Our first full day
Together we had a good nights sleep…. Ying was awake til 4am, I woke up at 5…
Hotel breakfast was extensive, 30yards of buffet. I was surprised at all the pork/bacon. Not in Malaysia now! And to Ying’s delight, free flowing coffee
Breakfast cafeteria. It’s has everything you could desire , continental meats, make your own salads with beans and chickpeas, fried and boiled eggs, bacon, sausages, Chinese porridge with every topping you could need, some steamed dumplings, breads, pastel da nata, doughnuts, coffee, different fruit juices, etc.
Off to the forbidden City
Our tour guide Dan picked us at the East Gate took us round and bought us round to the South Gate (main entrance historically and now. Passports taken and they became our “tickets” in and out
The Forbidden City is 1.5km by 0.75km wide. There are more than 70 large and small palaces in Forbidden City and more than 9,000 rooms when it was built in 1420 (though a “room” then has 4 corners not 4 walls)
Each of the palaces were used according to differing function and esteem, meeting ministers, exam halls for the beurocratic elite, emperors palace or dowager/concubine etc
The turtle and crane are signs of longevity. The other is a sundial
One feature of the day were the number of (mostly but not exclusively) women and children dressed in period costume (and doing instagram poses!
We were told the blossom was peach (not cherry)
After we climbed a substantial hill made from the spoils from the moat, and got an overview of the forbidden city (with haze)
Interesting contrast, 35yrs ago it was 95% bicycles, now it is 95% EVs, at least in central Beijing, making a quiet and pollution free walk to supper…
We found a suitably busy restaurant although no English spoken or on menu. So the main challenges were to use their WeChat app menu, negotiating with the waitress what to order via Apple translate, then paying on WeChat which we eventually did but overorderdd…
It was yummy duck though
As a final challenge to ourselves, off down the tube to master underground travel!
It’s been very noticeable the staffing levels. Every tube entrance has airport security (loosely applied) with an awful lot of supervisory staff. Similarly there are police in abundance more often in roadside tents also lots of video cameras but it seems everyone is accepting of it