Our first stop was Tiananmen Square (fact of place at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square) which can stood up to 1 million people! Was told by Xiao Li that one floor slab can accomodate 2 person. There are 4 surrounding places. I forgot which was which but I know the Monument to the People's Heroes, Zheng Yang Men and Tiananmen gate to the Forbidden City was there. I thought we could see Mao Zedong's body in the Mausoleum but it was close for renovation.
Tiananmen gate, entrance to the Forbidden City( notice Mao Zedong's potrait). Note: Opposite Tiananmen is Zhengyangmen a.k.a Qianmen (a building to obseve enemies)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_City and http://www.dpm.org.cn/english/default.aspIt's a palace full of doors! I guess they have tried their best to preserve the original state of the Imperial palace.. look at the floor tiles..
When visiting the place, it's best to wear comfortable shoes and not some pair of high heels or sandals. I don't think i managed to visit many of the exhibitions due to the disinterest of other people in the tour group. Some walk as fast as they could hoping to end the Imperial palace trip, some thought all the buildings looked the same and therefore pointless to see so many, some looked for place to sit and rest. Short attention span i called it. I mean if you chose to come to Beijing, obviously these are the things you're supposed to explore, otherwise, go somewhere else! However, i managed to catch glimpses of the rooms in the imperial palace. Not to say that we're allowed to go in and really experience it, but we can peek through the glass windows (replacing the paper ones). Although it didn't look as grand as the movies have potrayed, but understandable, it would have looked impressive had it been maintained properly since the last Emperor of China. But it didn't, the Imperial palace aged through time, war and changes of weathers and efforts to preserve it are still ongoing. Too bad during my visit, the Hall of Supreme Harmony was under renovation.
However, Zhong He Dian was available for view.
one of the smaller throne for the Emperor for audience
Emperor's study and resting place at Yangxin Dian
forgot whose room, either the Emperor's or his princess's( note: I noticed that all beds are short an wonder how they sleep)
Roof art...do read wikipedia for more info as i forgot what Xiao Li had told us
Summer Palace
Age old tree, took hard efforts to preserve!
Longest corridor in the Summer palace-now filled with people resting. Notice the art on the ceiling, each block has different painted picture!
A beautiful view of the man made lakeOlympic 2008
It might not look familiar now...it's called the Birdnest..hahaha
Epilogue
After a whole day tour, we were brought to a "Tea House" and taught the art of tea drinking which includes how to sip your tea to give the maximum taste of the tea. If my memory doesn't fail me, we visited Wangfujing at night. As told, it was a local tourist area and food was at least expensive (hawker stalls where you stand to eat). The hawkers are at the side of Wangfujing. One stick of 'luk luk' cost at least about 5-15yuan. They served scorpion and starfish as well. And the whole street was filled with smelly tofu smell. There were Muslim's luk luk as well, which the owner look very Xinjiang.
As for the Wangfujing itself, didn't managed to venture far enough due to lack of time. But there was a posh shopping complex next to it. Baleno and IP Zone was having sales! Chinese shoppers are quite rude, they knocked into you and never say sorry.
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