This is what the Emperor would have been carried up. It has clouds to signify his ascent to heaven. The emperor used to do this every day, prompting no end of jealousy from some other holy personages I could name, who only did it once...
There were lots of these odd minimalist mural-type things. I thought that they were really nice.
If the emperor ever got the munchies, this is the phone he used to call Domino's.
The sign says, "please do not climb on the cultural relic," or something equally pompous.
Graceful birds were a treasured part of Chinese society.
While elephants were habitually hamstrung because they smell funny.
Behind the Forbidden City there was a park with a hill and a view of what I always thought Chinese architecture was like.
When in China or Japan, there is no such concept as "too many photos taken through doorway / arch / gate".
All of my hilarious banter aside, this really was quite interesting. In the park they had a display of stills and music from various Chinese films throughout history. The photo above is just one panel. On others there was musical score which the old guys were diligently copying it down so that they could learn to play the tunes. I'm all for it. It was the first thing in China that I had seen that actually gave me a positive impression of anything the Chinese government had done.
In the evening we headed out to the night market, where you can buy more or less any living creature on a stick.
The grasshoppers were deep-fried and, whilst they weren't delicious, I have definitely had worse elsewhere.
Yours truly noshing on deep-fried insects.
The night market: It sells stuff, at night.
