We woke up yesterday morning to overcast skies and a much cooler temperature. We were quite grateful that our guide rearranged our schedule after looking at the weekend forecast to push most of the outdoor touring yesterday. I don’t even want to imagine walking the Great Wall in the rain…

at Tian’anmen Square

Armed with hotel umbrellas, we continued on our 2-day Beijing or bust tour. We started our touring at Tian’anmen Square, where guards were plentiful and the tourists even more so. We walked through the square past Chairman Mao’s mausoleum (which was open, a fairly rare thing) through the underground passageway to the Forbidden City.

For those of you unfamiliar with the Forbidden City, at one time it was the emperor’s private residence. To get to his residence, you’d pass through 9 very large gates. (Side note- the number 9 is very important in Chinese culture, especially to royalty.)  One of the distinctive features of the Forbidden City is that the doorway to most gates in royal architecture is raised so that you have to lift your foot up and over each threshold. This was a way that those entering the gates were forced to show deference to the emperor by bowing slightly in order to not trip when stepping over the rise. They’re also a great way to trip tourists who are being herded through gates– hypothetically of course!

Outside the Forbidden City

One of the gates with raised threshold

Passing through gates to the Forbidden City

Today’s lunch was at one of Chen’s favorite childhood restaurants– a very small restaurant tucked away on an upper floor in a Beijing neighborhood. We had fantastic fresh pickled cucumbers, various bao (steamed buns), and dumpling soup. It’s been really educational to eat lunch with our guide and driver, as we’ve been able to share stories and learn a lot about each other’s culture. For example– in Beijing, the government pays students to attend college– and larger amounts if they leave their home province. It was comical to explain to them that most American students have college debts for years after graduating! I also reached a milestone today in experiencing my first non-Western restroom of the trip. I won’t get into details here, but I am glad that I got a little practice in before we are in-province tomorrow.

We visited a silk factory, complete with silk worms, which was very educational but also a little too touristy for our taste. We’ve both noticed that Chinese vendors are persistent– very, very persistent.  It can be very difficult to firmly say that you don’t want to buy anything; we stayed strong and didn’t leave with any large, silk duvets.

Our final touring for the day was the Temple of Heaven, formerly the emperor’s temple and now a huge park mostly populated by retired locals and home to the iconic Temple of Good Harvest. Brian took some great footage of this– it’s very common to find strangers gathering together to sing folk songs spontaneously or others dancing with ribbons out in the open in this park. I’ll admit that it seemed a little unusual, but our guide said this is often where professional entertainers and dancers go after retiring so they can still show off their skills. As we moved closer to the Temple of Good Harvest, it was difficult at times because people would just start clumping and breaking out into song and blocking walkways.

At the Temple of Good Harvest

We capped our day by attending an acrobatics show. We were a bit skeptical at first, but it was incredible! Tonight, we actually stayed awake for dinner and found a great ramen restaurant. We had to resort to pointing and nodding quite a bit, but it was a good cap to Beijing. Today we fly out early in the morning from Beijing to Taiyuan in order to meet Alexander TOMORROW! It’s so hard to believe that we’ll be parents to a 15-month old in less than 48 hours. I’m a little nervous about our first Chinese domestic flight, but it’ll just be one more first to add to the record books for this adventure.

for Rachel and Jon- 8 girls, 3 bikes! Later, there were all 8 girls on 1 bike. Madness!

Waiting for the show to begin