Their objective is to introduce the great and wonderful ideas of Big C to the world and encourage people, and therefore governments, to adopt Confucian principles of virtuous government, thus bringing about a more peaceful and harmonious world. But wait a minute! I thought the Chinese Government was communist. I thought these guys were Marxists. It seems gone are the days of believing that capitalism was a class divided society and that the solution was to overthrow capitalism, end inequality, and build a world based on production for social need rather than profit. All we need is 'virtuous government' and the ideas of some reactionary feudal monarchist from two and a half millenia ago. I bet Chinese (and all other) women can't wait for his ideas to be promulgated and adopted around the world. Excuse me while I dash to the bathroom.

So that's enough spiritual enlightenment for one day. Onward and along a few Hutongs and I get to the end of walk No. 1. By this time, partly due to starting late - I had to wait for the guy to deliver my plane ticket before I could leave, and partly because I spent a long time wandering around the two temples and reading the displays about Confucius, I realised there was no point trying to do the second walk; I'd be better off going home and doing some photo sorting and writing up the day's activity. I came out onto the second ring road, and being adventurous (that should teach me), I decided that rather than go back to the original subway station, I'd go the other way and cut in towards the centre of town before linking up with the subway again. It shouldn't be too hard eh? I know where the sun is, it's in the north west, right . . .

My little detour finds me at the third ring road. Hmmm, I've been heading out of town. Oh well, that's OK,, I'm in no hurry, I can keep walking with the setting sun behind me, that's unambiguously in the west, and eventually I'll get to a subway line. Furthermore, if I veer ever to the right, I'll be heading north east towards the city centre. So why have I just arrived at the fourth ring road? Ah, because when I stuffed things up right at the start it meant that when I thought I was heading in on the Southern side of the city, I was, in reality already drifting across into the northern suburbs. It's getting pretty dark by now, but surprisingly, quite a bit warmer than earlier in the day, but I decide it's about time to ask for some directions. The first person I ask directs me to continue up the road I'm already on, turn left at the overbridge, and carry on up that road. I'm about ten minutes from the subway. Gratefully, I zoom on, well not exactly zoom, but there is a bit of a spring in my step, on one side at least. I've been vindicated a wee bit in that my theory of heading east and meeting the subway has proved correct. That's as long as he didn't think I was looking for a fast food outlet. I'm briefly overcome with doubt. Surely if someone in a city with a subway asks where the subway is, they mean the underground, not the fast food chain of the same name? Luckily, he did (or there was a subway shop there too.) Either way, I'm home and hosed, more or less. I go up to the food court across the road where Paul and I ate the night before. I'd noticed that at the place where we ate, the names are written in Korean as well as Chinese. Yay, it was worth my while learning how to read Korean. A quick (actually slightly laboured) perusal of the menu board and I recognise something I know, having eaten it before in Christchurch. I go up to the woman and ask for it by its Korean name, as it is written on the board. I'm greeted by a blank stare. Damn! Well at least I know what I'm getting. Various arm waving and pointing gestures follow and I've placed my order. I can't believe that a place selling Korean food, with Korean themed posters, a Korean flag (South Korean of course!), and the menu written in Korean, is staffed by a woman who doesn't even know what the food is called in Korean! Oh well, at least I have a good meal and can come home satisfied with another sucessful day, even if I had an unscheduled extra two hours of walking through an unfamiliar part of town. And I still managed to get some work done on my photos, although I didn't get this written because the internet was down.

Next time maybe I should take a map . . . Nah, it wouldn't be half as much fun!

The still pretty chilly not so far north

January 21st and I decided to avail myself of a useful wee product of Paul's called "Beijing by Foot". It's a set of about 50 small cards, each able to fit in a pocket, with a walking map on one side and a brief commentary on the other. Looking at two of them I saw that I could do one, go from the end of that one to Beihai Park, which borders the Forbidden City, then come back via the other that winds its way through a series of Hutongs, the little alleyways that still make up some bits of old Beijing. A Hutong is basically an alleyway normally built running East/West or North/South and often quite narrow; apparently the narrowest one in Beijing is 40cm wide in places. Along the Hutong on each side is a series of houses built around a central courtyard. In the past, these were the houses of reasonably well-to-do families but over time, population pressure, and presumably the declining fortunes of the owners, saw more and more families building dwellings within the courtyards. While crowded, the upshot of this process was a very strong sense of community where the whole Hutong was effectively a single unit of people and the idea of private outdoor space was not very relevant. As they've been replaced by highrise apartment buildings, that sense of community has gone, and is missed by many Beijingers who remember the old ways. Interestingly, the name is still used to describe a cluster of highrise buildings, built I expect, on the location of an old one of the same name.

So anyway, I set off on my walk, but started by heading in the wrong direction so took a look through the financial district instead. I came back and headed off in another, also wrong, direction. (Don't let that guy get a taxi licence!) I blame the fact that I was navigating from the start point where Fuchengmen Da Jie and the Fuchengmen Subway station exit were marked, but the subway station has four exits and there are four different bits of Fuchengmen Da Jie, North, South, Inner and Outer. That's my excuse anyway and I'm sticking to it despite any inconvenient facts to the contrary, like the fact that North was marked on the map!

Finally (after about 2 hours of wandering around other places) I figured out which way to go and got started. I went past a Buddhist temple that was begun under Kublai Khan's auspices, and a shrine to all the dead Ming Emperors, which is apparently not that interesting. I got to Beihai Park and wandered through that before getting lost (and misdirected by a soldier) trying to find the start of the route back. The map was wrong I tell you! (Actually it was). Anyway, by this time it was getting dark so I ended up wending my way home through dark alley ways where people were starting to pack up their wares etc so it was all quite interesting to do. The only annoying thing about the whole exercise, which took about 7 hours, was that at some stage I managed to injure my hamstring, although how that happened I have no idea. It was pretty sore by the end of the walk though, and I still had to go and find something to eat...

The next day was probably the worst one I've had so far. I decided to go and visit the museum of the People's Liberation Army, which is conveniently located right on a subway stop. I set out, but the wind was bitterly cold, and I didn't have my scarf or my warm hat, just a beany sort of thing. But that''s only the beginning. I got to the museum, only to find that it had closed for a week of rennovations just the day before, meaning it'll still be closed when I leave, unless the train tickets are for a later day than planned - I haven't heard from Laura yet. Anyway, undeterred, I decided I'd go to the National Museum at Tiananmen Square instead, so jumped back on the subway. I got there, only to find a security barrier all around it. It turns out that it's closed for rennovations until 2010! Grrrr. All of this while limping around with a dodgy leg. I'd thought a nice leisurely visit to a museum might be a way to give the leg a bit of work without overdoing it . . .

So since I'm in Tiananmen Sq I decide: "Oh well, I might as well go and have a gawk at the mummified remains of the Chairman." I brave the bitter North wind and walk across the virtually deserted square, only to find the staff at the Mauseleum closing up shop for the day - it turns out they are only open until midday! Defeated again, I decided it must be time to go home, thaw out, rest the sore leg, and do some research on other possibilities for tomorrow. I realised I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast, but Paul had suggested grabbing something when he finished work. Unfortunately, that didn't happen until about 9.30, by which time I was getting pretty hungry. So we quickly headed down to a Cantonese place in his work building (just across the road from his apartment) to eat. Paul got called back to work - the Chinese government had released annual GDP figures and when New York woke up, they wanted more detail. So I went home by myself. I felt a bit thirsty and by nearly midnight Paul hadn't got back, so I decided the water in the "distilled water" bottle on the kitchen bench must be true to label, and drank some. It tasted a bit odd so when Paul finally got back at midnight, I asked him if it was OK water to drink. "No", he said, "It's tap water I was using to water the pot plants." Ahh, I think. Still, it's about 19 hours ago now and I still feel fine. Amoebic dysentery takes a while to incubate though. I wonder if you retain any immunity after nearly 24 years since the last bout. I think that's enough for one day . . . The leg did feel a bit better though.

The plan for today was to take it a bit quietly again to let the leg recover. Seven and a half hours of walking with only two breaks of about two minutes each wasn't quite what I had had in mind but there you go. That's what happens when you get immersed in something. I decided to have a second crack at visiting the Mauseleum, or should that be Maoseleum? I go there with time to spare after a bit of a late start, and manage to get a squiz (sp?) at the old guy. I kind of expected him to look a bit skody and moth eaten but actually he didn't look too bad for a guy who's been dead for over thirty years. It's all very serious in there; no cameras, ammunition, explosives or bags allowed! And you have to be suitably grave as you file past. Out the other side and the trinket shop is selling Maomorabilia galore, of the tackiest kind. I ducked out the door and went to reclaim my bag and camera. Kind of interesting but the whole personality cult thing just doesn't do it for me I'm afraid. Unless I'm the personality of course.

I'd got out at Qianmen (Front Gate) station at the south end of Tianenmen Sq, hoping that that would put me right at the Mauseleum, which it had, so I crossed back over the street and started down Qianmen Da Jie. Qianmen is one of the very few remaining bits of the old Beijing City wall, torn down in the 60s to allow the number two ring road to go into place. The wall was a Ming era one, designed to keep the residents safe from the ravening hordes outside Beijing -unlike Tianenmen, which was there to keep the imperial court in the Forbidden City safe from the ravening hordes inside Beijing . . .

By walking down Qianmen Da Jie, you eventually get to the Palace of Heaven, where the Emperor used to go twice a year to ask the favour of the Gods and pray for a good harvest. But walking down the street was interesting in itself. It's been turned into a pedestrian only area (although it has a - very slow - tram) and it's very up-market. But it includes restaurants that claim to have been serving roast duck there for over a century. It's entirely possible that they have too because the buildings all look like well restored buildings of substantial age. Anyway, the Heaven Temple was my destination so I continued on until I found it. It's part of a large park, with lots of other pavilions of various shapes and sizes dotted around. I found that I was easily able to wander around the place for hours, despite the cold being really penetrating, especially when I found myself in the shade and the wind at the same time. I don't know how cold it was but it was so cold that even with my gloves on and my hands in my coat pocket, my little fingers started to lose their function. If I ever go to another place as cold as this, I'll be taking a longer scarf too. The one I brought is quite thick, but not long enough to wrap around more than once, so it doesn't stay up around your face. And it really was cold, when I got back and finally remembered to have a drink of water, the water in my bottle was frozen!

I got back about 6.30 and the leg doesn't feel too bad - a bit better each day - so it's time to head out and find something hot to eat!

The Frigid North

On the 15th we took a train up to Changchun, the capital of Jiling province. It was a 6 hour train ride arriving late at night. The train was an express and very new. What this meant was that although it was clean, quiet and had comfortable seats, it was also far too hot and dry due to the air conditioning. Laura really suffered. She usually likes train travel but didn't like that journey at all. Her past experience was of older trains where there's a bit of a draft to circulate the air and you can open a window. Anyway we made it OK. Changchun's mainly an industrial town (they make cars there). As with anywhere it's the people that make the place and Laura's relations there, whom she had never met, were really welcoming and nice. The one place tourists might visit is the Imperial Palace occupied by Pu Yi when he was serving as the puppet of the Japanese. While it looks in some ways as grand as any stately mansion in Europe might, it's a far cry from the Forbidden City or other Imperial residences he would have had access to previously. Oh how the mighty are fallen. The commentary notices never let you forget that he was a Japanese puppet or that his administration were traitorous puppets too. All true of course but they lay it on a bit thick.

There's an adjoining museum to te experience of Japanese occupation of the North, including a train they dredged out of the river that was lost when the Japanese blew the bridge to set up the Manchurian Incident by framing the Chinese army and gaining a pretext to invade. I realised that I was in the area described in "The Girl Who Played Go", a novel that tells the parallel stories of a young Chinese woman and a Japanese army officer at the time of the Japanese occupation of Manchuria and the invasion of China. Interestingly, I was lent "Memoirs of a Geisha" to read on the plane too and it is set in Japan at the same time; nowhere near as good a book though - in fact I'm having to force myself to finish it.

From the Imperial Palace, the next day we went to a kind of recreation area that the locals use to go skiing, dog sled riding etc. I was tempted to have a ski but didn't. Given that I can't ski, all I would probably have done was curtail my trip with some kind of fracture so it was probably wise.

I inflicted more karaoke singing on Laura's unsuspecting relatives and that was it. The family had a big dinner at a restaurant to which I was invited so that was a great experience too.

On the 18th, we drove to Haerbin (Often spelt Harbin, but pronounced Ha-er-bin), reputed to be the coldest city in China and quite a long way north of North Korea. There's quite a big Korean (Chosun Nationality) minority in this region so lots of shops with signage in Korean script. The main thing about Haerbin thoug is its Russian influence. During the 19th Century, when the "Great Powers" were carving up China, Russia put a railway through to Dalian and Haerbin grew from being a small village into a busy city - a "Little Moscow" in fact. There's still a lot of Imperial Russian architecture there including an Orthodox Cathedral, St Sofia. They also have the Ice festival there at this time of year and there are Ice sculptures all over the place. There's also a Disney Ice festival with ice ships, castles etc all themed to the various Disney movies and characters.

I thought Changchun was cold (well it was actually) but Haerbin at night was the coldest I've ever experienced. If I went outside without something over my face, I'd start to feel pain around my cheekbones. Having said that though, it wasn't unbearable. There were locals however wandering around without a hat! And I did see one guy begging without a shirt on...

Seeing Changchun and Haerbin made me more sceptical than ever that the Chinese economy is really on the verge of taking over from the US; I just can't see that when you still have guys transporting stuff down the main road in a a hand cart or a mule cart. There's no doubt that the economy has boomed astronomically but it's very uneven and there are some areas lagging way behind. And I haven't vivsited any rural districts, where people have missed out entirely.

Another thing I have noticed is that for all the gains that the revolution definitely brought for women, young Chinese women seem frustratingly "girly" and subservient to their boyfriends. You'd think that with these young women often being more highly qualified than their boyfriends and with the number of young men outnumbering young women, that they'd be pushing for some real equality, but it seems to me they're trapped in a mix of traditional attitudes and an infatuation with the Western idea of "liberation" being the ability to buy fashion accessories. Althoug I've seen hints of this with my students in New Zealand, it seems more predominant than I had expected, and it's reflected in Chinese TV depictions of relationships too. Women act giggly, petulent and helpless without "their man". Maybe I was expecting too much but I thought that some vestige of revolutionary consciousness amongst Chinese mothers might have rubbed off on the new generation, but it appears not to be the case.

Anyway, I'm back in Beijing for a few days by myself - Laura's off to Xi'an for her Grandfather's birthday, and then I'm meeting her there around the 26th, depending on availability of train tickets. The train trip back from Changchun was better - two hour slower but overnight in a sleeping compartment, and the air-conditioning set cooler. The same price as the express but I'd take the slower option with a bunk any day.

Going up north in winter was an experience well worth doing. I've never experienced that sort of cold before - the snow wasn't really snow, it was small flakes of ice - and may never again.I never got a chance to use an internet cafe while I was in the North but in Beijing, it will be easier for me to do another uppate soon. I'm going to spend the day walking around the neighbourhood; it's an old part of Beijing that's been settled since at least Yuan Dynasty (Kublai Khan's) times.