2002-12-07 - 11:40 p.m.

The Summer Palace

Beijing, Nov. 15

Continuing the story of our trip to China

The final stop on today's tour was the Summer Palace, not to be confused with the OLD Summer Palace that was destroyed by the British and the French in the mid-1800s.

The Summer Palace is well to the north of central Beijing and it's a gorgeous estate where the emperors used to go to escape the roasting heat of the summer in the Forbidden City. The Lonely Planet guidebook says that you could easily spend a day there and while I'm sure this would be true if the weather was nicer, but it was blustery and cold with an occasional snowflake drifting down. It was very pretty, but I didn't feel terribly inclined to lounge about.

The Summer Palace compound is even bigger than the Temple of Heaven park, which is twice the size of the Forbidden City. The Chinese emperors certainly knew how to occupy a lot of real estate.

The thing that takes up the most space here is an artificial lake. Yes, that's right, the emperors actually imported a lake to make a pretty view for themselves. In fact, one emperor hired legions of architects and landscapers to recreate one of his favorite scenic views right there at the Summer Palace. Too bad he couldn't have just bought a postcard.

The funny thing about the lake is that in spite of its size it isn't more than a couple of meters deep. No reason to make the fake lake deep!

Hearing these stories of imperial extravagance (there's more and worse) just makes me roll my eyes. The Chinese empire was crumbling, the people were starving and in the second half of the 1800s the western powers were almost carving China up like a turkey. It sort of makes the communists seem justified in terms of the sort of excesses they have indulged in that have made China a world power again. Almost.

The person who is most often associated with the Summer Palace is the Dowager Empress Cixi (pronounced See-Shee) who sank the most money into the place. In fact she took a bunch of money that was earmarked for the modernization of the Chinese navy and used it to make her palace more splendid. Ironically, one of the most curious features is a riverboat made of marble (!!) that Cixi used to have parties on. Maybe that's what she thought they meant by "modernization."

Empress Cixi virtually ruled China for 40 years, dying in 1908. She was more than the power behind the throne - when the emperor tried to push for some reforms that China badly needed she had him put under house arrest, and then later poisoned him.

The Emperors were surrounded by legions of eunuchs, something that is hard for us modern guys to fathom. Apparently chopping off the "twins" was a way to ensure your child would get a government job. Some eunuchs became incredibly rich and powerful, mainly because they were robbing the government blind. Cixi's chief eunuch (whose name I can't remember) was so widely hated that after he died and was buried in a splendid tomb some cranky peasants diverted a sewer into it. Maybe I'm mangling the story, which sounds like it should be titled "Some Shit For a Shit!"

At the peak of imperial splendor there were 8,000-10,000 eunuchs and there was a complicated pecking order among them. For example, the very highest ranking eunuch would have meals where 120 different dishes were served, while the Buck Private eunuchs would just get stew out of a communal pot.

One history book that I was looking at indicated that perhaps Cixi didn't know how bad China's situation was, so her excesses could be excused. Of course the main reason for that was that everyone was so terrified of her that nobody wanted to give her any bad news. I'm imagining a typical governors report: "Everything is fine in my province! No famine or peasant riots or hordes of bandits or mass executions or anything like that! And DEFINITELY no British soldiers making us smoke opium!"

One of the most remarkable sights at the Summer Palace is the Long Corridor, a lovely promenade that stretches for a little less than half a mile along the shore of the artificial lake. There are all sorts of beautiful paintings on the beams and the ceiling, and most of my time strolling inside it was spent looking up. Whoops! Watch your step there!

If some of the painting on the ceilings looks rather modern, that's because it is. Parts of the Summer Palace were defaced during the Cultural Revolution and then restored later.

The Cultural Revolution, for those of you who don't know, was a period in the 'sixties when China went nuts. A power struggle within the communist party about China's future direction got turned into a big youth anti-love-in. It was suddenly decided that it wasn't cool to be smart or old, and gangs of self-appointed thugs (called "Mao's Red Army") went around smashing things that were, well, old and smart. It was pretty awful, and a lot of precious historical articles and sites got defaced or destroyed. Education went to hell, and some very, very awful books and movies were made. The Cultural Revolution makes the emperors look not so bad after all.

Well, I guess Chinese history is not a morality tale put together for my benefit.

Leaving the Summer Palace we had our most harrowing experience yet - just outside the gates we were rushed by a horde of VERY aggressive souvenir sellers. Literally, it felt like we were in the middle of a rugby scrum. This did not make me feel inclined to buy anything. The tourist season is over and now the sellers outnumber the tourists, and they don't know their own strength. I got to repeatedly practice one of the few Chinese phrases I know: "Bu yao!" - meaning "Don't want it!"

With that, we went back to the hotel.

Continued