CHINA 1992_1

images-1

Early morning in Novosibirsk Tian'anmen Square. Queuing up to catch a glimpse of Mao. Entrance to the Forbidden City. The crowd is still watched by Mao. The Fairy Queen rides her troika through the lotus pond - for an ad. In Beihai Park. The middle part of a staircase in the Forbidden City.
Left side of a Staircase for the Emperor. Part of Emperor Qianlong's garden. From the White Pagoda one gets a good impression of the size of the Forbidden City. In front of the White Pagoda (1651/1741) Boating on Beihai lake. The cutest are not always the nicest. Chinese variant of the Frogger game. Level two: delivering lunch. Hundreds of busses take loads of tourists to Badaling.
So it's really crowded at the Great Wall. The animals in the background are not here for use as taxis. They're here because the famous Marco Polo -legend says- was here too, and you can pretend to be him riding such an exotic beast. Well..., tourists. To be outside the wall is more than bad luck. The Great Wall at Badaling. Dont ask about the connection between reindeer and Marco Polo... Only fragments of the Great Wall have been restored and are easily accessible. The rest is in an ill state of repair and walking on the wall from west to east is not a good idea. Exhausted. The Marble Boat in Summer Palace. It was rebuilt by Empress Dowager Cixi in the 1890s.
After feeding yourself you should always feed the lion. - Trashcans in China may be of quite strange shape. Detail of a huge bronce bell with sutra-texts and a praise to Buddha Amithaba inscribed. Lotus. Flowering lotus in the Old Summer Palace (Yuanmingyuan). The ruins of Rococo Palaces in the Old Summer Palace. It was destroyed by foreign troops during the Second Opium War (1869). Another hero rides by. The beauty and the beast. Sculptures at the 'spirit way' (shendao) to one of the Ming Tombs. One of the grinning beasts of the 'spirit way'.
A poor specimen: the Great Panda (daxiongmao), "living" in a concrete-only environment inside Beijing Zoo. View from the Beijing Drum Tower south to the Coal Hill. To the right the White Dagoba of Beihai Park is visible. Street corner next to the Beijing Drum Tower. Hutongs next to the Drum Tower, probably demolished by now. Old part of Datong City. Inside the old part of Datong city preparations are made to build a new sewerage. In the background are remnants of the old Datong City Wall. Above the Yungang caves are the remains of a Qing Dynasty fortress. Entrance to the Yungang caves complex near Datong.
Part of the Yungang caves. The Sitting Buddha Maitreya of cave #17 in Yungang Caves, near Datong. Northern Wei, ca. 460-494. Taihuai, the 'capital' of Mount Wutai. The place mainly consists of Temples and tourist dorms. One can see the big white pagoda of the Taiyuan temple to the left, built in the Ming dynasty. The Nine Dragon Screen in Datong, 8m high, 45m long, 2m thick, made of coloured glazed tiles (liuli). Ming Dynasty. Detail of the Datong Nine Dragon Screen. Statue of Mao in front of the Henan Provincial Museum, Zhengzhou. Posing in the forest of pagodas at Songshan, near the Shaolinsi. The Fengxian Cave is the biggest of the Longmen caves complex. The central seated Buddha Vairocana is 17 m high. Tang, 672-675.