Chairman Mao Zedong is quoted as having said (probably inaccurately) that “a man who has never ascended the Great Wall cannot call himself a hero.”
Unlike the Forbidden City whose construction was ordered and completed as a single project during the reign of a single emperor (Emperor Yongle 1404-1420), The Great Wall was multiple projects undertaken by a number of different dynasties over more than 2000 years beginning with the Qin Dynasty in 200 BC.
And contrary to popular lore it is not visible from space.
Although the totality of the Great Wall was over 5500 kilometers, only about 30% stands today and only about 10% is in good condition. Vast portions have fallen to natural decay, erosion and adverse weather conditions and large sections were destroyed by countryside farmers who took stones and bricks from the wall to use as building materials after the establishment of the Peoples Republic.
The Great Wall which stands today is for the most part the remaining sections of the wall that was constructed during the Ming Dynasty In the 16th Century.
We visited the Badaling section of the Great Wall which is about 70 kilometers outside of Beijing the restoration of which was ordered by Chairman Mao in the 1950’s.
It’s pretty touristy with souvenir shops, a cable car to the top and even an optional toboggan that can be ridden back down.
Mao climbed the Badaling Great Wall In 1957 when he supposedly uttered the above quoted aphorism and since then it’s been visited by hundreds of visiting celebrities and dignitaries including Richard Nixon who opened China to the west and visited in 1972.
It is the best preserved, most scenic, most accessible and most visited section of the Great Wall and it is pretty amazing.
So would the Chairman let you call yourself a “hero” if you “ascended” the wall in a cable car? Probably not but who cares, I’m too modest for that sort of thing anyway and it was a great experience. And did I mention that it’s my fourth of the World’s Seven Wonders? But whose counting?
After our visit to the Great Wall we returned to Beijing for a visit to the Olympic Village site of the Beijing Summer Olympics in 2008 and a performance of the Legend of Kung Fu show at the Red Theatre.
The Olympic Village was the site of the summer olympics in 2008 and will also be the site of the upcoming winter olympics in 2022 making Beijing the first city to ever host both a summer and winter Olympic Games.
And then we had dinner at Hua Restaurant on Guijie Street. The area is hugely popular with locals and loaded with restaurants one after the other each bright and lively. Guijie means ghost and the street is so named because each restaurant has lanterns on the sides of the entrances that look like the eyes of ghosts at night.
Hua Restaurant specializes in dishes prepared from the enormous variety of fresh mushrooms and fungus on display not to mention insects including scorpions, scarabs, cockroaches and silk worms. Who knew that a single silk worm has as much protein as a dozen eggs?
And beyond mushrooms, fungus and insects we of course had more Peking Duck and a truly delicious whole fried fish.
You’ll discover in China that most public places and religious sites have raised sills in the doorway entrences. In fact the more important the building or more sacred the Temple the higher the sill in the doorway entry. We visited temples that have doorsills in the entryways that are more than a foot in height.
And you are not to step on the door sill when you enter so entryways with really high door sills require you to really bend your knee deeply as you step over.
The Hua Restaurant is of a style fairly typical of nice restaurants in China that have private dining rooms with large tables for parties of 10 or more and there was even a raised door sill at the entrance of our private dining room.
My first thought when I saw the raised door sill entryways was that it makes it difficult for handicap access but I learned that the raised door sill serves a purpose which trumps the needs of the handicap.
They effectively prevent ghosts from entering because, although it was news to me, it’s common knowledge in China that ghosts can’t bend their knees. So they are forced to remain outside where they can do you no harm other than to stare at you with their lantern eyes while you enjoy your dinner of mushrooms, fungus, scorpions, scarabs and silk worms and in our case fried fish and more Peking duck.
Next up Episode 5 Xi’an and the Terracota Warriors
Ghosts can’t bend their knees. Hysterical
That was such an interesting read! I had to read it to my family, thank you!