The entrance gate.
In this temple were some stone dragons.
The tradition is to throw some coins into the dragon's open mouth for some good luck, but apparently someone had a laugh and threw some CRACKERS in there.
This is an incense stove. You get a couple of incense sticks (usually 4), light the end, hold them between your fingers, and bow 3 times. It's like Chinese praying. Then you put the (slowly) burning incense stick into the ash in the incense stove. (Trust me, it sounds WAAY less complicated in Chinese :)
This is one of the SOLID GOLD Buddahs of the Dalai Lama Temple.
*HOLY MUSIC!!!* The great Dalai Lama Temple!! Isn't it huge??
Again, I was just amazed by how much meticulous DETAIL there is!! Click the picture to make it super-big and see the detail for yourself. :)
The inside of the temple is even fancier.
We climbed up ALLL those steps (and it was SO HOT OUTSIDE!! I thought I would melt on the way up.)
Massive.
The detail is fantastic!!
Our next stop was the Echo Wall... it was kinda far away, so we had to walk some ways to get there... but on the side of the path to the Echo Wall, there was this huge patch of grass... I just noticed that it was SOOOOOO well kept!!! How in the world can grass look this good??? (BTW I checked; it's real).
Some information about the Echo Wall: Why is it called the "Echo Wall?" The Echo Wall is the circular surrounding wall of the Imperial Vault of Heaven. The hard and smooth wall in a perfect circumference constitutes an excellent reflecting body for sound waves, which travel along the wall surface by continuous reflections. If two people stand on opposite ends of the Echo Wall and speak with their face facing north, they can hear each other's voice clearly. Isn't that cool?
THE ECHO WALL!! Do you notice that the wall is kind of bent? This is only a small fraction of the OUTSIDE of the wall... the inside is pretty plain.
Next to the Echo Wall is this important tree... the Nine-Dragon Juniper Tree. Here's some info from the sign next to it: This is a Chinese juniper of 500 and more years of age. Straight, robust and in a grotesque shape, the trunk is covered all over with spiral grooves that twist up vertically along as if nine coiling dragons were wreathing up into the sky, hence the name "Nine-Dragon Juniper".
This is the inside of the Imperial Vault of Heaven (sound familiar? I mentioned that it was inside the Echo Wall).
This structure is called The Circular Altar Mound. I think there is something special about this place...
The surface of the uppermost terrace of the Circular Mound is paved with nine concentric rings of stone slabs; the round stone slab in the center is called the Heavenly Center Stone. It is surrounded by 9 stones in the first ring, 18 in the second, all the way up to 81 in the 9th ring, symbolizing the nine heavens. The voice of a person standing on the Heavenly Center Stone sounds particularly resonant and sonorous.
This is me standing on the Heavenly Center Stone!! It was the coolest experience I had in China. I said "This is so cool!" in the middle, and it actually SOUNDED cool!!!!!!!!! My voice, as the sign says, sounded resonant and sonorous :).
We went to eat at the best tourist restaurant in Beijing (seriously, there was a plaque that said it was a five-star tourist restaurant)! Of course it was in the mall, and I got this picture on the escalator :).
There was this (literal Chinese translation) fire pot. You put the meat in that little basin around the black burner (of course that area (the area where the steam is coming out) is filled with water, so it's boiling the meat).
Some of that meat got stuck onto the burner, and GASP!! After about 5 seconds, the meat shriveled up and started looking a darn lot like Hawaii!!!!!! Doesn't it?!!
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