Rewritten Version
It is 3 days since the National Day celebrations, although the holiday feeling continues until 8 October.
Foreigners had been advised to stay at home to 'avoid complications'. Residents living inside the 2nd ring road, where all the subway stations were closed and no buses could venture, were advised to stay indoors. Military snipers guarded the streets to avoid any possible attack from any vantage point. Hundreds of thousands of yellow-topped volunteers lined the streets. Police and tanks positioned themselves at strategic points in the city. It was all remarkably planned, coordinated and controlled in extreme detail. Many rehearsals had, of couse, taken place for the event.
When I watched CCTV's exhaustive covergae of the events in Tian'anmen Square and the extraordinary parade in Chang'an Avenue, I got the sense that every single person was in unison for this glorious day. The wall-to-wall coverage included brief histories of the struggle and effort to get the Motherland to this point (2009), a summary of all the achievements and successes, and as much flag-waving as is humanly possible. And when you have as many humans as China has, the strength in numbers is very telling... a superpower in the waiting? It's there... but I am sure a lot of it is gloss, hyperbole, even if it doesn't quite have the explicit propaganda of old 'new' China. It is a revisionist view of history, airbrushed to extremes. Never mind the casualties, here's 'the truth'. The weather was predictably glorious. I say, 'predictably' because the previous days' weather had been gloomy, grey skies, with drizzle. Coincidence? No! Apparently the skies get shot full of silver nitrate in the days leading up to important occasions such as this. This incredibly toxic substance is fired into the sky in a method known as 'cloud seeding' causing it to rain earlier than it would otherwise naturally... 'draining' the clouds of their moisture ahead of time. It made me think of Kate Bush's song/video, 'Cloudbusting' about Wilhelm Reich:
"It (Cloudbusting) describes psychologist Wilhelm Reich's arrest and imprisonment through the eyes of his young son, Peter. Reich's son later wrote his father's story in the book, 'A Book Of Dreams', published in 1973, on which the song is based. Wilhelm Reich is the inventor of the Cloudbuster. This is a rain machine that looks very much like the machine that is pictured on the cover of this single." (Wikipedia)
It was actually a fascinating day, which I spent travelling around Beijing by subway, from relatively empty station to station. I filmed from a distance and resigned myself to watching live coverage whenever there was a TV, which was frequent... from station platforms to portable media players, from big screens at intersections to tiny TVs in incense shops outside the Lama Temple. I watched the evening's firework-filled gala from the comfort of G Block, Jinyu, with the extended family.
The following day was spent at the Yuanming Yuan (Old Summer Palace), with Xiaodan. The glorious, post-cloudbusting weather continued. Jesuits were employed by Emperor Qianlong
"to fashion European-style palaces for the gardens, including elaborate fountains and baroque statuary. During the Second Opium War (1856-1860), British and French troops vandalised the palace and sent the booty abroad, an event forever inscribed in Chinese history books as a nadir in China's humiliation by foreign powers." (Harper D and Eimer D, Lonely Planet, Beijing, 2006)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Oldsummerpalaceruin.jpg
On Saturday, I visited Yonghegong (Palace of Peace and Harmony). The Lama Temple is a spectacular Tibetan/Mongolian temple, composed of seven courtyards along a single axis. It was an education, for me, in Buddhism and idolatry worship. Incense sticks were burned incessantly by all worshippers, at anything and everything. I was awestruck by the architecture and the especially the 18metre high Maitreya, in Wanfu Ge, carved from a single trunk of sandlewood tree. It also amused me that the trantric statues of Samvara, Vajra and Vajrasana guardians had to be heavily censored with yellow cloth, presumably by the outside authorities, because they were depicted in a sexual act of some kind. I felt little by taking part, waving my sticks around, except that I manage to focus my thoughts on what I wanted during my stay in China. There is an obvious clash between the secularisation promulgated by the government over the last 60 years and people's need for faith. Buddhism appears to be one of the more peaceful religions to tie yourself to, pacifist and non-political. It stands in stark contrast to Christianity which comes with a bloody history. I prefer Buddhism as a religion, although I generally baulk at that word; religion is, I always say, what religion does!
The day continued with the company of my extended family (girlfriend + her mother, aunt + nephew). I wandered past a Confucian Temple and College in Guozijian. I ate duck at the famous Quanjude chain near to Qianmen. We also visited both the entrance to the Forbidden Palace and jostled for position with the hoardes in Tian'anmen, ordinary Beijingers denied a ticket for the main event, clamouring for photo opportunities with Mao and the 60 or so 'flower carts' (floats) from the National Day parade.
It does appear that I have been adopted by my extended family and have been preparing for moving in with my girlfriend's aunt. On paper, it seems odd. My girlfriend will return home to Shenzhen soon, leaving me to live with aunt and to teach her 9 year old son 5 times a week. It is a very informal arrangement which will also include cooking occasionally. But it comes with lots of benefits for the winter months ahead. In my mind, I will commit myself for 3 months. It doesn't have to be forever. It will help me pay back my debts, while still enjoying my time here in the PRC.
To check out some photos of the holiday period check out:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/phil_longwell/
