okay, quick new update, i guess?

okay, friday we started out by going to tienanmen square, this is the square at roughly the center of beijing, just south of the forbidden city. the square is named for tienanmen gate, the entrance to the forbidden city, which is at the north end of the square. you can see mao's picture on the gate below.


to the west of the square is the house of congress, or the equivalent. during that tienanmen square incident, (which happened sometime in the 80s, but i can't check the exact date because i think the chinese ISPs block wikipedia.com. i want to say '89? in any event, i can't get to wikipedia.com for whatever reason) three students went up the steps of the building and waited for someone from the government to come out and speak with them. no one ever did.

the pic below is of the people's memorial. behind that is mao's mausoleum. these are at the south end of the square. during the tienanmen massacre, hunger strikers convened at the people's memorial. now you can't even go up to it - it's roped off and there are guards making sure you don't slip by.

to the east of the square is another government building - can't remember which. in front of it is a countdown clock to the olympics. there are several of these all over beijing.

then we went to the forbidden city. i couldn't find any outdoor pics from within the city that do it justice. the place is just freaking huge. but what i thought was interesting is that in one part of the city is a gallery of imperial treasures, two of which are jade mountains. they were originally part of a trio, but the third was carried off at the end of the qing dynasty and ended up in the minneapolis institute of arts. the reason that one was carried off is because it is a lot smaller than the other two.

okay, i figured out a way i can give you an idea of how big the place is. here's the map of the forbidden city that was on my audio walking tour thingamabob.

see the two rectangles surrounded by white in the center? the lower (southern) one is the hall of supreme harmony. it was under construction, but you can get an idea of the size of the building and the size of the square in front of it from the picture below. comparing this picture to the map above might give you an idea of how gigantic the place is. you could easily spend a day there exploring.

this is the starbucks in the forbidden city. a STARBUCKS. seriously. in the forbidden city. its presence here is kind of controversial. there's a chinese media figure who is making a big deal about it being a sign of american cultural and economic imperialism, and the fact that this starbucks is located in the traditional center of chinese imperial power.

this is a detail of the jade mountain above. look at that chain detail!


this is the other jade mountain.


okay, really quick. then we went to a huge manmade hill/garden just north of the forbidden city which offered amazing views of the city. below is the forbidden city.


we went to a bar that night. our profs came too! it was a good time.

one of the squat bathrooms in the bar.