Chinese Confession - Beijing, Nanjing, and Joe Completely Confused

Well, the week-long break from school and classes is coming to a close. We got back to Shanghai last night, and I am definitely glad to be back here. It was an interesting week, and although we didn’t have our trip nearly as planned out as we should have, it was still quite good and we saw a lot.

After seeing the Great Wall outside of Beijing, we saw several of the other major sights. My favorite was definitely the Summer Palace. It was so peaceful and beautiful. We spent an entire afternoon there, which was more than we were anticipating. We tried to check out the Olympic Park, but there was so much construction going on that we really couldn’t see a whole lot. Beijing will definitely be ready when the Olympics kick off next August, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t have an astonishing amount of work ahead of them. They also have to get several metro lines open and running, on top of their current 5.

A lot of our sight seeing was severely limited because of the weather. It wasn’t too rainy most of the time, but it was really, really cold. Apparently all of China was cold, so it wasn’t just Beijing though. I went around bundled up in my coat, a scarf, knit hat, and occasionally gloves, but I was still almost always cold. I’m really not a big cold weather fan, but I just deal with it.

We got to see Lama Temple, which is one of the Buddhist temples. It was really neat to see, actually. The most fascinating thing about it was seeing Chinese people still practicing a religion, including burning incense and bowing and the other parts of the ritual that they go through. We were just standing back and watching it all. I shot a few pictures. I won’t lie – I kind of wanted to join in and burn some incense, but I just felt that would not be appropriate, especially since I am not a Buddhist. They also had an absolutely enormous Buddha statue in the tallest building in the temple area. It was probably about 40 feet tall, which is extremely tall. That’s actually probably close to being as tall as the tallest buildings in downtown Loveland. That’s either really impressive for a Buddha statue or else really pathetic for Loveland.

On the topic of cities and size, Beijing really didn’t feel all that large to me. The city supposedly has somewhere around 14 million people, which makes it 4 to 6 million smaller than Shanghai, but it is so much more spread out and there really aren’t many tall, tall buildings. It felt more like a city of perhaps 2 million. I don’t know where they crammed the other 12 million, but they are in there somewhere. Perhaps they are all on the subway. That would explain why those metro lines were so insanely crowded. Many times we tried to hop on the metro only to be unable because there literally was no room anywhere. The city cut the metro fare down to two Yuan as a flat rate, which certainly has assured that there is an innumerable amount of people that take it. It probably helps alleviate traffic, though I wouldn’t have known because we only took a cab a few isolated times. The traffic is supposedly horrendous though.

Forbidden City was also pretty neat. It was absolutely huge. I had no idea that the palace could be so massive and have so many rooms, but it did. We spend about three hours there and saw hardly any of it. They were doing a lot of renovations on it, which meant that a lot of it was inaccessible. This, of course, was on top of the many areas that were already inaccessible for other reasons. There certainly wasn’t enough time to see the whole thing though, even if it was completely accessible. My attention span is decent, though not quite as good as some people’s, but even I started to tire of seeing corridor and room after corridor and room. The novelty definitely wears off after a while, which can be said about a lot of places and things.

The last day in Beijing we went to try to see some Millenium Monument, which ended up being a huge disappointment, coupled with the fact that we couldn’t even find the entrance. That coupled with chilly temperatures meant that we gave up soon enough and went to the Military museum. The museum was interesting for a while, but I guess I’m just not huge into war and military things. They had all kinds of guns, tanks, and aircraft that have been used by the Chinese over the past 100 years. Steve really gets into that kind of stuff, so he knew a lot about them all. For me, most of the time I was just going through the motions looking at things, my eyes hazy and unfocused as I wandered around in “Joe Land” in my imagination, barely sparing any mental processing for the multitude of guns, armor, tools, and Chinese documents in front of me. This is usually the same thing I do when I’m bored in class or have some idle time.

There wasn’t a whole lot written in English, though everyone once in a while there was a big paragraph explaining the big picture of what was going on. I knew enough about Chinese history that I could usually put it at least somewhat into context, and that was what made it more interesting. Steve and Will were also there with me, and Steve is a big history buff, so we could discuss things as we came across them in the exhibits. Beijing, as the capital of China, is also the political center of it and the government’s showcase to the world. I wondered if this museum is something the government will encourage foreigners to see when they come for the Olympics. It was replete with propaganda and things that, if not taken in a historical context, would lead you to believe things in history weren’t quite as they were. Of course the government certainly won’t deny this. They already plainly admit that they control education, media, and a lot of the books and intellectual things that are allowed or taught in the country. With the blurbs offering historical context for the things displayed in the museum, it was particularly interesting to see the word choices that they selected. They provided information that, although not terribly inaccurate, still didn’t reveal the full picture of things.

It’s really tough to describe just how much propaganda was there. You certainly could see it in the paintings and sculptures that were placed around the museum. The soldiers and workers labored tirelessly in some sculptures, wearing bright, wide grins on their faces. Women and children stood around them, also smilingly as if they were in an idealistic paradise. Obviously these sculptures weren’t meant to be historically accurate, because I really doubt they would all be grinning as they wheel cannons around to engage in a civil war that has engulfed the country or trekking through feet of snow, high up in the mountains in the winter. It just felt like these were more like expressive works of art meant to glorify the system they were all working to build rather than to document history. Perhaps this was the only way the artist that sculpted it could get the government to pay for it and put it on display. Perhaps it was forged during the Cultural Revolution, as the whole nation was swept by a unified vision for a completely new country and world. Perhaps they represented an attempt to revise history somewhat, or even rewrite it. I really can’t say, and it’s rather unfortunate that the sculptures and paintings themselves don’t have voices by which they could speak for themselves.

I’m not trying to be political or bashing in this, I am simply trying to provide an illustration of the things that I saw around me and show some of the inconsistencies with how they are presented, how they are meant to be interpreted, and how I interpret them because I have heard of them from multiple sources. I took a picture of one of the more, ummm, “colorful” blurbs offering context for China’s civil war that took place after World War II. I will include the picture here, so anyone can read it if they wish. I highly recommend it.

I found it interesting to see how they present the Communist Party as being the underdog, the will of all of the people of the country, and outright blaming the other side (and the US, of course) for “launching a nation-wide civil war.” The second paragraph is even more interesting, especially with how they tackled the topics of Tibet and Taiwan: “Up to June 1950, [the People’s Liberation Army] had liberated the whole country except Tibet, Taiwan and a few islands and won the War of Liberation.”

The last line is my favorite line of all: “The Party finally realized the objective of its long lasting struggle–‘to liberate the whole nation with its people and establish a new democratic China.’”

The last few hours in Beijing we spent mostly just wandering around and experiencing the city. Beijing is a very unique and interesting city, and there are many, many things to do. As I mentioned before, you really feel the presence of the government there though, and it really was like a weight I just couldn’t get off of my shoulders the whole time I was there. I’m glad I went, and I really did enjoy my time there, but I must admit that I was glad to be able to leave.

We took another night sleeper train to get down to Nanjing from Beijing. Nanjing is a decent sized city of about 7 million people. I think it felt bigger than Beijing, but it is also much more dense. Beijing is horrible to get around if you just walk and take the subway because it is so spread out. Nanjing only has one metro line and is fairly dense. I really liked it. The two days we were there, though, it was raining the entire time. It wasn’t as cold as Beijing was, but it still wasn’t balmy. This meant pictures weren’t quite as picturesque, even though the city really is beautiful.

We were pretty tired by this part of the trip. We also didn’t have a guide book for the city, so we didn’t really experience it quite like I was hoping we would. Fortunately, the city is only two hours away from Shanghai, so if I want to go back, it makes for an easy weekend trip.

The main tourist thing that we did was seeing Dr. Sun Yatsen’s Mausoleum at a huge mountain near the middle of the city. It is amazingly beautiful and clean. The trees, plants, flowers, and rocks are abundant. The tourists normally are as well, though there aren’t as many westerners in this part of the country as in Beijing or Shanghai. Unfortunately the clouds and fog were also extremely abundant, so the visibility was close to nil. I took what pictures I could, but I was unfortunately limited.

Our hostel was at the end of a main shopping area in the heart of the city. We could just step out the door and walk a few meters and find ourselves in a huge pedestrian and shopping area with just about anything you could want. It’s actually a lot like Nanjing road in Shanghai, surprisingly, except that in Nanjing there are far fewer tourists and no people trying to get us to get prostitutes. My favorite thing to do was to just walk up and down the streets in this area.

They had some amazingly delicious fruit skewers that proved to be nearly addicting. They just took some fruits like oranges, kiwi, cherry tomatoes, and grapes, and put them on these wooden skewers. Then they put a very thin hard candy coating on them that locks in all of the fresh juiciness without being too sweet, and then they sell them all around the area. They actually have these things all over the country, and they are absolutely amazing. I could probably eat them all day and still want more. Plus they are really healthy, which makes them a true guiltless pleasure (not that I, of all people, would have to worry about calories).

At night time, the people all flock to this part of town and just walk around, shop, and eat food. It really is a big social thing.

I decided to join the locals of Nanjing and experience it like they do. Based on my experience, I concluded that the locals of Nanjing go there to enjoy the amazing food, see the dazzling lights that illuminate the area, take lots of pictures, and shop. The clothes shopping is actually the most interesting part. Unlike in the US, the main objective here is to go to these überstylish stores, browse through what they have to offer, and try to determine if the clothes are for guys or girls. Once they determine that the article of clothing is one that their gender wears, they purchase it and wear it everyday for a year straight.

Okay, I am exaggerating a little. But in all honesty, I walked into these clothing stores and I seriously could not tell which ones were for guys and which were for girls. I would then turn to one of the workers, and ask:

这是男孩子的还是女孩子的？(Is this guy’s or girl’s?)

They would then stop, look at me like I had three heads, smile awkwardly, and try to find out what my size is. Needless to say, it made for a completely new shopping experience. I can see it now: I will go back to the US, start up a retail chain where part of the shopping experience is determining whether something is for guys or girls. It will be genius! Now boyfriends and girlfriends will have to go shopping together to determine which one should wear the pair of jeans they just purchased. Purses are still safe though – they seem to be only for girls here as well as in the US. Outside of those, anything is fair game.

When the time finally came our trip to come to a close, and I was still completely unsure of what clothes were for guys and for girls, we took our last train back to Shanghai. We took a D-train, which are almost the nicest trains in China. We got “soft seat” tickets, which basically are the equivalent of first class, so we rode in style. It felt more like flying than taking a train. Not only did it hit 249kmph (about 150mph), it made for a very, very smooth ride and the seats were very roomy and comfortable. It was certainly a transition from our hard-bed sleepers that we took everywhere else on our trip.

We did have to forgo the massages we planned on getting in Nanjing because we couldn’t find a massage parlor. But we can probably do that here this week. Getting back to Shanghai was really, really nice though. It felt like we were coming home. It’s so much warmer, denser, and more fast-paced here, which are big pluses in my book. But this trip really made me see just how unique Shanghai is. It is, hands down, my favorite city that I have been to in China (aside from Hong Kong, of course). It is also much more western than the other places I have been to, even Beijing and all it is doing to prepare for the upcoming Olympics.

Now that the trip is over, I only have about 5 weeks left here and a couple of really, really big projects that will be taking up a lot of time and effort for me. I will face those tomorrow, along with classes as they restart. I certainly feel like my spoken Chinese has improved tremendously with all of the speaking that I have been doing. I’m pretty excited to hit Mandarin class again and put it to work again and see how it goes!