Kicking it, Beijing-style

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[18 July 2012.  It's well past time for an update.  After several more trips and much time since my last post, I still have words - and importantly for this blog, more photographs! - from my last travels to Asia (& beyond..) to share.  So here goes.]

  Smog-hidden farming village in winter, en route back to Beijing.

Light smog among valley farmsteads, en route back to Beijing.

16 Feb 2011 sees our return to Beijing and everywhere I find signs of the impending thaw.  If nothing else, the temperature no longer hovers below freezing on a good night but the days retain their blistery wind chill despite the clear, brilliant sun.  Even so, Chris and I took full advantage of slowly improving weather to explore Beijing either alone, or at times with Tim, Natasja, Sasha, Craig, and other friends.

Not all that is gold glitters.  It shows when looking downtown.  Here, UBS, HSBC, AIG, RBC watch over prolific new construction of the New Beijing.

  Long hallway (top) near the Temple of Heaven after-hours, and encircling pedestrian lanes (bottom), when the locals play mahjong and stroll about - an unceasing vestige of the Old Beijing.

Tiantan, or Temple of Heaven, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  Original complex and site dates to ~1420 AD. 

Maybe I'll remove this one... Cats' eyes in the dark.

Gondola at ski spot outside Beijing.  Air pollution so dense you can barely see the top. 

Once forbidden for commoners even to glimpse under pain of death, the Imperial Throne now sits alone in the People's Republic. Forbidden City.

Veranda approaching throne room; expansive, but enclosed, view.  Forbidden City.

One of my favorite places in the world - Yonghe Lamasery.  Built in the early years of the Qing dynasty as a royal residence, it became national center for Lama administration; & it perists in this role.

While Chris & I did not get to visit the Great Wall on this trip (I had camped out overnight and hiked along a more remote section near Inner Mongolia 2009), we got to delve into contemporary Beijing with locals and friends.  Among regular forays into BJ's exuberant nightlife, jaunts through random districts and 'hoods with local friends, and exciting (but cheap!) street food adventures, we still had tons of time to check out standard hot spots for first-timers and off-track places.

Unusually placed lights along this alley in BJ made for a fun picture. Yup, more smog - visible on the same block!

En route to an Dashanzi art district (a la Factory 798), the walk gets (even) more interesting...

...to say nothing of what we see once inside the district.  Here: Concrete Mustang.

Bricks like dominoes. Wish I had seen it all go down..

Nice piece speaking to effects of carte-blanche experimentation of GMO worldwide.

Strike your warrior pose!

0_o

Buddha.   :)

Framing & context.  Yeah.

Speaks for itself....

..and so does this one.  Imagine rubbing elbows in this club.

By the same artists as above.  Brilliant - but what would say the State?

 

 Yet another piece from the same brothers.  Spent a good few hours conversing with these guys on a whole gamut of issues affecting Chinese societies.  Art as critique.

 

In summary - despite the modern facelift, the core of China survives.  And has great potential to thrive...

I look forward to my return to China - again.  More blog updates soon!!!

The photos laid out heretofore are taken with an Olympus Stylus 1050 SW 

 
These works by Tim Paez are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

City Center

26 May 2009 - You know those days when you're kind of not doing a whole lot, but still feeling good and contented, and you're hanging with good people? Today was one of those days - while Tim worked in the morning I explored a bit around the neighborhood (aka. seek street food!), and in the afternoon we invaded the dead-center of the city with roommate, Will.

Taking the one of the two underground metro lines - the Loops - we arrived at Qianmen Gate station, across the infamous Square and it's namesake gate, Tienanmen, and the Forbidden City which it has long guarded. In this part of the city, which for centuries was the heart of the Universe for imperial China (and is currently equivalent to the U.S. National Mall district in Washington D.C.), these gates were actually used as such - security gates, control points for flow of people and things into important places. Now they stand as island-relics of a long, pround, and immodest history. And lucky for me, epic landmarks for wary travelers!

Qianmen Gate; through it you see through to Tienanmen Square to the North.

It was here where, among the many nearby, we found an amazing museum about really just Beijing - the Beijing Planning Exhibition Hall. I was seriously in my element: running wild through this museumreading & watching exhibits (in English!); recalling snippets from some of my favorite classes, essays, and documentaries; foaming from my brain with ideas & knowledge about sustainable human development, better energy efficiency & production, public works, international municipal cooperation, natural resource conservation, and effective city planning, and equitable social stratification! [OK so I made that last one up, but its supposed to be a 'communist country' (marx & trotsky must've turned in their graves) so a guy can dream, eh?]
Aside from an awesome 3D movie flythrough of the cityscape, the giant the bas-relief map of the entire city (circa 1956) to scale entirely of BRASS, and the exhibits on public transportation and waste/water infrastructure (my current career field!) - aside from all that, AND a scale model of the Forbidden City, this place rocked my reference for cool museum shit with the 1:750 scale model of much of the city layed out in 1m^2 blocks on the floor in a whole wing of this place. I'm talking seriously awesome exhibit, a whole room where anyone looks like Godzilla romping through, and where ceiling blinds opened & closed to mimic day/night cycles, and the city & infrastructure light up to correspond! Cheesy maybe, but fuckin sick.

Lights on, ceiling blinds almost closed, 'sun' setting in background; the tallest building of the Forbidden City (center) is about 10 inches high. Planning Hall

Another exhibit: wastewater treatment! Pretty good job security in a city of 12million...

And like it's sister district the D.C. National Mall, the area around the very center of Beijiing area houses the more visible cogs of the national government (Legislature) and icons of civic significance (museums, monuments). The actual Square, sitting between Qianmen & Tiananmen Gates, is reputdely the largest public square on Earth - and it feels that way when you're in it. In a strange juxtapose of my developing ideology & sheer awe, I almost felt a desire to want to identify with China & its history, if only to be part of something so great, so enormous that one of the oldest and certainly the largest civilization - in short, I experienced a sense of nationalistic pride, for China. Of course, awareness of Chinese (and almost every culture's) brutal imperialistic history seeped back in pretty quick. I now have hope I may actually be breaking through that doctrinaire patriotism we're imbued with in America (it seems to be as strong in China, too...) and moving closer to really embracing a sense of internationalism!

Monument to the People's Hero's, Tienanment Square, Beijing, China.

One of two large statues flanking Mao's Masoleum, in tribute to the Workers. While only rather symbolic today, its working-class focus is a perspective we should take.

You gotta do it - Me, Mao, Tienanmen Gate, Forbidden City - encompass China. (StoCo Surf, represent.)

Finally, after taking pictures with Mao, a transmutation from trio to duo, and perambulating through the hallowed ground of imperial & national China's soul, Tim & I made our way to a nearby example of its emerging soul (one closer to that of the West): the Market, at Wanfujing. A tourist trap any city treasurer & commerce chamber would envy, this single side-street featured a way over-priced but multifarious selection of food, trinkets, & other traveler 'essentials' (items WAY cheaper if not free with good planning & forethought for a trip on a budget). But also wacky, funky things - like grilled scorpions, insects, & shahorses on sticks, local candy & drinks , 'unique' 'antiques', books, & more - all in one alley. Then after exploring a few districts by foot, we finally ambled our way toward the Uni district, home, and a great evening with a few good people, if I recall, at hotpot!

A few stalls in, and Tim can't contain his self.

Wanfujing Market/Street. Probably the highest concentration of Westerners in Beijing here.