Our tour left the ship at 6:30 am, a lady on the tour got on the bus and summed it up, “we are tired stupid people”. We barely recovered from yesterday’s tour and we were back at it; another 3-4 hrs back to Beijing on that damn bus. The bus was uncomfortable and the rest stops were horrid. Hygiene is just not important in this society. The bathrooms are usually gross but some did have soap and water – I’m sure these were the nice ones that they took us westerners. This is such a contrast to being in Japan where hygiene is so important; they have deluxe toilets that wash your bottom in different ways and they give you moist towels to wipe your hands before eating. Don’t know how I got on this subject, but it an important part of visiting.
Today we visited Tienanmen Square (pic 1), as you might imagine, security was very tight. It is a very large open area bordered by Mao’s mausoleum, the Forbidden City, the national museum and a government building. On the museum is a large reader board (pic 4) counting down the time to the Olympics.
We then toured the Forbidden City (pic 2). It’s quite large (pic 3) but when you’ve got lots of people to take care of you need a big spot. One of the emperors had 9000 concubines – that’s crazy!
Lastly we visited the Temple of Heaven (pic 5). This is where the emperors would come to pray for a good harvest, 3 was the magic number; 3 gates, 3 gardens, 3 roofs on the temple. They did a nice job restoring the temple. It was also very windy, a good day to wear my hair in a pony tail.
These parts of Beijing seemed to be in better shape than yesterday’s, but we were close to the center of downtown
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