The Great Wall

Okay, finally made it out to the great wall today. I opted for the hiking option, rather than the cable-car one. I suffered for it.

Turns out I am grossly out of shape, and the altitude is pretty mean, and the day was humid. Many thousands of stairs lay between us and the top, at a pretty steep clip. Based on the signs, I think our vertical ascent was close to half a kilometer. My legs burned, and there were many periods of rest. But we made it to the top!
Drenched in Sweat
Catching My Breath

A few more steps, and we were inside the defensive structure of the wall, ready to fend off Mongolians/Manchus/Japanese.
No Mongols Coming Through on My Watch
"Okay, Still Tired, Take Another Picture"

The rest of the morning-and-early-afternoon consisted of hiking up and down the great wall, checking out some of the defensive architecture, talking about restorations, etc. Very interesting stuff. There is not too much story to tell, so I will explain pictures from here on in. One of my favorite photos (giving me a brief sense of "Good gravy, I'm actually here").
Hand-Made in China

More good views of the great wall:
It Got Brighter

Another one of my favorite shots:
Many Tourists with Many Languages

We noticed the wall really went long distances to assure that it was on local maxima of the mountainrange, maximizing irritation for invading armies without any consideration of cost:
Very Irritating Indeed

The valleys ran deep, covered with foliage even at the time of construction, at least on the "enemy" side--assaulting this thing would have been a challenge.
"Why Don't We Go Around?"

You'll notice two holes here: one for arrows, one for oil/refuse/rubble, whatever you're dropping on scaling enemy soldiers. Very European-style defense. I don't have much in the way of arch pictures, but the defense tower interior very closely resembles Roman Empire architecture:
"We're Out of Oil, Sir!"
"Then Throw Down the Souveniers!"

Here's one of the best examples of a defense tower. They were very 150 meters or so.
Leaning a Bit to Get This Shot

We ran into a single canon--very small, and not terribly well-constructed. No good way to know just how long before the advent artillery this was put in place, but it doesn't seem as impressive as many European designs, particularly given that it's stationary... But the whole construct is a bit confusing; there is clearly concrete renovation for this, but it looks like the concrete is holding the canon in place--what held it in place before that?
This is Not an Excuse to Photograph Rear Ends

On our way back down, a deslightful sight: Beasts of Burden!
Donkey!

And with that, we trotted out--going down seemed so much easier than going up, except that I almost slipped to my death. After sweating, drinking, and then sweating all of the water in my body and my backpack, everything felt a fair bit lighter, too. Left with a bit of a headache from the strain, but got back, got some grapefruit juice in me, and was ready to go.

Tomorrow: Chinese People's Anti-Japanese War Museum (as my mother said: "No political correctness necessary"), which is the name of the war the stuck during the propaganda campaigns of the 1930's, and maybe even some Chinese Acrobatics (I have seen enough Peking Opera on TV that Acrobatics is currently more exciting to dish out the big money for).

The Summer Palace

Okay, as you all know, Sunday was Summer Palace. Let me first say: "not so great, actually." I am starting to get bored of seeing the same Chinese imperial architecture, the same lions, the same facades, the same roofs, the same pagodas. It's like somene 2000 years ago decided that the greatest artistic achievements possible had happened, and anyone that tried to deviate would have his hands chopped off or eyes poked out, etc. When you look at these buildings, the meticulousness and effort are blindingly obvious, and bound--creativity is locked in the black stone hearts of those lions, each the same, never to see the light of day. I wanted to smash them to see if it might emerge.

All of these palaces and temples are truly epic tales of the slow and methodical crushing of the human spirit in China.

So it was among lush and carefully-tended tress (our tourguide was quite the botanist, and told us quite a bit about each plant) that we looked forth onto the thatched roofs of the Summer Palace:
Curiously Modest

The primary lounding areas of the Supper Palace looked out onto a great lake, sculpted and excavated, in such a way that the Emperor could sit within a small pagoda with a beautiful lady and say "See that? It's mine," in an attempt to make their inevitable evening together seem a bit more like it came through persuasion rather than force:
"That? Also mine."

The whole thing sits on a hill, as you can see below. Yeah, more golden terraced roofs--I suppose the emperors wanted it to remind them of home in at least a few ways. I never figured out what the wire, along the outside of the building, was for:
His Majesty's Eighteenth Royal Lounge

Back on the top of the hill, we saw what appeared to be a guard or sentry tower of some sort--the pathway to the tower itself certainly seemed to be made for bowmen to fire, but upon getting to the tower we were just not sure (it was locked):
Not Very Defensible

Back at the bottom, the elaborate East Gate, covered in large bronze pots (we are still not sure of the mettalurgy behind them), crane statues, and large limestone deposit rocks hauled out of the river by slave labor, designed to immediately dispel any thoughts about just how heavenly-rich the emperor was:
Imperial Chinese Bling

But the single greatest testament to civic waste in this decadent symbol of tyrrany was the Emperess Dowager's 60th birthday present to herself: A giant marble (yes, all marble) barge, one which barely floated. To build it, she redirected all the funds raised by the state for a blue-water navy:
The Qing Chinese Naval Fleet

The Chinese were subsequently routed, only once (that's all it took), by the Japanese navy as it cleared a path for itself to resupply troops invading Manchuria:
Wait, We Can't Defend Manchuria With This?

When I look at this, I can think only of lives wasted in two ways: the lives of those men wasted futilely trying to resist the Japanese without a navy, but worse, the lives of those wasted in slave labor building such a terrible icon.

Anyway: with that, we were out of there, and off to a nearby park that also had to be seen. We were quite interested in the maze, but found it to be solvable in about five minutes, particularly given that we were significantly taller than the walls...:
Solved Faster Than a Kid's Placemat at Wendy's

This park contained vast ruins--clearly Western, which was curious. Our guide taught us that these ruins were originally built by skilled French architects and construction laborers on the Emperor's commission, only to be destroyed by incompetent French soldiers during the Opium Wars and Boxer Rebellion:
"Monsuier Le General, This Looks Like it Came from Paris!"
"They Must Have Stolen it! Smash it to Bits!"

Though large enough chunks remain. The French were not as efficient as the Chinese in the 50's and 60's--using point-blank artillery, they made sure that there was nothing but dust and pebbles left of the Buddhist monasteries that they demolished. But much of this destruction looks collateral, rather than purposeful. You'll notice people can touch about 85% of China's history--unlike the West, of course, where it is kept in a glass box:
People Are Probably Pocketing Some of This Stuff

The rest of the park was somewhat pretty, though there was something "off" about the whole thing. It felt so artificial it was uncomfortable. The Chinese had stuck hideous statues (that people really wanted pictures of themselves alongside...) in a few clearly incorrect places--enough so that I could not bring myself to take pictures of them. One of the statues was a Chinese kite, but it was two-dimensional... upon closer inspection, one saw that it was a rather poor computer print-out of a kite, glued to a board. Not impressive. But the temple on the island was nice:
Probably Not a Computer Print-Out

Finally, I leave you with a bit of well-sculpted landscape, because really, that is hard to come by around Beijing. Landscaping really is not China's specialty. But all in all, a strangely oppressive day of broken and bad art that is coming--for me--to symbolize that scares me most about Chinese culture.