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Great Wall visitor
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Travel on Friday included a trip to Beijing Middle School No. 8. We arrived in time for morning exercises. Over one thousand students were lined up on the field and performed calisthenics with a student leader to the count of piped in music. We all smiled as we saw the faces of students so much like our own: the enthusiastic performers and the half-hearted ones. The students were so friendly to us as the passed us into the building and hung out the open windows waving and laughing at us. This school's commitment to environmental activities was notable. The school stresses relationship with the environment and students perform community service activities to clean the environment.
Next stop: Great Wall. During a 90 minute ride from Beijing, we were treated to narration by a delightful, "saucy" tour guide. According to Ms. Wen, the scarcity of women means that they apply the five "Cs" to the choice of a husband: Car, Condo, Cash, Cook, Cute. Some of the men in our group were wondering how many of the Cs they would fit!
The Great Wall is unspeakably magnificent. Standing on top of the mountain, I felt amazed to be realizing my long term dream. Walking the Wall is surprisingly strenuous; the stairs are steep and uneven. Workers were repairing and rebuilding the Wall using the most primitive tools. The wall was built between 400 and 200 BC. The Chinese have a feel for the long term.
According to Ms. Wen, you cannot buy a condo, you lease it for 70 years from the government: two generations of lease. After 70 years, you can re-lease or you may have to leave if the government wants to do something else with the land. Unfortunately, any construction is only guaranteed for 50 years. Unusual in a country where the Great Wall has lasted for centuries.
Because of a contact our tour directors had, we were able to visit a village at the base of the Great Wall. Julie Upton-Wang from MA has established a village to village partnership with Sherbourne Falls, MA. She and some partners have renovated an old schoolhouse into a glass blowing factory. We were also able to tour elegant dollar homes being built for international clients. Construction can only take place on existing buildings, so an American contractor is employing Chinese workers to renovate and custom build "weekend" homes. We surely brushed elbows with the wealthy yesterday.
We couldn't be eating any better. Every meal is a display of 20 dishes. Yesterday, lunch at the school included roasted duck.
Today we go to the Forbidden City and Temple of Heaven.
Latest Comments (2)
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Re: building new onto old? (reply)
Apr 21, 2008 10:40 EST by ruthwarren
They can't destroy the basic structure, so the inside is demolished but they can add on. So in the two houses we saw, they added to the original building and remodeled the interior of the old.
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In reply to:
This is so interesting . . . they build a new building right on top of the old?? Is it like a second story? Or do they go aroun... show all
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building new onto old? (reply)
Apr 18, 2008 22:10 EST by gmetteta
This is so interesting . . . they build a new building right on top of the old?? Is it like a second story? Or do they go around it like the new Notre Dame stadium? Or do they just renovate them thoroughly like some of those home renovation shows on TV? Gwynn
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