The Forbidden City is where the emperor used to live up until 1911 when the Qin dynasty fell (if I remember correctly). The palace is huge, as it was meant to be able to fit most of the city inside its walls. My roomate and I went together yesterday, and despite the rain, the place was still packed. Outside of the Forbidden City is the Tiananmen gate, which is located across from Tiananmen square. A huge picture of Mao Ze Dong looms over the gate along with the ever present red flags. Unfortunately, most of the palace is under construction (most likely for the 2008 Olympic Games). But, what we did see was pretty amazing. The only problem is that most of the antiques were taken to Taiwan when the nationalist party fled, claiming that they were removing the antiques to protect them. So, most of the palace is huge empty rooms with maybe one or two chairs, or a large water pot. Anyways, as usual, while leaving the palace I had a group of asian men want to take a picture with me. Seriously... ooo red hair... what a joke =P I was thinking that when I got back to America I should run up to random asian people and ask them in my poor chinese if they'd take a picture with me.
I took a ton of pictures of the place but don't have a way to upload them to a computer here soooo... sorry to make you wait mom but it'll be another month hah.
That's okay, I'm just glad you're taking pictures! I hope you asked your roommate to take some with you in them.
It amazes me that foreign tourists are so rare there that people want to have their picture taken with them. Are there really so few?
yeah I'm always the only white person if I go somewhere with my roomate or my language partner.
and dont worry, i took a ton of pics with me under the big Mao Ze Dong portrait hah
Great!! :) Are you going to get to see the great wall?
Wait--your roommate isn't white? I assumed he was.
Nah my roomate is Chinese... he is in the 4th year class and speaks incredibly well.
Columbia planned different room assignments but then when everyone got here it was all just assigned in the order your came.
HOWEVER. I now have a new room, it's a suite style so I've got my own desk and bed and door to close. Phew, only took 5 and a half weeks to get ;)
Oh congratulations! I'm so glad. :)