Forbidden City

Exploring parts Old Beijing means you have to stand upside down. Chinese maps are drawn with respect to the top of the page from South to North, and therefore everything has to be looked at with an upside down perspective. Why upside down? Well, that's only our Western view. We stand outside the world, look down on it and naturally this view leads from North towards South. Chinese tradition has it that man stands in the middle of the world and faces the sun. So the maps, which of course are drawn initially only for the Emperor, are pointing towards South. That is only one of dozens of little information pieces that Sharon and I learned on a 3-hour walking tour from across Tian'amen Square through the Forbidden City, organized by the Chinese Culture Club.

On Tian'anmen Square, the clash between old and modern Beijing is obvious. On the left and right side, you still see old buildings from the early 20th century, built by the Europeans, and the Soviet-style Great Hall of the People (parliament). Only two of the nine original City Gates remain, and in the center of the huge Square is the mausoleum of Mao Zedong. Our guide tells us that the body visibly shrinks and gets more and more shiny and rosy. In other words: There are doubts that the body is real, since in 1976 the Chinese did not use very sophisticated techniques (imported from Russia via Vietnam) to preserve Mao - who, by the way, wanted to be cremated and not put on display. But as long as the Party is in power, the mausoleum will contain a Mao look-alike and you will also see the huge, famous, millions of times photographed painting of Mao at the outer wall of the Forbidden City.

The Forbidden City itself is still worth a lengthy visit, although several of the big wooden palaces are under repair and therefore hidden under protective cloth. Beijing invests huge sums in order to restore historical sites in advance of the Olympic Games in August 2008. It's a matter of national pride now to show the best of the old buildings not destroyed during the "Cultural Relvolution". What was considered as "old garbage" 40 years ago is now a showpiece to the world.

Our guide talks quite openly about the changes and the challenges in modern China. He mentions the total secrecy around the inner workings of the government, the weak parliament (which only convenes for 2 weeks each year to rubber-stamp laws designed by the top level of the Party). Note the historical parallels: China closed its doors to the outside world in the Ming Dynasty (16th Century) and was forced to open itself again in the 1820s by the British. The country again closed the doors under the communists until the late 1980s. Only now China begins to open again, but at a much faster pace, and this time, it appears that there's no turning back. -- Possibly the maps have to be redrawn again: From West the East now to East to West in the future.

Guest blog by Walter Niederberger