Woke up in Beijing
Spent the morning in Mutianyu
Spent the afternoon in Beijing
Fell asleep on the way to Shanghai
The alarm went off around 7 just before our overnight train pulled in to Beijing Station. We got off the train, found somewhere to check our backpacks (which was always a little scary considering that I knew it definitely wasn't as safe as checking bags in Japan), stopped inside a Chinese McDonalds for some breakfast, cursed ourselves for not learning "where's the bathroom?" in the Beijing dialect of Mandarin, and finally made our way to the bus terminal.
Everything in Beijing was a little scary. Checking bags was a little scary. Eating McDonalds was a little scary. Getting on a bus (& praying that we were going the right way) was a little scary. Breathing was a little scary ("air pollution levels on an average day in Beijing are nearly five times above World Health Organization standards for safety" ... yea, that's scary). Beijing just had kind of a 'scary' vibe. But we were on our way (hopefully) to the Great Wall. There was nothing scary about that. (Except for the scary people on the bus).
We took this bus 70km northeast of Beijing to Huairou County. It took like two hours to get there, but we did make friends with the only other English speaker on the bus, a lady named Edva from Israel. It ended up working out nicely because we split a cab that took us from a random bus stop in Huairou County to Mutianyu. There's a limited number of sections of the Wall 'open' to the public, most of which are close to Beijing. We chose the Mutianyu area for a couple of reason ... because we had heard it was less touristy than the other sections, better preserved, there was beer at the top, and we would be able to 'slide' back down (although we didn't really know what that meant). That all sounded good though.
A little Great Wall history ... The thing is unbelievably old. Real technical, I know. :) Back in like 200 BC (see? That's so long ago) construction was ordered to build a wall to protect the empire from intrusions by these Xiongnu people who lived up north. Throughout the course of later dynasties, the Wall was repaired, rebuilt, or expanded to further defend themselves (the crazy Chinese) from those damn northern invaders. And then in the 1400's there was another push to reinforce the Wall as the Ming Dynasty battled it out with the Mongolians. Most of the effort was put into areas around the capital city of Beijing, explaining why those areas are the most well intact ... they were the areas that were built the strongest.
Seeing the Great Wall was overwhelming. It's just like breathtaking (and I hate saying that word). I can't find the words to describe what the feeling was like but it was similar to that of seeing Big Ben, or the Opera House, or the Eiffel Tower, or Kinkakuji, or walking along the D Day beaches. It was just incredible.
The Wall is approximately 4,000 miles long, although no one really knows the exact length and considering that the Wall branches in some areas and extends radically in others, some say the total length can be somewhere close to 5,500 miles. AND, just this year another 200 or so miles of the Wall were discovered. They had been submerged in sand. Who knew? At the same time, it is predicted that something like 50 miles of the Wall will disappear in the next 50 years because of sand erosion (apparently this sand is a problem). So who really knows the exact length of the Wall? No one. I can tell you the exact length of the trek Daniel and I took though ... 2,250 meters.
Oh, and that whole bit about 'sliding' down the Wall ... yea, it wasn't a joke. We took a roller toboggan all the way down (after drinking our TsingTao at the top) and it was wild.
We watched the guards prepare for a nightly flag ceremony and they were kind of scary. Go figure. Like everything else Beijing.
As the sun went down we made our way to Tiananmen Square ... one of, if not the biggest 'square' in the world. This are is well known for it's political activity and student protests. One of the most famous events in Tiananmen Square was the proclamation of the People's Republic of China on October 1, 1949. There were also numerous mass rallies during the cultural revolution in the 60's and 70's.
The Monument to the People's Heroes and the Great Hall of the People from Tiananmen Square:
One of the most severe protests, and biggest displays of political opposition, was in 1989 and ended in what is referred to as the Tiananmen Square Massacre. "The protests were sparked by the death of pro-market, pro-democracy and anti-corruption official, Hu Yaobang, whom protesters wanted to mourn. By the eve of Hu's funeral, 100,000 people had gathered on the Tiananmen square. While the protests lacked a unified cause or leadership, participants were generally against the government's authoritarianism and voiced calls for economic change and democratic reform within the structure of the government."
Basically what happened is the government stepped in, brought in tanks and troops and used excess force to end the the hunger strike, the protesting, and the opposition, causing widespread international condemnation of the PRC government. The death toll is a complete mystery. NATO Intelligence ranks the deaths around 7000 (including civilians and soldiers), while according to the Chinese government, the official figure is 241 dead, including soldiers. "Many people suspect that troops burned the bodies of many citizens to destroy the evidence of the killings." Yea, scary. I've been saying it this whole time.
The whole story is really interesting and definitely worth reading about. There's a great pictorial article from The First Post ... In Pictures: Tiananmen Square Massacre
Sitting there in the middle of the square surrounded by guards, security, and cameras all over the place (yes, that's what it's like now), was almost eerie. Thinking about people essentially being run over by tanks and risking their lives by standing up to open fire as a way to openly oppose a communist government only to have the hopes of political liberalization crushed literally right there in the square was enough to make me quiet for quite a while. I almost felt relieved when we stood up to make our way towards Beijing Station to catch the train back to Shanghai.
We were physically exhausted from climbing the Great Wall and mentally exhausted from having endured all that is Beijing, but we weren't too exhausted to have a TsingTao at the bar on the train. The plan was great, except they didn't have any Chinese beer!! How is it that in China we end up with our only choices being Heinenken, Bud Ice, and some Filipino beer? I don't know either, but hey, we were drinking beer in a bar on a train. And yea, I took the Bud Ice. What of it? :)
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