Tian’anmen Square, right in the center of the city and the largest square in the world, is always packed with tourists, Chinese and Western alike, and of course vendors selling tacky souvenirs, postcards, kites, water, etc. Here I also got to witness the rapid change Beijing is under. When I came on Monday, the Square looked just like it had looked a year ago, once I came back on Tuesday, the whole area in front of the “Monument of the People’s Heroes” right in the middle of the square, was under construction. (EDIT: As I learned from the newspaper that night, those are the preparations for the anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China on October 1, which started on Tuesday. I didn’t realize that they started that early, but I should have figured, as the flower ornament decorations which are displayed on the square on October 1 probably do take a long time to make. Also, this year there are going to be flower statues of the Olympic mascots for the first time, each around 12 to 15 feet high. The decorations are supposed to be finished on September 27, so hopefully I’ll get to have a look at them before I leave.)
After walking across the square and around the Monument of the People’s Heroes, a tall obelisk-like building, I first went to the National Museum to the East of the Square as I still remembered from my last visit that right in front of the museum, the “Official Timekeeper” is counting down the days, hours, minutes, and seconds until the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Beijing Olympics and I wanted to get a picture. Everyone else had their picture taken there, too. As soon as I had taken my camera out, a group of Chinese came up to me and asked whether I would mind getting in the photo with them. We took a really historical picture, Chinese host and foreign guest shaking hands right in front of the countdown clock for the 2008 Olympics. Being asked to get in a photo is a phenomenon that probably everyone who has been to Tian’anmen Square or anywhere nearby has experienced. Especially on days when there are lots of tourists from the countryside, it is basically inevitable. Just smile and enjoy feeling like a celebrity.
Once they had left, a student came by and asked me whether I wanted him to show me around an art exhibition in the museum. Again, this is something very common. There are countless art exhibitions all over Beijing, and art students are always looking for potential buyers. They used to ask directly whether you wanted to see their art; as far as I can tell they’ve switched strategies now and involve you in a conversation first until it is very hard for you to turn them down politely. It can become annoying if you’re asked for the tenth time in a day, but there’s no harm in going once if you want to buy a Chinese painting or just for the experience. My self-declared tour guide showed me around, explaining the pictures half in English half in Chinese. Although it was clear that he wanted to sell, it was no problem to get back outside without having bought anything.
Afterwards, I decided to go inside the museum, and since I’d been told by various people on the Square that the only interesting exhibition at the moment was the waxworks, that’s where I went. There were two exhibition halls. In the first one, the 20th century leaders were standing right opposite the emperors of the past dynasties. In the second, there were wax figures of the ethnic minorities, and of famous Chinese of past and present from the fields of literature, sports, movies, etc. There was also a small selection of famous Western people, including Charlie Chaplin, Marilyn Monroe, Isaac Newton, Einstein, and Bill Gates. I really liked the waxworks, but captions were only available in Chinese, and it’s only half the fun guessing who is who when you have no way to find out whether you guessed right or not.
To the West is the Great Hall of the People, where the National People’s Congress meets, banquets are held, etc. You have to leave your purse or backpack outside, and since valuables cannot be stored, I went inside equipped with two wallets, a cell phone, passport, camera, and my plane tickets – just a bit too much to hold on to with just two hands while wanting to take photos. As expected, I found vast halls with red carpets, decorated with paintings and with chandeliers on the ceiling. Some of the rooms are named after the different provinces. Quite a few areas were off limits to tourists though when I went, and overall, there was nothing too spectacular, except for the fact that I had been were the official government of China meets, which was what I had come for to begin with.
To the South of the square is the “Chairman Mao Memorial Hall”, a name which is slightly misleading, as the building serves both as a memorial hall for the Chairman and other Party leaders of the first generation as well as as Mao’s tomb. Unfortunately, the hall was already closed by the time I got there. As this place is very high on my lists of things I want to see while in Beijing, I will definitely come back later and write more about it.
Finally, and most importantly, there is the Forbidden City, also known as the Palace Musuem behind the Gate of Heavenly Peace (Tian’anmen in Chinese, hence the name of the square), the large gate with Mao’s portrait to the North of the Square on the other side of Chang’an Boulevard. I will write more about the Forbidden City in a separate post.
So, did you get most of your advice (like about the waxworks) in English or in Chinese?
Both, actually. Some addressed me in Chinese, but quite a few people came and started talking to me in English first. Around Tiananmen Square there are always lots of people who want to practice their English. We usually switched to Chinese after a couple of sentences though. Some of the people would have been able to give the same advice in English. With some others, the conversation would have probably gone differently had we continued in English.