No Call Number: The Great Wall at Mutianyu

Today we went to the Great Wall at Mutianyu. This section of the wall is about 70km outside of Beijing, so we had to sign up for a tour at the tour desk in our hotel. We piled into a bus with 8 other English speakers, only one of whom was American. We have noticed that Americans are in the minority of Western tourists here. There are far more Europeans. The other people on the bus were German and Austrian.

We drove out of the city and into a sprawling countryside filled with courtyard houses, wide roads, and empty space. We headed for some mountains, while our tour guide told us some interesting things about Beijing. There are 1,900 new cars in Beijing every day. To deal with the pollution and traffic congestion, both of which are substantial, people with license plates with certain numbers are not allowed to drive on designated days. Every day, 1/5 of the cars in Beijing are not allowed to drive. She also told us about family planning, which we call the one child policy. It's a little more complex than that, apparently. People in an ethnic minority (not Han Chinese) get to have as many children as they want. Two people who are only children can have 2 children.

We got to the wall, and headed down a gauntlet of shops with increasingly familiar hawkers. We took a cable car up to the top of the mountain, and below us I could see some old walls, I guess meant to keep the path from flooding. We discovered that the wall is basically a giant staircase. Some of the stairs were perilously high and small, but we slogged until we got to the end of the reconditioned wall. There were gatehouses at regular intervals that were pretty big: each had about six or seven rooms. This must have been where people lived. Our guide told us that there were farms all around the wall so the soldiers could feed themselves. There were vendors at regular intervals selling overpriced water, which we bought. Going down the mountain was delightful: we each took a toboggan down a loopy track. It was like a carnival ride.

On the way back we were pushed into a state supported “healing center” where we were offered free foot massage (no one took it) and a palm reading. We were all analyzed by a Chinese doctor and advised to buy expensive traditional medicine. One thing I will say is the guy felt my pulse, looked at my tongue, and pinched my ear, and he was dead on about me. I do have poor circulation and pains in my stomach. I went through a lot of testing a couple of years ago to discover that there's nothing really wrong with me, and the Chinese doctor apparently could have told me what caused it in 10 seconds. I did not buy the medicine.

When we got back, we were hungry, so we hit the Donghuamen Night Market. This is a row of food stalls that sets up in the late afternoon. It was similar to the food stalls in Korea, but with a much wider variety. We had fried banana balls, eel sticks, corn cakes, and some jello like substance. We went out for dinner a few hours later. We headed for a restaurant recommended by Nicole Mones, who wrote The Last Chinese Chef. We actually did not find the place. There was no English on the sign and the address was not readily evident. We went inside a restaurant with a nice English hawker, who helped us select the best meal we have had in China. It was incredible and less than $20. When we got outside, we found the restaurant we were supposed to go to, but it was a happy mistake.

We walked to the bell and drum tower, which are massive structures built by the emperor to tell the time. They were impressive, even at night. We wandered the hutongs for awhile. Hutongs are old streets designed by the Mongols. They are really thin and accessible only by bicycle and small car. These were lined with old structures and very picturesque. I wish I could have gotten a picture, but my camera doesn't do night shots.