Day 3 (Wednesday)….The Temple of Heaven
We had to change hostel today so we chose one that was close to Tiananmen Square, as we knew we definitely wanted to visit the square. But first, we headed back to the department store as we needed to by something and found out that today, it was raining. GREAT! Out came the macs.
We took a wrong turn on the way to the department store and turned right one street too soon. On realizing this I said to Laura, well, we should just turn right here and cut through this alley and we will come out at the road we need which is running parallel to the road we were on! Simple….ha!
Beijing is made up of really really large main road, which are 4 and 5 lanes wide on each side…then smaller main roads of two lanes and a cycle lane and then hutongs…Hutongs are alleys which run off the main roads and are full of shops and hotels….its where our first hostel was.
So off we went walking up the alley but it seemed to come to a dead end, so we followed it round and found the most strange place….i don’t mean to be disrespectful, but it was like a shanty town! The floor was all soil, no concrete, and the houses were tiny one and two room square blocks all lined up together…some had there front windows open and were selling food from their kitchen…and they didn’t smell too great either. I didn’t take a picture as I thought that would be rude.
Further walking brought us out on the road we needed right in front of the department store! We collected out purchases and headed home. We arrived at our hostel very wet and very muddy. Looking at the subway map we realized we had to change train twice to get to the knew hostel, which, with out big rucksacks and the rain and mud we decided against. So we grabbed a taxi, which was only 20 yuan (just over a pound…)
But, OMG! When we pulled up outside the hostel my heart sank. it seemed to be in the middle of a rabbit warren of hutongs and was covered in tarpaulin. I thought it was shut. We entered the reception and it was loverly. And warm. And there were other backpackers there. Laura and I just looked at each other and smiled and were sooooo relieved….
Our room here is shared but only with another couple (jan and Richard) and is four clean beds with showers and toilets just outside the room. All are clean and warm. There is also a tourist desk upstairs and the lady wrote the symbols for the temple of heaven on a piece of paper to show the bus driver…
(this is something we have discovered…entering china you need to have your directions in Chinese, as the taxi drivers cant read English. And everywhere else, the road name is always the road name, but here, its all in the symbols and they don’t recognize our alphabet, so we have had a few problems getting around, but we have it all sorted out now!)
When we got our room no one else was in it, so we changed and headed out. This time for the temple of heaven. We had to get a bus (the number 34) for 1 yuan each (which I cant calculate but its really not very much) and after three stops the driver shouted to us to get off. But the temple was no where to be seen. We were sure we would see it from the road as it is massive. Instead we were stood in from of a grey wall, which we followed around the corner to see the entrance gate to the temple. We paid our 30 yuan entrance and 10 yuan for a map and headed in. the temple was still no where to be seen.
After about 20 minutes walking through the gardens we found it….and it was breathtaking…..
When you walk up the steps of the temple and look out you can see that the trees are all planted in concentric circles around the temple…..(you cant walk on the grass….but the workers that did work there and were on the grass had little bags that they were picking up the fallen leaves by hand and putting them in the grass!)….you can just see the outline of the Beijing city in the distance, but you could imagine that when it was built there would have been trees all around, and mist, and it would have felt very divine and peaceful…..it was truly truly breathtaking, and my photos don’t do it justice. With the rain and mist they are a little dark, but its so hard to capture the majesty of the temple onto film.
The temple is in two halves. The circular temple of heaven and the square earth.
After a few hours we headed home, managed to find out bus stop and head home. We decided to go for peking duck for tea and found a cheap restaurant close to the hostel. We ordered our duck and beer and after the meal I was taking a photo of the beer (!) and the chaps on the next table started laughing at us (in a nice way) and we got talking to them and they were helping us with our Chinese. Everyone in the restaurant joined in and was looking at us and listening…one of the old chaps then indicated that he wanted to pay for the meal and opened his coat to reveal a pocket full of 100 yuan notes! We promptly shit ourselves and politely as possible declined. I think we offended him and they left shortly afterwards and he seemed a little grumpy!
We left the restaurant and headed home (which as it turned out, is very simple to find from the road and not at all as complicated as the taxi driver made is seem when she dropped us off!). we found a bar across the road from the hostel (which we discovered is part of the hostel) called the travelers inn!
This was when we first really felt that we were traveling. It is full of notes on the walls and tables form other people and there were other backpackers in there….we could hear English being spoken by someone else English!
Being here has really made me stop and think about what it must be like in the uk for people not from there, and why communities congregate together for familiarity and safety. Everywhere we go we are stared at (and a few people have asked us to have their photo taken with us!) it sometimes feels a little uncomfortable.
We got back to the hostel and promptly crashed out!
