Today was the last day of my arranged tour, and also the shortest. Our first stop was the Panda House at the Beijing Zoo:
The five pandas are named Beibei, Jingjing, Huanhuan, Yingying, and Nini. When you break it down, it reads “Beijing huanying ni,” which means “Beijing welcomes you.” Cute, huh? This is cuter:
We saw red pandas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesser_panda) as well, but their windows were dirty so the pictures have some blurriness:
Our next stop was the Olympic Green. As you probably know, Beijing was the site of the 2008 Olympic Games.
After that, we took the bus to a traditional Chinese tea house to enjoy the tea ceremony:
Everyone loved the name:
But the prices were kind of high so we didn’t buy anything. The free samples were excellent, though, especially the fruit tea.
Nearby were the famous Beijing Hutong Districts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutong), so our guide arranged for us to take rickshaw tours around the hutongs. These were officials’ homes during the Yuan Dynasty, which was when the Mongolians ruled China, but now they are local villages in the heart of Beijing. Originally, “hutong” was the Mongolian word for “well,” as in the ones from which you draw water. Now, it’s become synonymous with these kinds of dwellings. The view from the rickshaw:
We stopped at an old official’s house, which is very well-preserved. Let me explain some interesting things about the culture and architecture related to the hutongs. First, notice that there are 4 beams coming out over the doorway. In ancient times, 4 beams over the doorway indicated that a family was high-class and wealthy. 2 beams indicated the poorer peasantry. Children from “4 beam” families and those from “2 beam” families were not allowed to intermarry. Next, you may notice that the door is decorated with 2 colors: red and gold. Lower-level officials had doors decorated only in red. You can tell by the gold details that this house belonged to a very important official. There was also an interesting ritual for knocking on the door in those days. The owner of the house would knock once, and the servants would let him in. The owner’s wife knocked twice, and the eldest son knocked 3 times. However, if you were a daughter or a younger son, you had to enter by the backdoor. Only the eldest son would inherit anything from his father, so only the father, wife, and eldest son “owned” the house.
Last by not least, you probably saw the solid beam at the bottom of the doorway. This trait isn’t special in any way to ancient China. In fact, you still see it today in Chinese-style buildings all over Asia. It serves 2 functions—one practical and one superstitious. The practical reason is to keep water from flooding the house. Many areas in China have poor drainage systems, and the situation was much worse hundreds of years ago. Therefore, people built their doorways to keep the water out. The superstitious reason is to keep ghosts from coming into the house. The Chinese concept of ghosts is quite different from the Western concept. You see, the ghost of Chinese superstition is a strange little creature that doesn’t walk, but jumps. However, it’s so small that it can’t jump very high, and so it has to stay close to the ground. People built their homes with these barriers in the doorways to make it hard for the ghosts to jump inside. Nowadays, you mostly see Western-style homes, but temples and tombs always have these barriers. For reasons still unclear to me, women are supposed to cross the barrier right-foot first, while men should cross with their left-feet first.
We ate at a local family’s house, although they didn’t eat with us. They seriously toned down the hot peppers in the kung-pao chicken, but I can understand. There’s a common belief in China that all Westerners cannot handle even the slightest bit of spice. Of course, that’s not entirely true, considering that yours truly and several other foreigners simply adore anything and everything oozing with spiciness. However, I suppose a lot of Westerners really don’t like spicy food, just as many Chinese don’t. It’s just a stereotype because they aren’t familiar with cultural differences across the Western world. I mean, we have a single kind of “Chinese food” in the USA, but there are at least 20 different kinds of ethnic cuisine across China. Same idea, different part of the world. And, yes, they do have “American” restaurants, but I have yet to hear of macaroni & cheese or collard greens on the menu (not that I frequent these establishments here in Asia, you understand). The local family’s kitchen:
Our last destination of the day was Lama Temple (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lama_Temple), and no it’s not like “llama.” That’s an animal. “Lama” in this sense refers to a monk from the Tibetan Buddhism sect, such as the Dalai Lama (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dali_lama). Even though Beijing’s rather far from Tibet (also a province of China), Tibetan Buddhism enjoys a strong following in the capital city, and has for a long time. In fact, this Tibetan temple was built in the 1600s and 1700s.
We were not allowed to take pictures inside the buildings, which is a shame because they were absolutely beautiful. Also, the style was quite different from most other temples I’ve seen, which is mostly because of the elaborate tapestries hanging from the walls and ceiling. We were able to take pictures from the outside, though:
Here’s an interesting fun-fact. If you ever come to China, or to Chinese temples anywhere in the world, you will probably notice that there’s a series of mythological creatures on the corners of the temple roof. This is how you know which building is most important because the more important buildings have more little animal statues. However, they only come in odd numbers, because odd numbers are associated with “yang,” whereas even numbers are associated with “yin.” You can also tell the rank of buildings based on the color of the roof. Blue is reserved for places of worship, yellow is for the emperor, and green is for the common people. Originally, the Lama Temple was built as a palace for one of the emperor’s sons, so the roofs are yellow instead of blue:
The temple signs are written in 4 languages—Chinese, Manchurian, Mongolian, and Tibetan:
Honestly, I’m a little sad to leave Beijing, though I doubt any of you are surprised. It really comes down to just this: I simply love Mainland China. Still, I felt even more reluctant to leave Xi’an. Beijing is wonderful, and I could live here for several years both happy and satisfied. However, I still prefer the pace of life and the culture in Western China. For those looking for a truly “Chinese” experience, Beijing is an excellent place to visit, although you should steer clear of the shopping districts and department stores. I hope I have a chance to come back in the future, but I’d actually be more surprised if I didn’t.
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