More Beijing- Tiananmen Square and Forbidden City

After Temple of Heaven, we went to lunch with our guide and driver. Great food! I warned them I was extremely picky, but Eric wanted to try everything under the sun. We had rice, noodles, chicken dish, shrimp dish, pork dish, and beef dish. And tea of course. Believe it or not, I tried everything! I loved the sticky buns and pork. I liked it all, and was so proud of myself for trying everything. AND, the waiter even told my guide he was shocked at how good I was with chopsticks. That's like the ultimate compliment.

Off to Tiananmen Square, which is directly south to Forbidden City. The square can hold 1 million people.

T square
T square.. You can wait in line here for hours to see Mao's body. We passed
Holy smokes was the sun bright yesterday! We were SO thankful b/c it had snowed Friday, and was completely dreary. We had a gorgeous Saturday. No haze, which is usually the case from pollution.

Some military guys. And Yes Mom- I asked my guide before I took a photo of military people while I'm in a communist country.
They hang a new picture every year so it doesn't start looking bad. This is the first communist leader from the big civil war in 1949.

Split leg pants. This is how the Chinese potty train. The pants are split in the back, and the children don't normally have on a diaper. I guess this one did b/c of where we were? But then five minutes later we saw a kid toddling around with bare bottom hanging out.

Rivers and numerous gates protected the actual city.
Forbidden City has 9,999 rooms. 9 is a lucky number here. A newborn can live in a different room every day, and not have to be in the same room until they are 27 years old.
The real name for the Forbidden City. It was Forbidden to the public during the dynasty's but is now a museum.


The bricks on the left have been replaced, the ones on the right are over 300 years old. None are the originals.



The last thing we did Saturday was a hutong tour, but I'm not sure I'm gonna get to blog that this morning. We have to pack up and meet our guide and driver at 9:30. We have a two hour drive to the Great Wall, and then lunch. Then the Wall! We are super excited! They will have us back to the airport and Angela will go in with us and get us headed into the right direction to our gate. We have about a two hour flight to Changsha, and our guide Shirley will meet us in the airport there. We go to our hotel, unpack, settle in, and get one more night's sleep before it's TESSA TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

More Beijing

The first place we went Saturday morning was to the Temple of Heaven. It was where past emperors went to worship to heavens. It was interesting to learn about Taoism and ancient religions, but sad to know how lost those people were. Angela is a fabulous guide, and knows a ton. Traffic was great, the park wasn't crowded, and we made great time! All these old temple sites are now public parks. There were so many people out exercising and enjoying the sun.

Entrance gate. Don't you love how Eric humors me and lets me take his picture a million times? I've given up asking him to smile:)

These guys use water and write Chinese calligraphy on the stone ground. Angela said they write poems, stories, whatever they want.

Where ox were burned for sacrifice.
Another use for burlap! No slip steps






The juniper tree. There was a man standing there worshiping it. I said a little prayer for him.

We saw a lot of these carving in the middle walk way of steps.

Why we need a guide: Because Eric sucks at taking pictures;-) See below for evidence.
Our guide Angela. Love her!
Echo wall. You can stand on different parts of it, far away from one another, and have a normal conversation.

Snow on the roof.

The tallest building in Beijing. It's more spread out that spread up, as a city.

I had to ask our guide why all these people were crammed on this little wall. Turns out, the sunshine! It's always so hazy and polluted here, that true sunshine is rare. They were playing a variety of games.
Playing cards
Chinese Chess
Ladies exercising

This tour group was following the Angry Bird balloon. We got a good laugh out of that.
Little girl in the park. I wanted to go scoop her up and hug on her.

It's Sunday morning here. Eric is in the gym, and wants to stay in this hotel forever. It's like a resort, and we've been calling these couple of days our second honeymoon! We've had a great time to reconnect and recharge before jumping back into parenting full steam ahead.